Vulnerability Assessment Team Looks At Bolling

Starting with the commander's in-brief on Monday and continuing through next Friday, a crack team of highly trained professionals will infiltrate Bolling, its tenant commands and its Navy neighbors. Operating almost entirely undetected, its mission is to seek out and identify areas that are potentially susceptible to terrorist attack. Our mission is to be alert: "JSIVA" is coming.

JSIVA, the Joint Staff Integrated Vulnerability Assessment, is an ongoing DOD-wide program that focuses on finding areas in which an installation's security position could be improved or strengthened. The Defense Threat Reduction Agency conducts JSIVAs for the Deputy Directorate for Anti-terrorism and Homeland Defense, and its multidisciplined, joint-forces teams consist of active duty, Reserve and civilian personnel. The eight-person Bolling unit will be led by a Navy captain and includes two Navy and Air Force field-grade officers, an Army noncommissioned officer and four GS-13s.

The last JSIVA was done in September 2000, but of course everything has changed since then, said Gary Jones, 11th Wing anti-terrorism/force protection program manager. The current assessment process has "evolved" and been "refined" to reflect the new, 21st century threat environment. "Who would have thought of using an airplane as a flying bomb before 9-11?" he said.

Once the assessment is completed and potential vulnerabilities identified, DTRA will send Col. Duane A. Jones, the 11th Wing commander, a complete set of recommended actions designed to help the wing detect, deter, counter, mitigate and recover from potential terrorist attacks.

Jones emphasized JSIVAs are not "inspections," but "commanders' tools" designed to inform them about areas that could be targeted by enemies. And unlike inspections, which often involve intense preparations and occasional anxiety, JSIVAs look at bases' normal, day-to-day operations and have almost no effect on the person in the street. Also, unlike inspections, wing leadership wants vulnerabilities detected by the JSIVA identified, so they can be fixed before terrorists exploit them.

"For most of the people on Bolling, it won't impact them at all," Jones said. "Probably 99 percent of them won't even know that there is a team on base or have any contact with them. The people responsible for planning -- either disaster response, engineering, security -- those will be more involved because they are the first responders."

But Bolling will still be under a microscope, one that could potentially focus, albeit briefly, on anyone here. "If they're [the JSIVA team] sitting in the food court for lunch, they're listening to see what kind of conversations take place," Jones explained. "They will pay particular attention to those facilities that have large populations because those are the most likely targets. Densely populated areas are also likely places for operations-security miscues that can aid a terrorist in gathering information to plan an attack."

It's also quite possible that JSIVA members could stop a few shoppers at the exchange and ask them questions that would reflect their relative degree of security awareness.

"They could stop somebody and ask them what FPCON [force protection condition] we're in," explained James Riner, 11th Wing anti-terrorism/force protection officer.

A major area of emphasis for the JSIVA team will be to evaluate the "synergistic" aspects of the wing's security environment -- or how well Bolling's anti-terrorism officers and first responders work with the Navy, Coast Guard and other organizations' counterparts here.

"We have to have a good partnership with all those folks," said Jones. "We meet with them in a variety of venues -- partnership counsels, our threat working groups, our force-protection working groups. It's not just Bolling, because we have to look out for the community as a whole. It takes a synergistic approach, and the commander is responsible for all these activities on Bolling."

 Jones said the bottom line for us at Bolling is to be aware of our surroundings and prepared to act quickly and appropriately should the situation arise. "Are people aware of what the threats are, what the force protection conditions are?" he said. "Do they know how to report suspicious incidents? We want people to be alert, not alarmed. There's no terrorist event that ever takes place without a surveillance operation. So if you can interdict that while it's still in the planning stage, you have saved yourself a lot of grief and possible loss of life. If you see something that looks out of place, you need to report it."

(Special thanks to Mike Campbell, 11th Wing USAF Public Affairs)

FMI: www.bolling.af.mil