The Deputy

When he checked in at Portland for his flight to Boston on the eleventh of September, Mohammed Atta was selected by a computerized pre-screening system known to the FAA as CAPPS. In the FAA’s language, that stands for Computer Assisted Passenger Pre-screening System, a software system designed to identify passengers who should be subject to special security measures.

Under security rules in place at the time, the only consequence this selection was that Atta’s checked bags were held off the plane until it was confirmed that he had boarded the aircraft. Three members of his hijacking team were also selected in Boston.

Their selection by CAPPS affected only the handling of their checked bags.

Well, that was then. It is a new world and a lot of things have changed. A whole new Transportation Security Administration was created to deal with the problem. The first Administrator was Jim Loy, the bluff former Commandant of the Coast Guard. He established the place, and tried to professionalize a screening system that was a patch-work of private low-bid contractors.

He has decided to take a well-deserved second retirement. His replacement, Rear Admiral Dave Stone, the second Chief of TSA, was in front of the Senate Commerce Committee yesterday to talk about the threat.

He said he is still hearing from the intelligence folks that a commercial plane may be targeted for attack by the bad guys, or used by them to carry out an attack. He specifically referenced the two Chechen women who carried sheet explosives taped to their torsos on two Aeroflot jets and blew them up last year.

Unfortunately, screening airline passengers is not the only mission of the TSA. The 9/11 Commission obviously was concerned about air attacks, but they concluded last year that the threat of a maritime or surface transportation attack is “as great or greater” than an attack on the aviation system.

While Dave was in front of the Senate committee, his deputy was meeting with our business group in the Eisenhower Room of the Caucus Club Restaurant at 401 9th Street, across the street from the massive pile of the J. Edgar Hoover Building.

TSA is part of the Department of Homeland Security, and the institution has been a notoriously hard target for business to approach. It is not that they don’t know what they are doing. It is that things are still confused, and it is difficult to establish who is in charge of what, or how the Department lets contracts.

The Deputy is a formidable woman, fashionably attired in crisp business fashion. She had a distinguished career of public service in the Air Force, twenty years of active service, and retiring as a Judge Advocate General (JAG) officer. She had subsequent experience in the Department of Justice, and before coming to TSA, as a political appointee in the Air Force Secretariat.

One of her most memorable experiences came when she was on the set of the George Clooney movie “The Perfect Storm,” which featured Air Force and Coast Guard aircrews in favorable roles. She said it was pretty cool to be kissed by a movie star, which is one of the better government perks.

But that is how she came in contact with then-Commandant Admiral James Loy at the special premier screening for the two services. She gave the speech for the Air Force and Loy spoke for the Coast Guard. They stayed in touch thereafter, and a strong professional friendship resulted.

When Loy was named first Administrator of TSA, he immediately called her to join the management team of the fledgling agency.

She was in private practice at the time, and she took a $300,000 pay cut to become a member of the Senior Executive Service.

I would have liked a glass of wine, but times being what they are, I settled for iced tea. The waiters brought in a nice Roquefort chopped salad, and the clink of silverware paced the Deputy as she described the three phases of TSA’s existence: the trauma of the stand-up, the agony of the establishment of DHS and the merger with twenty-two other implacably opposed agencies. Now, the department is ready for what they call ”Phase Two.”

This is supposed to be “a dynamic time of change,” as though there had been anything else. Congress thinks the professional government screeners should be privatized, as they were before, and she made a realistic appreciation of the state of confusion that had existed. But she said “things are getting better.”

She raved again and again about the incoming Deputy of DHS, Michael Jackson, who she described as a huge advocate of technology. That is good, since that is what most of us around the table sell. It was apparent that Jackson’s role in helping to create TSA in an earler government post was going to mean access and influence for them in the larger Department.

She could not have been more optimistic about the impact he was likely to have. The medallions of beef arrived around that time, medium-cooked, and resting on an interesting dollop of mashed potatoes over baby asparagus surrounded by sauce, meat and potatoes with a haut cuisine flair. I was pleased I had picked them, though the crab cake looked pretty good.

A few people had chosen some sort of squab that was presented in a large porcelain ewer, impossible to balance a notebook around.

It was a challenge to take my notes around the entre’e, but one does what one can in Washington. The Deputy says that Secretary Chertoff was being confirmed by the Senate as we listened and ate, and that “Two type-A personalities are going to sweep through the Department.”

The first hundred days are going to be interesting, I thought. Just what we need, more turmoil, driven by type-A attorneys.

At least we know something about what to expect, since there is a road-map. I was at the roll-out of the joint Heritage/CSIS think-tank report on Homeland Security reform, and with the election now out of the way, the findings are likely to comprise the agenda of the first hundred days of the new Secretary’s agenda. That includes more change, more consolidation, and flattening of the organization.

She ticked off some of the accomplishments of her organization. She was pleased that TSA screening had identified thirteen actual crewmembers of commercial aircraft who had links to terrorists, from the flight deck to the galley, and had barred them from flights to the United States. That was something to think about as the waiters cleared the table.

With coffee and desert she made some predictions about which responsibilities would be transferred within the DHS, and it was possible that TSA would be streamlined to deal exclusively with aviation issues, though I read from her body language that it was clear that they would not cede responsibility without a fight.

Desert was remarkable. I never have it, for lunch or for dinner, but there it was: a cup of thin chocolate, white veined, filled with rich chocolate custard and topped with sweet rich cream and three raspberries, precisely placed. Around the chocolate cup was a delicate swirl of raspberry sauce. I marveled at the construction, and how I would demolish it with a spoon.

The Deputy finished off with a list of technologies they had funded in this years President’s budget, and what was in the next. The top three included check point screening devices with overlapping capabilities. First to be fielded were “trace portals,” which utilize a puff of air on humans to detect the residue of explosives for an undisclosed amount of time. Next was the procurement of special document screening devices, able to instantly access dozens of data bases to determine if passengers were a risk of flight.

The deputy was pretty disappointed about the most promising technology, which is a low-power x-ray device. She said it was the only way to detect both explosives and weapons. The nagging problem was one of personal privacy, since the machine obviously can see through clothing. TSA has not yet found a way to avoid compromising the curve of the human bosom, or the shape of our collective privates.

There was a vigorous discussion of privacy around the table, the consensus being that most of us did not care. The Deputy mentioned possible algorithm development that would depict target travelers as “stick figures,” or some other means by which the curve of the human body would be filtered out while still detecting sheet explosives of the type used by the Chechen women.

One of the attendees suggested that a line for backscatter exam could be made voluntary, and thus save travelers business travelers such as ourselves precious time in line. The Deputy said they were looking at that, and if we were willing to register with the TSA and give up certain biometric data like fingerprints and a retinal scan, we might be able to avoid the lines.

We were finishing coffee as she looked at her watch and told us she had to go. There was not problem with the check, since the companies in the alliance take turns picking up the tab. I noted that she had consumed no lunch, so she was in full compliance with the ethics laws. Everyone is a little nervous since the Air Force Acquisition Chief is doing nine months in jail for inappropriate relations with Boeing.

Life in the big city, I thought.

I went around the other side of the horse-shoe table and button-holed her before she got to the door. I thanked her for her time, and made a quick pitch for our network approach to defeating the threat of shoulder-fired missiles. She smiled, and vowed to use her office to connect all of us with the right people in the TSA as she swept out toward her next appointment.

I held the door for her as she went. It was nice outside, maybe sixty degrees and the sun was shining. I wondered if we had broken the back of winter. I decided to walk back to the office and see if I could work off the dessert.

Copyright 2005 Vic Socotra

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