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American Morning

Latest Threat Forces New Airport Security Revisions

Aired December 26, 2001 - 08:08   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: The discovery of explosives in the shoes of an airline passenger over the weekend has forced yet another revision of airport security thinking.

To talk more about that, CNN's security analyst, Kelly McCann, rejoins us from Washington. He's a former Marine Corp major, a former Special Operations commander and is now CEO and president of Crucible Security in Fredericksburg, Virginia -- Kelly, good to have you with us again.

J. KELLY MCCANN, CEO AND PRESIDENT, CRUCIBLE SECURITY: Thanks, Miles.

O'BRIEN: It seems like every time a loophole is closed, these terrorists find another one. Is that just the way it's going to be?

MCCANN: Sure. I mean, the tactical reality of all of this stuff, Miles, is to seek a vulnerability, and to exploit that vulnerability, which these fellows have done over and over again. The same thing that we would try to do obviously in what we're doing. So I think it's a pattern, it's established, and we're going to see it again and again.

O'BRIEN: So, what is to be done given all of that? That can be -- make it kind of challenging for a lot of folks to get on the plane with some degree of confidence this time of year.

MCCANN: Sure. Rethinking it -- you said it in your intro -- rethinking it is the most important thing. For instance, say if you go to fly on an airline right now, you know, you may be asked five times for your license -- driver's license as a form of I.D. instead of twice. It's kind of redundant stupidity if you think about it. I showed you my license once and twice already. Why do you need to see it three more times?

The better approach would be to ask those kinds of provocative questions that can be asked to evoke a visible response from you that would then vector you to another line for a little bit more probing questions and then ultimately taken out of line and then checked in a different way. So, I mean, that kind of thing at El-Al in Israel has been doing for many years is kind of where we need to go.

O'BRIEN: You know, I must say -- I must confess standing in those lines and producing my driver's license three and four times and doing all of that, I really get the sense that what is happening is an awful lot of window dressing. It's there to make people feel as if things are happening, but simply producing that license three times is not going to necessarily thwart a terrorist.

MCCANN: You are absolutely right. The only problem is that some of the security of cosmetic, and it's meant to put on a demonstration of, perhaps, unpredictability to bad guys, where they can't get a pattern down. They can't establish sometimes there may be canine support there, sometimes not. Sometimes you may be asked for your license at the gate, sometimes not. So that's part of it.

More far reaching things, though, have to be done. For instance, magnetometers alone, there are several things you can do to exploit a magnetometer's vulnerability, and those things are well known in the industry -- not appropriate, obviously, for discussion here. But the technological advances that we have to implement, you know, run into a lot of money. We're going to have to go there as well, so behavioral and technical advances.

O'BRIEN: All right. But looking back on this particular incident, this suspect, who tried to get on that same flight on Friday, and was in fact turned away when people became suspicious, was able to get back on that plane in spite of the fact he didn't check a bag. He had a brand new passport...

MCCANN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

O'BRIEN: ... seemed evasive. I see numerous red flags here. And I just -- I'm a little bit confounded as to why he was allowed on the plane.

MCCANN: As I am. The report -- "The Washington Post" reported that, in fact, the company responsible for the screening in Paris had said this guy failed the profile. I mean, so the obvious question by us is: Then, why did he get on the plane? And I don't know what that runs to, whether it's the French support of us saying, look, we need to be very, very cautious -- very, very careful, or whether it's an inconsistency in the security that was applied that day.

But I agree with you. I mean, until we get our arms around this thing, it's a little bit unsettling.

O'BRIEN: Is there any other technological solutions out there? You know, we've been talking mostly in this segment about some of the human intelligence, if you will, you know, security people asking probing questions, profiling and that kind of thing.

MCCANN: Right.

O'BRIEN: Is there a silver bullet out there that would provide a technological solution that would, for instance, just to limit a plastic explosives getting through that sanitized area where the gates are?

MCCANN: There are, but you know, Miles, it's probably better called a platinum bullet, because they are very, very expensive. And there are sniffing devices. There are all kinds of spectrography, spectroanalysis kinds of machines, things like that that are available, but the money has got to be funded. If you think about September 11, this would be a totally unbudgeted event, I mean, several billions and billions of dollars to upgrade all of our airports.

So until we get the kind of support here in the U.S., and we still don't have it in the Congress, there are people who are pushing back and saying that's enough, we can't introduce a lot of that technology. So the answer exists, it's just how serious are we, and can we pay for it.

O'BRIEN: If you were running the show there, what would be the first thing you'd do to improve airport security right now in this country?

MCCANN: I would get interactive with the National Guard and take their weapons away. No. 1, they don't have the skills necessary to discern, discriminate and engage under pressure in a crowded circumstance. That doesn't help. What they can do is they can actually walk up freely to all of the passengers, while they're in the airport terminals, ask them questions, "geez, where are you going? Geez, can I look in your bag?" They don't have to be challenging about it, but that kind of unpredictable presence meant to put you off guard is significant -- more significant than people give credit to.

But they have to be trained, and obviously they have to be a little bit less -- right now, they don't want to interact with people. They'd have to want to interact with people.

O'BRIEN: That's good advice. Kelly McCann, our security analyst who is with Crucible Security in Fredericksburg, Virginia -- thanks very much for your insights and that little piece of advice. Let's see if that one comes to be. Let's hope it does.

MCCANN: Thanks, Miles.

O'BRIEN: All right -- take care.

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