Ha! Rick must of sabotaged my link.Here's the story.
Customs Service Working to Prevent 'Nuke-in-the-Box'
By Jeff Johnson
CNSNews.com Congressional Bureau Chief
August 27, 2002
Capitol Hill (CNSNews.com) - The commissioner of the U.S. Customs Service said Monday that America's borders are safer from the threat of terrorists sneaking a weapon of mass destruction into the United States, but much work remains to be done.
Commissioner Robert Bonner told an audience at the Center for Strategic and International Studies that the Customs Service (USCS) began deploying personnel today in its newest program to prevent terrorists from using the ocean cargo transportation system to attack American targets.
"It's an 'insurance policy' against terrorism," he said. "We don't want to wait for the 'nuke-in-the-box.'"
The "Container Security Initiative" (CSI) program assigns American agents to inspect and secure selected cargo containers bound for U.S. ports before those containers are loaded onto ships at their point of origin.
Using a computerized database of information about all shipments bound for the U.S., intelligence analysts will identify potentially "high-risk" shipments. Those containers will then be subjected to advanced electronic testing - for radiation, explosives, concealed passengers, and other contraband - and even searched by hand if necessary. Once the container has been cleared by USCS inspectors, it will be sealed and sent on to it U.S. destination where it can be immediately released to its intended recipient.
"It's a system that not only provides a substantial increase in security," he explained, "but one that also facilitates trade, allows it to move more efficiently, and more quickly than it did prior to 9/11."
One way CSI achieves that goal is by working during the "down time" between when a cargo container arrives at the port and when it is scheduled to be loaded onboard a ship. The period, usually two to five days, allows USCS personnel ample time to analyze the manifest of the container's contents and to determine whether it merits further scrutiny.
Twenty of the world's busiest ports were picked to be the initial participants in the CSI program. These "mega-ports" were chosen because nearly 70 percent of the 5.7 million cargo containers entering the U.S. annually pass through them.
Currently, five countries - Canada, the Netherlands, France, Belgium, and Germany - have signed agreements to participate. Singapore has verbally committed to the program. Participating countries that wish to do so can also send their customs inspectors to the U.S. to examine cargo bound for their ports. So far, Canada is the only nation to utilize the reciprocal nature of the agreements.
Bonner said he expects to be signing agreements with "several other governments" to participate in the CSI program "in the next few weeks." While he did not have a cost estimate for the USCS teams' deployment, he described the cost of a five- to ten-member team stationed at a foreign port as "peanuts" compared to the "profound" consequences of a successful terrorist infiltration.
"If terrorists used a sea container to conceal and smuggle a weapon of mass destruction into a port of the United States and detonated that container, the impact on global trade and the global economy would be immediate, and it would be devastating," Bonner warned. "All nations would be affected."
Proposed new regulations will also require more specific disclosures of a container's contents and earlier filing of those disclosures. Bonner said such rules are "essential for CSI to succeed." Those new regulations would apply to all cargo shipped to the U.S., however, not just containers originating from CSI-participant ports.
Another program instituted by the USCS is the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT). Private industry is helping the government improve security throughout the supply chain of foreign-made goods shipped into the U.S.
The partnership allows major U.S. importers, carriers, customs brokers, and others to meet minimum standards for security of the shipments they facilitate from foreign to U.S. ports.
"In return, these companies that partner with U.S. Customs," Bonner explained, "will be given the fast lane through our land border crossings, and through our seaports."
In late January of 2002, General Motors, Target Stores, Sara Lee, Ford, Daimler-Chrysler, BP-Amoco, and Motorola joined C-TPAT as "charter members." Currently, more than 400 companies have signed on to the program.
Bonner, who took office just 13 days after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, is intent on continuing the improvements to the Customs Service and to supporting President Bush's initiative for the creation of a Department of Homeland Security.
"Our systems should be more secure, but they should also be better and more efficient than they were bore 9/11," Bonner concluded. "Even with all that we've done so far, I'm still not satisfied. There's much more that we need to do."
