Essay: Secure Americans Abroad: US Marines in Abuc Tabletop Exercise



Lexi Krantz

Professor Porcelain

INS 573-Final Paper

2 May 2016

Terrorist/Bioterrorist Abuc to Miami Tabletop Exercise

I. University of Miami had a scholastic break in March of 2016. During this break, several students and faculty members attended a conference in Abuc, a Caribbean country. The hotel that these UM community members were staying at was seized by a terrorist group, while some members made it home the day before the seizure. However, the people who returned home were at risk for exposure to a potential bioweapon, as three students reported symptoms to the health center, yet further investigation was needed.  The country of Abuc would not cooperate and give out information during this time. Cryptic messages are being received during this time as well, which did not help the hysteria surrounding the situation.  In response to this the University of Miami Crisis Decision Making (CDT) team consulted and convened with local, state, national, and UM officials to determine an action plan to protect the safety of the students on campus, abroad and the nation as a whole from this potential threat.

II. As a member of the Department of Defense, our main priority is to secure and defend the interests of the United States of America and our citizens at home and abroad. Specifically, we represented the Marines as a branch of the Department of Defense. The Marines are one of the four armed branches of the United States Department of Defense and have the resources necessary to combat such a potential bioweapon. The Marines have a special response force that specializes in combating chemical and biological incidents, that has dealt with such things in the past such as the Ricin incident in 2004. During this ordeal in 2004, a white powder was found on a sorting machine in the mail room of the Dirksen Senate Office Building. The substance tested positive as ricin, and it is this very response force that is to thank for the identification of the substance and stabilization of the situation (Department of Health and Human Services 1).  This response force is called the Chemical-Biological Incident Response Force whose goal is to counter the effects of chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) disasters. The Marines also have a disbanded Antiterrorism Battalion, which was deactivated due to the increase in size of the United States Marines. However, this incident in Abuc calls for a need to reinstate this battalion, so the Marines will have the ability to do so with Congressional approval. The Marines have the armed power, intelligence, and physical resources to secure the UM campus and the nation as a whole.

Ethically, the Department of Defense sees many issues as they represent a power house and a threat of war. If the Marines need to enter the nation of Abuc in order to rescue American citizens, it may be taken as a threat of war to any terrorist group or the nation of Abuc itself as the Marines are armed. Prior to this infiltration, however, approval would be needed to be deployed from the federal government which could take time.  Although we did not plan to use our arms unless necessary or in retaliation, the connotation of carrying arms in a nation is one strong enough to pose a threat. The main goal of the Marines is to rescue and secure the health of American citizens being held hostage in Abuc.

At the point in time of the conference, the Department of Defense had a plan of action in place but needed the approval of other organizations before proceeding, as armed forces represent a last resort. The Marines may also have had a conflict of interest with other branches of the armed forces who might have found it necessary to intervene in such a matter. The representation of multiple armed forces in Abuc, could also have represented a threat of war. The Marines must work in coordination with other agencies such as Homeland Security and the World Health Organization (WHO) to make sure none of the efforts of one agency are counteracting that of another. The responses of agencies must be cohesive, as the WHO may attempt to detect the bioterrorist weapon and so will the marines, however actions to detect the same thing must be coordinated. The United States Department of Defense does not want to interfere with the Department of Defense in the nation of Abuc, so we must obtain contact and cooperation with these authorities overseas.

The Marines in this specific scenario were practically ignored by other agencies, as many assume that defense is something of last resort and cannot help in an issue of rescue and identification. However, this misconception needs to be addressed and agencies and the population need to understand that there is more to the Department of Defense than starting war and defending the nation through combat. When this misconception is corrected, the marines could be more actively involved in the search, rescue, and detection of biological weapons. The Marines have extremely useful and important resources to assist in such issues.

III. In responding to an international issue, collaboration is a necessary step in coordinating responses to the situation. Primarily, before any action takes place a chain of command must be established to ensure cooperation from all parties and a unified response. This chain of command establishes a single leading party or leader who starts the chain of action. This ensures the unity of a response rather than have multiple responses in which are not coordinated and could create more havoc. In addition to this, information must be surveyed and monitored to ensure accuracy and intent. In today’s day and age, information is transmitted in the click of a button and it could be inaccurate or cause hysteria to spread through the general population. With this comes great responsibility of agencies, especially social media to keep a close eye on this information.

In creating a response from the Department of Defense(DOD), the plan needed to be strategic and take into account all possibilities of outcomes that could come as a result of any action. The goal of the DOD is to promote human security while using smart diplomacy so that the individuals are protected rather than the method of traditional security in which the goal is simply to protect the state. However, an underlying issue that the DOD holds as previously stated is that although only attempting to help the individual victims of this potential bioterrorist attack, coming into a nation bearing arms creates an image of threat. In order to prevent conflict from occurring, according to Murray, et. al., “accurate assessments of the risk of conflict and the magnitude of possible consequences would raise the possibility of preventing the health consequences of conflict” (348). With weighing the potential risk of potential conflict, the DOD can prevent future health consequences of the conflict, which in turn would just create another issue that would be needed to be dealt with. The health of the public is greatly impacted by war and terrorism. When a terrorist attack occurs, retaliation is sometimes committed in the form of war or the threat of war. Yet, this creates more of a strain on the public health of a nation as war is damaging to health just as terrorism is. With war families are destroyed, as well as communities and cultures and it takes resources away from health and other infrastructures that need funding. Other than morbidity and mortality, war creates some less apparent damage to the public health of a nation (Sidel 516).

