Tactics of Terrorists



Table of Contents

Bioterrorist attack involving botulism3

Differing outbreak characteristics4

Federal/ local government's response to bioterrorist attack5

Tactics and capability of the terrorist group5

Implications of the information learnt6

References8

Tactics of Terrorists

Bioterrorist attack involving botulism

Suddenly a number of emergencies were reported in the emergency department of Memorial Hermann Southeast Hospital. These emergencies were nine in number including two children and a lady. All these people had eaten at a local restaurant. This restaurant serves food around the clock and is one of the places of choice when it comes to eating out. They had all eaten at the restaurant at a particular time and were found to live nearby. They ate at the restaurant at different times and were all found to be sickened by a life threatening illness that could take the life of the person consuming it in any form.

The hospital report suggested that the ingestion of the Clostridium botulinum bacterium had caused this and it was present in the hamburger and other food that the nine people had eaten at the restaurant. This presented a serious flaw in the manufacturing process of the restaurant. A fact that said indicated that the event could be intentional was that all the people had eaten different food but they were still a victim (Sobel, 2005). Another reason why the indication could have been assisted was that the guard responsible for the security at the manufacturing process plan had escaped. His absence at this critical moment could only have two possible explanations. Either he got afraid that he had failed to perform his duty with utmost care and could be held liable. Or it could be that he himself was involved in the event and had something to do with the botulism case.

Another factor which adds to the suspicion that this was not an incident is that one of the manufacturing plant employees has also been missing. he expressed his desire to get a few day's leave on the pretext that he had been thinking of seeing his sister who is not well and lives in New York. His absence became a problem when he was not found at the address he communicated to his employer, the manager of the restaurant. hence, he had mis-communicated with the employer and he might have a very good reason for doing so.

all these findings were the result of the government's intervention and the investigations of the FBI. the FBI found this to be the attack from a lone suicidal bioterrorist who was supportive of the terrorists organizations such as Al-Qaeda and others.

Differing outbreak characteristics

In the above incident, there are certain observations that suggested that the event noted above is a planned event and not just an incident. If these reasons were not there than it could have been that the above event was an accident as there have been food poisoning incidents which are related to Clostridium botulinum toxin (Otufuji, 2007). To begin with, the first thing that would have been different is the ...