DPM & Coordinating Minister for National Security, Mr Wong Kan Seng @ 8th National Security Seminar

Synopsis

…we should also start to think of preparedness as something more likely to be articulated and operationalised through engagement and development of a an activist cadre in each domain rather than try to attain a homogenous or uniform level of preparedness across our society en-masse." said DPM Wong at the National Security Seminar.

OPENING ADDRESS BY DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER AND COORDINATING MINISTER FOR NATIONAL SECURITY, MR WONG KAN SENG AT THE 8th NATIONAL SECURITY SEMINAR 2010 ON TUESDAY 9 NOV 2010 AT 9 AM AT CIVIL SERVICE COLLEGE AUDITORIUM

Distinguished Guests

Ladies and Gentlemen

Introduction

Welcome to the 8th National Security Seminar. I would like to especially welcome our 2 foreign speakers who have flown in to join us this morning - Prof Rommel Banlaoi from the Philippine Institute for Peace, Violence and Terrorism Research and Dr Sidney Jones from the International Crisis Group based in Indonesia.

Over the last 8 years, this annual seminar has provided a valuable opportunity for us to come together as a community of security practitioners, analysts and researchers so that we may learn from one another. If there is anything that we must take away from the lessons of all past terrorist incidents and near misses, it is the critical value of global cooperation and information sharing. This goes beyond the professional relationship of just national security and intelligence agencies. It must include the free exchange of views, ideas, experiences and best practices with a larger community comprising scholars, leaders in business, industry and the general community. No one has a monopoly of wisdom in this important issue.

The Challenge of a Dynamic and Evolving Threat

In the news of late has been the alarming reports of two parcels with improvised explosive devices (IEDs) sent from Yemen via commercial air cargo to addressees in the United States. Analysts believe these were sent by the Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) in Yemen – an entity that has shown a determination in recent times to target civil aviation and commit terror. Fortunately these parcels were detected before they could be detonated. Intelligence and the timely sharing of such intelligence across countries played an important role in uncovering this plot.

Each time an incident like this occur, the authorities hunker down, analyse the latest form of the threat and see how existing preventive and detection measures can or need to be beefed up to address it. I am sure civil aviation security experts around the world, including Singapore, are doing this even now as we speak. The purposive development of protective security technology and best practices must continue so that we can better meet such creative threats by al Qaeda and its proxies.

However, one thing we should be careful about is the danger of being narrowly focussed or overly preoccupied with the last sensational topical incident. Today, it is parcel bombs on aircraft. Last Christmas, it was bombs concealed in the perpetrator’s underwear. Further back, it was Mumbai-style attacks.

Indeed we cannot and should not ignore or minimise these innovative threats as they arise. A jihadist terrorist mind with good understanding of how systems and sensitive security materials work can create many situations and methods of causing catastrophic incidents. Underestimating the enemy is sheer folly. But perhaps we should also try to frame these innovative threats against the body of our knowledge of similar past incidents. The fact is while these threats demonstrate creativity and an adaptive quality, they are seldom completely brand new. Often they are revisions of past efforts in the same vein.

One can argue that the Mumbai-style attacks are not new methods but are old methods adjusted and given currency in the so-called fedayeen attacks of the Laskhar e-Toiba in Kashmir. Likewise parcel bombs are not new to us. Indeed concealing IEDs as cargo or baggage on aircraft is something that was popular in the 1980s by Palestinian terror groups.

Terrorism researchers and scholars in academia can offer a valuable perspective in this connection. They can show a historical context which in turn may give useful insights into the evolutionary direction that the next threat of the same theme may develop.

The various specialist domain communities are the other major partners that we must constantly cultivate and engage. This can be private developers for building security, or industry and business players. It is actually in their interests also to engage the Government and the security authorities so that the development of solutions and measures are balanced and practicable in their various sectors.

Domain community vigilance is an invaluable resource. In the recent air cargo parcel case from Yemen, one question raised is why the fact that electronic printers were being sent from Yemen to the United States, when the trade is usually the other way around, did not raise a red flag for those processing such cargo. It shows that apart from technology, the human factors is equally if not more important. There is great scope in developing the key stakeholders cognitive screening abilities. This is an area which all stakeholders should develop and share experience.

