At least temporarily on Wednesday, the FBI was clearly concerned that the ISIS-inspired/-directed attack in New Orleans may have been the work of a broader cell of terrorists. Early on Wednesday morning, a U.S. citizen, Shamsud-Din Jabbar, drove a truck at high speed into New Year’s Eve revelers celebrating on New Orleans’s famous Bourbon Street. At least 15 people were killed. Vehicle ramming attacks are an ISIS hallmark.
Later came media reports that the FBI believed three or four individuals other than Jabbar were caught on security cameras laying explosive devices. These reports may have been mistaken.
Still, one key indication that the FBI had at least some credible intelligence to indicate a sustaining threat was the deployment of the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team to New Orleans. As I noted earlier, a Department of Justice Boeing 757-200 aircraft flew from Richmond, Virginia, to New Orleans on Wednesday afternoon. HRT deployments on these aircraft operate under call signs JENA1 and JENA2. It is probable that elements from the FBI’s counter-IED section and crisis negotiation unit joined HRT on the flight. All three of these units belong to the FBI’s Critical Incident Response Group based out of the bureau’s presence at the Marine Corps base in Quantico, Virginia.
The HRT deployment here is highly notable. There are certain assets that the FBI will deploy following terrorist attacks or other incidents in order to reassure the public that their safety is paramount even where the FBI believes the threat has been addressed. These include public disclosure of the deployment of evidence response teams, additional agents from other FBI field offices, etc.
HRT deployments are never made simply for reassurance.
HRT operates three tactical assault/sniper teams, Gold, Silver, and Blue, which rotate through training, support, and crisis contingency deployments. A small number of HRT operators from the team on support duty are regularly deployed nationally and globally as advisers or on temporary missions such as high-threat reconnaissance, close protection, and cross-training operations with other tactical units.
Crucially, however, scaled HRT tactical deployments by the crisis duty team only occur when the FBI assesses that there is a highly credible and significant potential of ongoing threat. That’s because if the HRT tactical duty team is deployed where it is not ultimately needed, it won’t easily be deployable if another contingency develops where it is certainly needed. Put simply, scaled HRT deployments such as this one are held in reserve for evidence-supported crisis scenarios. While the crisis duty team is held on four-hour readiness to move from alert notification, it can often deploy in under three hours.
With little more than 100 special agents on its roster, HRT is the world’s preeminent law enforcement tactical team. While similar law enforcement tactical units such as France’s GIGN, Germany’s GSG-9, and the United Kingdom’s CTSFO squads are highly impressive in their own right, they cannot compare in tactical capability, flexibility, or skill to HRT. Indeed, I’ve heard it said by very credible sources that there are only two tactical units in the world that HRT looks up to when it comes to close-quarter battle proficiency. In first place is the Army’s Delta Force, in second place the Navy’s DEVGRU.
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We’ll likely learn a great lot more in the next 24 hours. But for a moment on Wednesday, it’s clear the FBI thought that HRT would need to go on an urgent terrorist hunt. Moreover, in light of what have been largely open U.S.-Mexico and U.S.-Canada borders over the past few years, the particular threat of ISIS-K syndicate attacks on U.S. soil remains a significant concern.
One thing is certain: This won’t be the last time HRT is deployed against a terrorist threat.
This article was originally published at www.washingtonexaminer.com
