Feral Jundi

Monday, January 25, 2010

India: Terror Group Lashkar-e-Taiba Planning Paraglider Attacks In India

Filed under: Al Qaeda,India,Parachuting,Weapons — Tags: , , , , , , — Matt @ 6:50 AM

   Wow, these guys are getting innovative. The attack using a paraglider opens up all sorts of ideas and problems-both for the terrorist and for the defenders.  I believe many paraglider kits can be used for tandem jumping, so they could conceivably haul a payload of equal weight. So that could be a payload of maybe 150 to 250 lbs? Maybe more, because I know some military parachutes that can carry up to 300 lbs, along with the parachutist.  But we are talking about paragliders, and that is a little bit out of my lane.

   Next would be the possibilities with that setup.  You could insert one individual or you could insert several individuals into key attack positions, or you could just fly the things straight into the target and detonate.  You could also swarm on to one target and just keep flying human bombs into it until the target is completely destroyed.  Or you could do the Chechen ambush, and fly a bomber into the response teams (EMS and Tactical), after they come in to respond to the first attack.

   As for how they could pull it off.  I could see them towing a paraglider near the target using a car or motorcycle, and then they just fly in like that. Or they could take off from a nearby mountain.  I guess they could also use a backpack fan, but that would be pretty damn noisy.  They would have to cut the engine near the target or something.

   So what is next?  Using a birdman suit or just pushing suicide bombers out of planes and have them glide into a target, like some kind of human JDAM? Or how about these guys just paragliding over the target and dropping mortars on target? Or they could just be looking at using these for insertions, as another way to do a Mumbai Part 2 style attack.

     What’s the counter to this is the question?  Shotguns, mini-guns, trained eagles, or drone archers flying micro drones  into these guys? lol  Who knows, but it is definitely food for thought. –Matt

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Paraglider

Terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba ‘planning paraglider attacks’ in India

January 25, 2010

Rhys Blakely in Mumbai

Indian intelligence officials suspect that the terrorist group behind the 2008 Mumbai attacks is planning another audacious strike on the country — this time from the air, using suicide bombers flying paragliders.

U. K. Bansal, an Indian Home Ministry official, told reporters that the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba faction was thought to have acquired a number of the gliding parachutes.

“We have intelligence reports that LeT has purchased 50 paragliding kits from Europe with an intention to launch attacks on India,” he said.

No other details were given, but security levels have been hiked across the country ahead of tomorrow’s Republic Day celebrations, one of India’s biggest holidays.

(more…)

Friday, November 27, 2009

India: India’s Private Security Metamorphosis, by Jody Ray Bennett

Filed under: India,Industry Talk — Tags: , , , , — Matt @ 6:42 AM

   Another great post from Jody.  This story puts a little more light on to a subject we briefly covered here and here.  India is massive, and if Mumbai is India’s 9/11, then it totally makes sense that the security industry growth would match the U.S. growth after our tragedy.

   Now one of the thoughts I had, is if the arms race between Pakistan and India will come to be reflected in a sort of PMC and PSC race?  I mean Pakistan seems to have a huge problem with PMC’s and PSC’s right now, but what happens when they start figuring out that their sworn enemy is actually embracing them and has a thriving security market to prove it? Will there come a point where Pakistan actually looks at the Blackwaters and Dyncorps and thinks, hmmm, maybe we should have a couple of those?  And on a broader question, will countries start looking at their local PMC’s and PSC’s as tools of national security?  Are we the new tank or jet fighter in the defense industry?   Interesting thought, and I would like to know what you think.  –Matt

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India’s Private Security Metamorphosis

27 Nov 2009

India’s newest private security personnel are rapidly transforming from static security guards to anti-terrorism forces, Jody Ray Bennett writes for ISN Security Watch.

By Jody Ray Bennett for ISN Security Watch

Thousands of young men throughout India begin each day in blue uniforms that closely resemble that of official police officers, and often armed with little more than batons and radios, they patrol, survey, search and check guests and clients of some of the largest multinational firms in the country.

