Security in the United States and terrorist groups
The most common mode of attack that terrorists pose on the U.S is by air. There are several factors that are exploited by the terrorists associated with aero attack that favor them. These aspects are not weaknesses on the victims’ side but the exploitation is done due to humanity of the victims (U.S department of justice, 2004).
The first reason that makes terrorist groups to exploit air attack is the speed associated with the aircrafts. Aircrafts are very fast thus speed of accessing the target is high enough to enable reaching the target before detection of any security breach (U.S department of justice, 2004).
The second reason support use of air by terrorist groups in attacks is number of targets that they can reach per unit time. This means that the terrorists can use a single plane to carry out several attacks within a very short time span compared to use of land or water (U.S department of justice 2004).
The other reason is the wide view from above enabling them to carry out attacks to a specific target without necessarily touching other areas. This would mean great precision in targeting. From the same perspective, it also appears that terrorists know that air attack has greatest impact compared to land and water attack. This is mainly because the aircrafts themselves act as explosives thus if a bomb explodes in them, they tend to increase the explosion causing more damage than the bomb itself would cause (usgovinfo.about.com/library/blhomeland).
Lastly on their use of aircrafts is lack of escape means when you are in a high jacked aircraft. This means that under whatever circumstances, the terrorists will have some victims and will not die alone.
Looking at the susceptibility of the western countries including the U.S to attack using biological, chemical or radiological means, the western world is under this threat. This is mainly because the western depends on importation of some chemicals, radioactive elements and food from either the eastern world or Africa. By importation, the countries may suffer an attack accidentally or intentionally set by the country of origin (usgovinfo.about.com/library/blhomeland).
In conclusion, the United States and other western world countries are prone to attack by other countries since they depend on other countries on importation of products that may be used as attack on the importers (U.S department of justice, 2004).
U.S department of justice. 2004. Terrorism in the United States 1999: 30 years of terrorism. U.S government Press
http://usgovinfo.about.com/library/blhomeland.htm
