OPENING
STATEMENT OF
REP. JAMES SAXTON
SPECIAL
OVERSIGHT PANEL ON TERRORISM OPEN
HEARING ON BIOLOGICAL, NUCLEAR, AND CYBER TERRORISM
This
afternoon, the Special Oversight Panel on Terrorism
convenes in open session to hold its first hearing.
This is, I think, an auspicious day. I personally have
been studying and working actively on these issues for
over ten years. And many of us, from both parties, have
for years been watching terrorism evolve into an ever
greater threat. We have been increasingly concerned
that the growing threat is not understood, or its implications
fully appreciated. For that reason, I and my colleagues
have sought the establishment of this Special Oversight
Panel on Terrorism.
Through
this panel, we hope to cast a spotlight on terrorism
and related emerging threats. One of our chief goals
is to illuminate the rapid emergence of what amounts
to a new terrorism, different in kind and potentially
vastly more destructive than the terrorism that we knew
during the Cold War. This Panel will dissect the evolving
phenomenon that is terrorism. Our objective is to understand
how terrorism is changing, and where the terrorist threat
is going, so that policymakers and the public will be
better positioned to make informed decisions on what
to do about that threat.
Therefore,
in keeping with the purpose of this Panel to explore
disturbing new aspects of terrorism, it is appropriate
that our first hearing deal with cutting edge terrorist
threats: biological terrorism, nuclear terrorism, and
cyber terrorism.
Biological
weapons are becoming easier for state and non-state
actors to develop as bio-technologies proliferate. Indeed,
many of the same technologies that are used for benign
medical research or for innocuous commercial purposes-such
as the fermentation of beer-can be used for manufacturing
biological weapons. Biological weapons are relatively
inexpensive and easy to make, and yet are potentially
deadlier than nuclear weapons. Future terrorists wishing
to wreak mass casualties may well turn to biological
weapons.
Nuclear
terrorism, regarded as the stuff of fictional novels
and movies during the Cold War, is now widely regarded
as plausible. Lax security at Russian nuclear weapon
storage sites and at laboratories and power plants where
nuclear materials are available raises the possibility
of theft or sale of nuclear weapons to terrorist groups.
Terrorists armed with short-range missiles-which these
days can be purchased even by arms collectors and museums
on the international market-and armed with a nuclear
weapon could conceivably make an electromagnetic pulse
attack against the United States. An EMP attack could
incapacitate power grids, communications, computer systems
and other electronic infrastructure that makes modern
society possible.
Terrorists
could also build or acquire radio-frequency weapons
and use these non-nuclear devices to selectively damage
crucial parts of the U.S. electronic infrastructure.
For example, a radio-frequency weapon detonated on Wall
Street could erase electronic business records and cause
billions of dollars worth of damage to the U.S. economy.
Or, a relatively small radio-frequency weapon- built
from readily available technology could be used by a
terrorist parked at the end of an airport runway to
debilitate airplanes during take-off or landing.
Cyberterrorism
could use information warfare techniques to manipulate
computer systems to disrupt or incapacitate power grids
and other infrastructure, without resort to nuclear
or radio-frequency weapons. The ILOVEYOU virus is a
recent example of cybervandalism-that disrupted governments
and industry worldwide-and may foreshadow far more serious
destruction that could be inflicted by cyberterrorists.
We have
with us today a panel of independent experts to address
these various threats:
Ken
Alibek is Chief Scientist at Hadron, Inc., and was
the Deputy Chief of Biopreparat, a leading biological
weapons laboratory in the former Soviet Union.
Bron
Cikotas is a nuclear weapons expert, was formerly
EMP Division Chief with the Defense Nuclear Agency,
is one of this nation's foremost experts on electromagnetic
pulse phenomenon, and invented the Ground Wave Emergency
Network to protect U.S. strategic communications
from nuclear attack;
Dorothy
Denning is a professor of computer science at Georgetown
University and an authority on cyberterrorism and
cybersecurity.
I thank
our panel of distinguished witnesses for joining us
today. But before proceeding to hear their testimony,
I want to call upon Mr. Snyder, the Ranking Democrat
on the Terrorism Panel, for any statement he may wish
to make.
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