These young men are escorting VIPs, checking luggage and bags with bomb-sniffing canines, surveying landscapes with binoculars and night-vision goggles and even using hi-tech electronic equipment to scan for cyberinvasions and other network threats for a multitude of private clients.

The company they work for is busy assessing security risks for elite multinationals doing business in India while providing them with personal, private security. In the event of an emergency, the company claims it will deploy a “quick response team” dispatched through a 24-hour manned security control room.

In an increased blurring of the lines between security guard services and the private security personnel of companies that often raise eyebrows in western media, several Indian firms are preparing to earn their spot in the global private security industry.

Meet TerraForce Security Services, India’s newest private security company. Set apart from many of the other private security firms throughout India, TerraForce was recently formed by Indian billionaire Kushal Pal Singh to protect the assets of DLF Group, India’s largest real estate company. DLF states that it is by far the “largest” in terms of “revenues, earnings, market capitalization and developable areas in India,” so it is hardly difficult to identify the company’s vested interest in protecting its businesses, projects and assets in a country that even the US Department of State has said is “ranked among the world’s most terrorism-afflicted countries.”

According to the New York Times, TerraForce is hiring “as many experts as it can,” some of which include “former National Security Guards, the black-clad commandos who reclaimed the Mumbai hotels” in the aftermath of the 2008 Mumbai attacks, and in a statement from TerraForce president and chief executive Harsh Wardhan, the company is “importing instructors from the Israeli army and the United States Marine Corps.”

Anti-terrorism is big business

Much like the private security industry boom that was experienced throughout North America and Europe in the aftermath of 9/11, India also experienced a rapid increase in demand for security in the period following the Mumbai attacks.

(more…)

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Film: Terror in Mumbai

Filed under: Film,India — Tags: , , , , — Matt @ 7:21 AM

   Outstanding.  This is the kind of film I like, just because it breaks down what happened and allows the viewing public to see first hand how to combat something like this.  Knowing is half the battle, and we have to expect that attacks like this will happen again, and in all corners of the world.  Get prepared, and study how these things work I say.  Be a ‘hero in waiting’, and foil these attacks by being able to recognize the signs and actions of it, and inserting a monkey wrench into the terror machine. That smart phone in your hand, is your weapon, along with anything else you can think of to cause harm to or stop this kind of attack.  Or you can coward away, and expect someone else to save you. –Matt

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Terror in Mumbai

Synopsis

TERROR IN MUMBAI features exclusive audio tapes of the intercepted phone calls between the young gunmen and their controllers in Pakistan, and testimony from the sole surviving gunman.

The Mumbai attackers’ targets included the city’s main railway station, a popular cafe, two major hotels and a Jewish center. Leaving the city’s iconic Taj Mahal Hotel in flames, and Mumbai’s woefully unprepared police and security forces paralyzed with fear, the attacks sent an ominous message to governments around the world.

“Much as the 9/11 attacks in the U.S. did in 2001, the events that unfolded last November in Mumbai served as a terrifying wake-up call, not just to India but to the rest of the world,” says narrator Fareed Zakaria, who appears on camera in the opening and closing of the film. “It broadened the spectrum of our enemies and brought attention to the number of different terrorist groups that exist, who may be bigger and better organized than we ever imagined. The fact that a small group of gunmen was able to inflict so much pain, and the government of the second most populous nation on earth was unable to stop them for three days, should change our sense of the dangers out there.”

In the words of one of the operation’s masterminds, who remotely controlled the terrorists’ every deadly move by cell phone from neighboring Pakistan, “This was just the trailer. Just wait till you see the rest of the film.” The assailants belonged to the terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba, or “Army of the Righteous,” which aims to “liberate” Muslims living under Indian rule in Kashmir. Their mission: global jihad against the “infidels.”

TERROR IN MUMBAI presents a moment-by-moment account of the horrific attacks through interviews with survivors and Indian police officials, archival news coverage, extensive video surveillance footage of the terrorists in action, and chilling audio excerpts of cell-phone conversations intercepted by security forces. The phone intercepts provide a grotesque running commentary as the controllers, watching events unfold on live TV, direct the gunmen, telling them where the security forces are, which of their hostages should be killed and how to do it. With the killers wounded and asking what to do next, the tapes reveal the controllers calmly urging them to fight to the death and not allow themselves to be taken alive.

