December 31, 2009
From
Family Security Matters
Exclusive: Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab Meets Inspector Jacques
Clouseau
Robert Weissberg
Much has been written about the failed attempt of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to
blow up Northwest flight 253 on Christmas day. Unfortunately, just as we now
must remove our shoes at airport screening thanks to Richard Reid’s botched
attempt to light one of his shoes, new security measures have a decidedly
rearview mirror quality, e.g., passengers are to remain seated during the last
hour prior to landing since Mr. Abdulmutallab stood up to ignite his underwear.
One can only suspect that if Abdulmutallab had worn a baseball cap and sang
Dixie, these, too, would now be banned.
Let’s be pessimistically blunt: it is impossible to anticipate every possible
terrorist response to each new security measure. Technology may be wonderful for
detecting miniscule amounts of today’s available explosives, but who can predict
next year’s formula, and upgrading the equipment while deploying thousands of
freshly-trained bomb-sniffing dogs requires years. And even these responses
depend on a nimble, quick-thinking Transportation Security Administration and
all the other Washington bureaucracies. What we get instead are symbolic
gestures that will only annoy innocent travelers.
The one analysis that nailed this problem was offered in the December 29, 2009
Los Angeles Times. It is worth quoting at length:
This sorry sequence of events recalls nothing so much as the failure of
intelligence officials to correlate available data about the plotters of the
9/11 attacks. In both cases the problem wasn't a lack of information but an
inability to sift through copious data (italics added). What is required, at
every stage of the process, is alertness to particularly suggestive details --
and, lest abuses occur, periodic reevaluation of names added in the past….Some
experts suggest that this incident demonstrates the need for vastly expanded use
of high-technology screening devices. Before Congress accepts that counsel,
however, it needs to focus on something that seemingly eluded officials in this
case: the human factor (italics added).
In other words, better intelligence is necessary and this does not mean yet more
funding of the CIA, NSA, FBI and the like. As President Obama himself later
proclaimed, “"Bits of information available within the intelligence community
... could have and should have been pieced together." Intelligence here means
smarter people and this is an uphill battle in today’s politically correct
world that so prizes diversity while insisting that nobody is any smarter than
anybody else. I’ll spare the polite euphemisms: smart people, as measured by IQ,
are far more likely to catch would-be terrorists than average Joes and Janes who
have spent six weeks laboring to “master” a 300 page “How to Catch Terrorists”
manual.
And now for the really dreary news: the US government has waged a systematic war
on intellectual talent under the guise of diversity. This began in the late
1960s when tests producing the “wrong” demographic results had to be re-designed
to eliminate “barriers” to historically under-represented groups. The old
Foreign Service exam favored Ivy Leaguers with its stress on language and
culture were repeatedly refurbished, some might say “dumbed down” to expand the
job pool. Jimmy Carter killed the civil service SCORE exam that identified the
very top suitable for policy-making (it was “unfair”). Rep. Charles Rangel has
recently instigated a program permitting blacks to serve in the Foreign Service
for five years without having to take the exam. I once personally asked the
second highest CIA official about recruiting brains and he frankly admitted that
his goal was a CIA resembling America, an achievable goal since the talented
were everywhere. Given a choice of hiring the smartest of the smart to protect
America versus avoiding alleged discrimination litigation, government is
inclined toward the latter though public officials will always insist that every
hire is “highly qualified.”
Begin by first considering “intelligence” as it is measured by standard IQ tests
and, to a lesser extent, tests like the SAT verbal test. While reputable
psychologists quibble over details, the gist of the term refers to an
individual’s capacity to discern and organize information so as to draw correct
inferences about what is perceived—in a phrase, brain power akin to computer
processing power. Intelligence is particularly useful in unstructured
situations—making sense out of millions of separate, seemingly unrelated facts.
It is not specific knowledge though smart people usually know lots of facts. Nor
is intelligence a synonym for common sense or to be confused with talents such
as piano playing or painting. Moreover, information processing capacity is a
general ability—regardless of the situation, a baseball game or the opera,
intelligent people perceive more, connect the dots faster and draw better, more
plentiful inferences from what is observed. Finally, save in extreme situations
involving early sensory deprivation or physical damage, intelligence cannot be
taught.
These put-the-pieces-together abilities are familiar to anyone admiring brainy
detectives (e.g., Sherlock Holmes, Lt. Columbo). They correctly interpreted
minor details, noticed incongruous innocuous behavior, heard a dog that did not
bark, put two and two together where others saw nothing. Brains, not brawn or
the police manuals, solved puzzling crimes. Hercule Poirot once observed that a
hotel guest claiming to be English was lying since he registered with the
American abbreviated dating system (m/d/yr) instead of the European d/m/y. To
speculate a bit, a smart consulate official might have noticed that Umar Farouk
Abdulmutallab was a little vague about his Detroit lodgings, could not supply
its address or failed to pack warm clothing necessary to survive Michigan
winters. And why was he visiting Detroit? That he only had a backpack and paid
$2800 in cash made no sense given his affluence (he surely must have had a
credit card). A Hercule Poirot on Flight 253 might also have noticed excessive
nervousness, frequent touching of his crotch (just like international passengers
compulsively check their passports) and other give-away details.