However, before assuming this incident is a direct bioterrorist attack on individuals from the United States, agencies must find connections between the people who were in Abuc and came back with symptoms. In addition to this, a report of white powder was found in a student’s dormitory which leads to the belief from agencies and the public that there is a connection between this and the Abuc incident. However, further investigation of the substance and the student’s connection to the the Abuc trip need to be found. These reports are a major issue in the securing of a disaster. In Carlos Castillo-Delgado’s “Trends and Directions of Global Public Health Surveillance”, he mentions that the spread of information is so quick due to the globalization of the world. “It is possible to travel between most places in the world in less time than the incubation period for many infectious diseases” (22). This explains how permeable the borders of the world are and how quickly disease and information is spread. Due to this is is imperative to survey information continuously, as today’s world allows for real time information to be transmitted through various sources including the internet and smart phones. This could lead to a potential issue in people putting information out that is not true or the layman misconstruing this information which could lead to mass hysteria. Surveying the information that is coming out from the Abuc crisis is imperative because we do not know the sources it came from nor the accuracy. Students of UM and their families could potentially misconstrue this information and have more concerns than they previously did. For this reason, it is imperative that we continue to monitor these situations and assess.

In addition to simply assessing incoming information, we need to remember to understand what type of harm this is presenting to the UM community and the United States. Whether this is simply an epidemic, a terrorist attack, a bioterrorist attack, or a threat of war is something needed to be figured out prior to deploying a plan of action as different measures would be taken depending on the disaster at hand. If what occurred in Abuc was a terrorist attack using a biological weapon, different measures need to be taken than if it were a terrorist attack that did not involve a bioterrorist weapon. “Until 1997, the subject of bioterrorism was not discussed within the medical community and deliberately ignored in national planning efforts” (Henderson S76). This being said, the United States is not necessarily adequately prepared for a bioweapon as exploration in the field was not too recently brought into the light and recognized as something of greater concern. That is where the Marines’ Chemical Biological Incident Response Force comes into place as they have the resources to detect and identify agents, search and extract casualties, perform technical rescues, decontaminate personnel, provide emergency medical care, and stabilize contaminated victims.

IV. In order to provide the best response to the crisis in Abuc and to stabilize the situation, a plan of action must be implemented. In accordance with statements made by Maria Villar of mass communications at the Florida International University, open communication is necessary between all agencies involved in the actions being taken to handle the crisis in Abuc. A communication team needs to be created, all information needs to be gathered and sorted by credibility while responding to rumors with facts, and each organization needs to explain their role in the plan while identifying partners in the media. This will lead to a more cohesive and holistic response. Gathering the appropriate information is imperative in ensuring what is believed to be going on is actually occurring while working with other agencies and organizations to also ensure that information is the same across the board. Having the same information and cross-collaborating ensures a response that is cohesive and does not cause more chaos.

In addition to agencies collaborating to ensure a productive response to a disaster, in a bioterrorism response it is imperative to stabilize the situation currently at hand on the UM campus while preparing to take action abroad. The security of individuals effected is of primary importance as they are the basis of the very nation. Previously it was held that the security of the nation rests on military power, which is a part of the Department of Defense. However, the strength and aggressive power of the military is sometimes looked down upon and does not necessarily secure the citizens of a nation (King 588). However, the Department of Defense has multiple facets that do not represent traditional military power, such as the previously mentioned Chemical Biological Incident Response Force, which mainly focuses on the detection of substances and rescue of exposed individuals. This response force represents an emphasis on securing the safety of humans over the security of a state.

V. In such a scenario, more collaboration could have occurred between agencies and personnel attending to the crisis in Abuc. Many agencies ignored the capabilities of the Department of Defense, when in fact the DOD has the power to help in situations other than using militant force. In order to get the DOD involved in helping crises more often, the stigma surrounding the agency must be eradicated from the minds of people. From this exercise, it can be learned that cooperation and gathering the appropriate information is of the utmost importance to stabilize a potential crisis and avoid further chaos surrounding the scenario. When the DOD was not included in the responses of any other agencies, it made it difficult to create a plan of action. The plans of the DOD could only be tentative as it was and is important to not take action that could counteract another agencies or be a duplicate response. All in all, the Abuc exercise was extremely didactic in showing how a crisis is handled at the local, state, and national levels and what goes into creating such a response.

Works Cited

Castillo-Salgado, Carlos. Trends and Directions of Global Public Health Surveillance.

Epidemiol Rev 2010;32-93-109

D.A. Henderson. John Barlett and Bioterrorism, Clinical Infectious Disease, 2014:59 ISuppl 2)

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King, Gary, and Christopher J.L. Murray. "Rethinking Human Security." Political Science

Quarterly 116.4 (2001-2002): 585-610. JSTOR. Web. 31 Jan. 2012.

Murray, C. J L, Gary King, Alan D. Lopez, Niels Tomijima, and Etienne Krug. "Armed Conflict

as a Public Health Problem." BMJ 324.7333 (2002): 346-49. Web.

Sidel, Victor W., and Barry S. Levy. "War, Terrorism, and Public Health." The Journal of Law,

Medicine & Ethics 31.4 (2003): 516-23. Web.

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And Local Public Health and Medical Officials. Washington, DC: n.p., 2006. Print.