Community & Public Vigilance a Critical Resource

The Singapore Government has over many years, made a conscious effort to cultivate and engage the various domain communities and stakeholder groups so as to raise security awareness and vigilance against terrorism. And through such a dialogue, we also obtain feedback and gain access to practical ideas and solutions. We were fortunate that this collaborative relationship is not something new in Singapore since we have been doing the same in our battle against drugs and crime for many years before the threat of terrorism took centre-stage.

The government can reduce the threat of terrorism, but it cannot eliminate it. One good reason that would keep Singapore safe is that we have a unified effort across all levels of government, and also very importantly, the vigilance of our community to highlight suspicious activities. Still, we must not take this for granted and be complacent about it.

A week ago – on 2 Nov - the Singapore Police conducted an exercise to gauge public vigilance against suspicious activities, The exercise was modelled after the New York Times Square incident in May this year. In this exercise, the Police parked a vehicle in 9 locations around the city, such as Orchard Road, Boat Quay, Shenton Way, Harbourfront and Marina Bay some time between 8 am to 7 pm. The tell-tale indicators on the suspicious vehicle comprised two separate tiers. The 1st-tier indicator was displayed at the start of the exercise to see if the public would respond. The 2nd-tier indicator was a set of more obvious indicators which would be used if the 1st-tier indicator failed to attract attention. The vehicles were rigged to exhibit certain tell-tale signs that it could be set up as a bomb, for example, an overly laden vehicle with wires sticking out from the under-carriage at the 1st-tier of the exercise, and with smoke coming out from the boot at the 2nd-tier of the exercise. The public’s reaction was then observed from a short distance away.

During the hours when the vehicles were staged, about 7,200 members of the public walked pass within 10 metres of the vehicles. However, only a total of 260 members of the public noticed the suspicious vehicle. This represented about 3.6% of the total number of people who passed by and noticed the vehicle. Of these 260 persons who took notice of the suspicious vehicle, only 52 acted immediately and called the Police or SCDF hotline or informed building management security officers in the vicinity. Another 97 persons said they intended to do so after they have moved away from the vehicle. A total of 44 persons said they noticed the suspicious vehicle and sensed something amiss, but admitted that they did not intend to report it.

The results of the Exercise suggest that on the whole, our public is generally complacent about the possibility of a terrorist incident occurring in Singapore. However, the fact that there were those who were alert and noticed the suspicious vehicle quickly and acted on it by informing the Police or SCDF, gives us cause for some satisfaction.

One of the things that we have observed, not just in Singapore where we have not had a terrorist incident, but also in societies which have been traumatised by such incidents, is that over time, people become less vigilant. This is perhaps inevitable and natural because a community needs to get on with life and not live perpetually in the clutches of fear that a traumatic terror incident provokes.

Those who engage the public in security outreach may need to find a way to accommodate this phenomenon and yet achieve a level of readiness and vigilance that would help make the country a hard target and a resilient one. What is the optimal level is something no one really knows and like other security planners, we are grappling with it as well.

What we do know is that perhaps the pragmatic way forward is to find a realistic sustainable level of preparedness. Even though we should persist and continue to engage the general public, we should also start to think of preparedness as something more likely to be articulated and operationalised through engagement and development of a an activist cadre in each domain rather than try to attain a homogenous or uniform level of preparedness across our society en-masse.

The Community Engagement Programme (CEP) which was launched 4 years ago has proven to be a valuable instrument to do this. For instance, in the CEP grassroots cluster, the constituencies through the People’s Association have worked to develop such a small but active pool of grassroots cadres in each ward who develop practical contingency plans, to exercise these plans and are ready to be mobilised if there is an incident in the ward. The same approach has been pursued in the various clusters like labour, education as well as ethnic communities.

Conclusion

The Government cannot guarantee that there will never be a terrorist attack on Singapore soil. But we would do everything in our power, in partnership with academia, the private sector and the public, to try and prevent attacks and secure our country.

The terrorist threat against Singapore will continue to evolve against developments internationally and in the region. Singapore’s security cannot be divorced from the security in the region. Knowing more about what is happening around us and making friends to work together is the only way we can better insure our own security as much as we can also contribute to the security of other countries in our neighbourhood.

Today’s National Security Seminar attempts to accommodate and deepen discussion and exchange among people who are an integral part of the expert community. Such an event also allows us to build new contacts or renew old ties so that we may further continue our conversation and collaboration well after this seminar is over. Let me wish all of you a very fruitful seminar.

Thank you.

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