When you combine dim-witted obliviousness to the usual PC inhibitions—a black
male from an impoverished nation—it is no wonder that he slipped through.
Conceivably, those manning the checkpoints were terrified of the most heinous
modern crime—using stereotypes—and thus were happy to overlook the obvious
incongruity of his luggage and vague travel aims. Think of this way—for eons
humans have honed their suspicious nature to stay alive; PC teaches us to ignore
this hard-earned learning and is thus anti-evolutionary, a recipe for death.
I first appreciated the value of cognitive ability to combat terrorism when I
flew on El Al to Israel. El Al hires smart kids to screen passengers, not
dutiful workers who learned their trade from Stopping Terrorists for Dummies
manuals. They obsess over “little” tell-tale things. I was asked “Are you
Jewish,” and when I said, “yes,” the security agent immediately shot back,
“where were you Bar Mitzvahed?” My reaction was instant: Temple Emmanuel in
Paterson, NJ. Since no Jewish boy ever, ever forgets this fact, my reflexive
answer sufficed. I can only imagine if I had said, “In the Middle West,” a
geographic term that no American would ever use, and security would have taken
me away. (Compare this unexpected question to the predicable one about packing
one’s own bags.)
This episode stands in sharp contrast to when my son, then about thirteen, once
tried to board a US Airways flight in St. Louis. He was carrying his pill
container, a hallowed out .50 caliber machine gun screw top “bullet” with a key
chain. He of course opened it up for inspection and it was clearly hollow.
Nevertheless, the security agent announced that since it was a “bullet” (albeit
with keychain shrapnel) it would have to be shipped separately. Were we going to
threaten the Captain with this pill container? My feeble efforts to point out
the obvious, let alone the absence of the necessary .50 caliber machine gun to
launch the pill container, fell on deaf ears.
America faces a serious dilemma. It is imperative to get as many smart people
into the security apparatus and the smarter the better, but this will surely
bring a preponderance of white males since they (and Asians) get the best scores
on IQ-related tests. Unfortunately, this outcome is unacceptable in today’s
political climate. Just imagine Senator Barbara Boxer, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, et
al, watching this transformation. They will immediately insist that we need
diverse airport screeners to detect bomb-laden Saudis or Somalis. More likely,
to escape this dilemma the government will hire yet more intellectual mediocre
security personnel and spend billions more on high-tech. Perhaps the only thing
saving America, at least so far, is that the Umar Farouk Abdulmutallabs of the
world often meet their match in that great French detective, Inspector Jacques
Clouseau (of Pink Panther fame) and his trusty band of multi-cultural,
wonderfully diverse Keystone Cops.
FamilySecurityMatters.org
Contributing Editor Robert Weissberg is emeritus professor of political science,
University of Illinois-Urbana and currently an adjunct instructor at New York
University Department of Politics (graduate). He has written many books, the
most recent include The Limits of Civic Activism, Pernicious Tolerance: How
teaching to "accept differences" undermines civil society and the forthcoming,
Bad Students, Not Bad Schools: How both the Right and the Left have American
education wrong (early 2010). Besides writing for professional journals, he has
also written for magazines like the Weekly Standard and currently contributes to
various blogs.
You can find this online at:
http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/id.5154/pub_detail.asp
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Professor Weissberg's article struck home for me for several reasons, some of which I share with all other readers and a few of which are my own. When I have to fly somewhere, I like to have some degree of certainty that I'll reach my destination alive. However, as an innocent passenger, I am deeply offended by the lines and rules and evermore intrusive searches of us innocent passengers, when we all know who the jihadis are.
The professor's remarks about "intelligent" intelligence people validate my own views. I am retired from 26 years as a U.S. Air Force intelligence officer, and I am also a former member of Mensa. Mensa admission requires an IQ measured in the top 2% of the population. I quit because the prestige wasn't worth the dues. Professor Weissberg is right; correctly analyzing and interpreting "information" and fusing it into "intelligence" requires mental quickness, cleverness, analysis, memory, connecting the dots, reading between the lines, seeing what isn't there, becoming one with the data. I'm not saying that you have to be a Mensa member to be a good intelligence officer, but I am saying that you can not make an intelligence officer out of an affirmative action candidate.
The No Bullshit Sign? That's what this website is all about. I have a low tolerance for BS, our government produces prodigious piles of it. I'm an old retired fart who had no really favorite hobby until the obuma administration came to town. Now I have a purpose in life, to ridicule, insult, mock, abuse and threaten the federal government in the company of "We The People" as we defend ourselves from the government.
EnemyoftheState