Cloned emergency vehicles lookout memo issued.
Security officials around the cities hosting this year’s political conventions are being told to watch out for fake or cloned emergency vehicles.
A Federal Emergency Management Agency memo ‘bulletin’ says terrorists could use such “cloned” emergency or commercial vehicles to conduct surveillance or carry out an attack.
The National Insurance Crime Bureau says faking such vehicles is inexpensive, perhaps costing as little as $2000.00.
Meanwhile, the Secret Service says it doesn’t have any specific information that cloned vehicles are being used for terrorist or other illicit purposes at the Democratic convention in Denver or the GOP convention in St. Paul, Minnesota.
The bulletin, called an “infogram,” is distributed to emergency management officials across the country.
Officials are advised to know how to verify markings on government and military vehicles. Imaging systems that can see inside trucks as well as radiation detection equipment will be used in both convention cities to prevent anything dangerous from getting near or inside the venues.
Thousands of federal, state and local law enforcement officials will be working to secure the conventions, as will airport screeners, nuclear weapons experts and intelligence analysts.
Previous Incidents Involving Cloned Emergency Vehicles
Several recent incidents of cloned vehicles has caught the attention of intelligence analysts at the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE). In a nationwide survey of recent “cloned” vehicle reports, a troubling pattern emerged. In their study, tagged “law enforcement sensitive,” and completed this January, the FDLE charted some 15 incidents involving both faked official and commercial vehicles between 2005 and 2007, which should serve as a wake-up call to law enforcement and counterterrorism officials worldwide.
As the FDLE’s study, The Road Map to Cloned Vehicles, put it: “… the use of government vehicles with official markings, especially those associated with friendly military, government and public safety entities, could be a means of delivering a vehicle-borne explosive device to a target site. This method could allow terrorists to bypass established security protocols and strike hardened, high-value targets.”
“Load it with a conventional explosive or even a radiological device and you have the makings of a truly ‘ultimate nightmare’ scenario,” said a federal counterterrorism official familiar with the new Florida study.
Officially, at least, the FDLE declined to comment on their restricted clone report when asked for comment recently by HSToday. “That is ‘Law Enforcement Sensitive.’ The lawyers are looking at that now,” said Eva Rhody of the FDLE’s Office of Statewide Intelligence.
Some of the agencies, entities and commercial companies cited in this report also declined on-the-record interviews about the numerous incidents listed. To put it in context, they, too, are actually “victims” of such illicit practices.
One of the more ominous cases uncovered by the FDLE study was a July 2006 joint federal and state investigation in the Portland, Ore., area in which one stolen pickup truck displaying both National Security Agency (NSA) and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) emblems was seized.
“During the investigation, a second stolen truck, again with FEMA markings and other FEMA documentation, was also recovered,” the report stated. The results of this rather worrisome case have still not been released.
It’s not just law enforcement that has to be worried. “We’ve had a few incidents, too,” as Bill Anderson, Ryder Truck’s director of global security, put it in an interview with HSToday. “Fortunately, they ‘only’ involved cargo theft,” and not terrorism threats, he said.
THIS information needs to be exposed all across the nation through the basic news media channels and networks so that ALL citizens are educated about these issues and the problems exposed for wider scrutinization by the citizens that this sequestered information is directly affecting.
It is this guise of “National Security” and the hush-hush antics of the security forces that are causing greater harm to our country and other people of other nations by plating this spy-vs-spy crap rather than turning the lights on the terrorist cockroaches and causing them to scatter back under the rocks from which the came.
9-11 is a case in point situation. I was on a concert tour with the band TOOL during the World Trade Center disaster. I remember seeing the news reports that the powers-that-be were actually watching the terrorists as they moved about in the airport terminals prior to their boarding the planes that they ended up hijacking and turning into weapons against us.
I recall the excuse for this method of madness on behalf of the national security geeks is that they wanted to “see where they go and who they communicate with”…
You people are doing a great job making this limited yet important information available to us and your efforts are greatly appreciated. keep up the excellent work!
I now wonder if the national security morons have the answers they were seeking?
It doesn’t take two brain cells to realize that an ounce of prevention produces a pound of cure, but when our own officials keep playing this sick game of hiding and playing this top-secret BS game with information, it doesn’t do ANY of us ANY good and only furthers the harm and disaster later on down the road.
What a country?
I agree with your statement. I haven’t trusted this goverment in a number of years. They can send our troops to protect borders of other countries but will not protect our own borders. We can keep an eye on our own communities and when a strange family or person moves in keep an eye on them but be friendly. In the military we were told to be aware of what is around you. When we go into places to eat i want my back to the wall. I had to explain this to my wife My community has a security watch program with signs and i have called our local police a few times. I wonder if this web page is being scaned by our goverment? I love my FREEDOM and will protect it for my grandchildren. I helped protect Germany during the cold war in 60-63. Hey we could get in touch with Germany and see if they would send some troops here to help in protecting our borders this would be returing a favor to the USA. Man what a mess.