Guests from the Taj Mahal and Oberoi hotels tell how the terrorists first staged mass executions, then worked their way through the corridors, killing whenever they managed to enter a room. An elderly couple recounts how they were spared by the terrorists when it was realized they were fellow Muslims, while all around them were mowed down in a hail of bullets. Perhaps the most unsettling testimony comes from Ajmal Amir Kasab, the sole surviving terrorist, who answers his captors’ questions with startling frankness from a gurney soon after being captured.

While the Mumbai attacks differed in many ways from the Al Qaeda assault on the U.S. on September 11, 2001, the personal motives of the Laskar-e-Taiba terrorists bear some of the same hallmarks, notably the belief that there would be material wealth for their families and heavenly glory for themselves if they died for the cause of jihad.

What remains unclear is how this quest for holiness meshed with the indiscriminate nature of the killings, which mowed down Muslims and non-Muslims alike.

(more…)

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Company Spotlight: India’s Topsgrup

Filed under: India,Industry Talk — Tags: , , , , — Matt @ 1:18 PM

     -In May 2008 Topsgrup acquired a 51 percent controlling interest in UK-based Shield Guarding, a $121 million security services provider. The company is now raising money to buy out the remaining 49 percent in Shield Guarding and possibly acquire newer companies. “We have signed a memorandum of understanding with a $300 million US security company for acquiring them. After that we want to get into the Middle East, Africa and some parts of Asia as well,” says Nanda.

     -Neems to agree, relating a recent incident when the CEO of the American company he planned to acquire told him, “Rahul if the deal happens, please don’t say an Indian company has acquired us.”

“I understood where he came from,” he adds. “Eighty-five percent of Americans don’t have passports and think America is the world. For them India, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan are all in the same breath.”

     –Holding on to local brands is something even the big players have often done, like G4S with Wackenhut and Securitas with Pinkerton’s in the US. But being a hands-off investor might be a risky strategy, all the more so because the companies Topsgrup acquires outside India might in many cases be significantly bigger than itself. 

*****

   What I have done up top, is to cut out the key portions of this article that really stood out for me.  I haven’t a clue who Topsgrup plans on buying out, but whomever it is, stand by and I wish you well. I have worked for companies that were bought out while I was employed there, and it is always a little unnerving.  Topsgrup is at least trying to maintain some stability with it’s purchases by keeping the key figure heads in place.

   Like I mentioned before with Terraforce, I am kind of out of the loop with the Indian security market, and I really don’t know much about them.  But management and leadership issues are a universal theme, and I could care less what country you are from, you are either universally accepted as a performer or you are not.

   If Topsgrup is a student of the industry, they will learn from the Kabul Fiasco and know that they must care about what is going on with the contracts of their newly acquired companies.  Get some shared reality, and make sure your ‘new’ employees and contractors are actually getting taken care of.  Or that your leaders are only doing good things for the company, and not destroying a company with the poor management of people and contracts.

    Basic stuff really, but given what had happened with AGNA and their relationship (or lack there of) with Wackenhut, I am pretty skeptical of any company that calls itself organized or compassionate about employees/contractors.  Actions speak louder than words Jack.

     If any readers have some inside scoop, please feel free to speak up.  I would be very curious to know who this US company is? Or if you are with Shield, let us know how that is going.  The other angle on this, is it could all be hot air.  Please note that Topsgrup was talking about purchasing this ‘mystery US company’ May of last year.  What gives? –Matt

Topsgrup Website here.

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Topsgrup

Elvis Has Left Town

Diwan Rahul Nanda has spent the last 15 years building Topsgrup into India’s second largest private security provider. Now he is staking it all to become a global player

by Rohin Dharmakumar | Oct 27, 2009

The Man: Diwan Rahul Nanda, 37, Chairman

The Company: Topsgrup. With close to 85,000 employees and Rs. 867 crore in revenue, it is the second largest security services provider in India.

