Commentary

Intelligence suggests next major attack could be on cruise ships

by Roddy Heyliger

Thursday, April 15, 2004

ST. MAARTEN, Netherlands Antilles: Last week Captain John Hewlett, a guest speaker at an International Maritime Security and Port Facility Code (ISPS) Awareness and Implementation Seminar, in the twin-island Federation of Antigua & Barbuda, stated that US intelligence suggests that the next major terrorist attack could be on cruise ships.

He was quoted as saying, “The target intelligence suggests that there is going to be a lot of attacks against Americans outside the US, in countries friendly to the US … and the problem is, it is very important for us … intelligence suggests the next major attack is going to be on a cruise ship and we really hope and pray that it does not happen in the Caribbean.”

Caribbean governments are moving full speed ahead to meet the July 1 mandatory deadline to become ISPS compliant with reference to port facility security. Will all ports in the region be able to meet the deadline approximately 10 weeks away?

Over 9.5 million persons around the world took a cruise in 2003. Another record year is anticipated by the cruise industry in 2004, with over 10.5 million guests taking a cruise. The Caribbean Tourism Organization says that cruise passenger visits to the region were up by 10 per cent in 2003.

Cruise industry experts say that the Caribbean is the most popular cruise destination in the world and the region is expected to maintain this footing. Therefore, we can see why a possible terror attack may be a high possibility in the future.

A PricewaterhouseCoopers report said that lines from the Florida Caribbean Cruise Association (FCCA) contributed an annual economic impact of US$2.6 billion throughout the Caribbean in 1999/2000. Over 60,000 persons were employed and had a wage income of US$285 million.

The Caribbean market share of the North American cruise capacity in 2000 was 45.6 per cent. Of course those numbers today would be much higher due to more persons taking a cruise in the Caribbean.

A terrorist attack would have a serious impact on the multi-billion dollar cruise industry. The only way to prevent such an attack is to have up to date security procedures and regulations in place and trained law enforcement officials who are ready for the “new age of terrorism.”

The intelligence community immediate response calls for increased physical security measures, like a greater presence of police in the streets; random checks in public places; an iron-fist against illegal immigrants. Strengthening of security forces, by adding manpower and equipment, and increasing their budgets. Increasing cooperation with friendly intelligence and security services, including more intelligence exchanges on cross-border terror and operational cooperation in anti-terrorist actions.

St. Maarten law enforcement authorities on behalf of the Antilles should take the lead role in starting a dialogue with Caribbean law enforcement bodies to establish a counter-terrorism body comprising of the security services from each island in order to be able to counter any terror attack within the region. The worse thing is to become complacent.

We can already see that cooperation between law enforcement bodies are key for detecting possible threats and taking pro-active measures to prevent an attack. Everyone needs to learn from the mistakes of the FBI and the CIA. Both bodies due to statutory regulations among other issues could not share information with each other. If they were able too, perhaps 9/11 could have been prevented.

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