His Goal: Create a multinational security behemoth from India by acquiring other security companies around the globe.

The Risks: Acceptance of an Indian company in Western markets will be a challenge, especially as private security companies there run jails, man borders and guard cities. Nanda will have to battle perceptions about Indian companies being synonymous with cost cutting and lowered standards for training.

Around 1.15 p.m. on October 7, an auto-rickshaw pulls up outside Gate 2 of Hewlett-Packard’s campus in Bangalore’s Electronic City suburb. The lone passenger in the auto-rickshaw, a young man of average build, pays off the driver and hurriedly walks through the campus gates along with a group of other employees. He is carrying a shoulder bag.

Diwan Rahul Nanda, Chairman, Topsgroup

When one of the security guards asks him for his identity card, he tells him that it is inside his pocket. He is lying, for HP had sacked him over three years ago. Since then he had found it impossible to find another stable job in India’s IT capital. Worse, his wife had left him a year back, taking their daughter with her.

(more…)

Saturday, October 24, 2009

India: Security Summit in Mumbai, and Private Security Increases

Filed under: India — Tags: , , , , , — Matt @ 11:21 AM

Other companies have also launched security services. The Indian building firm DLF has formed TerraForce, its own security outfit, trained by the Israeli army and the US marines, to patrol its properties. Infosys, the IT giant, and the country’s largest private-sector firm, Reliance Industries, have both been allotted permanent protection from India’s state Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), whose officers, unlike those in private security firms, are permitted to carry firearms.

Hiring private security is arguably necessary, given the evident failings of the Indian state security forces during the attacks. The police were armed with nothing but bamboo “lathis” or sticks when they had to face the militants. Members of the elite National Security Guard (NSG) took eight hours to travel from their base in the state of Haryana to the hotels, and then it took two more days to defeat the 10 gunmen. 

 *****

   Well there’s your problem India.  You don’t bring bamboo “lathis” to a gun fight. lol All kidding aside, it will be interesting to see what comes out of the meeting of the minds during this security summit. I certainly hope Incident Command is at least given a mention during this summit, because if they have any hope of defeating an attack like this, it will come from unity of effort and a fast and efficient means of getting everyone on the same sheet of music in the beginning stages of an attack.  The private guards like Terraforce, or the police units, military units and fire units all should have radios that can be programmed or are set up already to communicate with one another.  An Incident Commander on scene, needs to take the reins of the situation, and bring to bear the necessary resources to deal with the developing situation.  And when seconds and minutes count, all the little details of command and control need to be hashed out, well before another Mumbai attack.  That is how you prepare for this.  I can’t stress enough how important it is to get everyone under the same umbrella of Incident Command, in order for this system to properly work.  Your first responders are the ones that will be able to confront and defeat the attack before it gets worse. And if they are organized and know what to do in order to take control of a situation, then you will see a disaster/attack go from chaos to organized chaos, giving everyone involved a higher chance of survival.

   On a side note, I am interested in this whole TerraForce thing?  That must be a typo about the US Marines training them?  I just couldn’t find anything to support that claim and perhaps what the article meant to say is that it was ‘former US Marines’.  Maybe some Embassy guys, or some unit came in to train them, and I could be wrong.  Either way, if any of the readers have any input about TerraForce, let me know. –Matt

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Mumbai unbowed by attacks

Richard Orange

October 24. 2009

Early next month, the head of London’s Metropolitan Police, the former secretary of the US Department of Homeland Security, and a panel of international security experts will gather in Mumbai’s Trident Hotel for a “security and resilience summit”.

That some of the world’s foremost experts on terrorism, including Sir Paul Stephenson of the London Met and the former homeland security secretary Michael Chertoff, are willing to spend a day and night in a hotel where militants killed more than 30 people just a year earlier is a sign of how much the city has recovered. (Many of the same faces were in the Trident for a similar conference as early as January).

In the time since 10 Pakistani gunmen brought terror to Mumbai for two days starting last November 26, India’s main business hub has bounced back. (more…)

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