How Tough It Is To Stop A Lone Wolf

A would-be suicide attacker detonated a pipe bomb strapped to his body in the heart of Manhattan’s busiest subway corridor Monday, sending thousands of terrified commuters fleeing the smoke-choked passageways, and bringing the heart of Midtown to a standstill as hundreds of police officers converged on Times Square and the surrounding streets.

But the makeshift weapon failed to fully detonate, and the attacker himself was the only one seriously injured in the blast, which unfolded just before 7:20 a.m. New York time.

Law enforcement officials said the attacker, identified by police as Akayed Ullah, 27, chose the location because of its Christmas-themed posters, a motive that recalled strikes in Europe, and he told investigators that he set off his bomb in retaliation for U.S. airstrikes on Islamic State targets in Syria and elsewhere.

It was the third attack in New York City since September 2016, and the second in two months, coming only weeks after eight people were killed in a truck attack along a Hudson River bike path. Like the earlier two, the attack Monday appears to have been carried out by a “lone-wolf” terrorist.

This new “normal” of modern terrorism is primarily marked by a transition away from large-scale terrorist organizations and instead towards an increasing reliance on independent operatives.

To be fair, this transformation has been a pragmatic response to the international community’s efforts to dismantle large terror organizations such as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

As a result, terror groups are increasingly relying on lone-wolf operatives to carry out an attack on behalf of the organization.

The State Department’s acting coordinator for counterterrorism seems to agree, suggesting that the Islamic State’s urgent appeal for lone-wolf adherents to rise up and strike their home countries is an “acknowledgment of the more difficult environment.”

While on the surface the dismantling of large-scale, bureaucratic terror organizations represents a positive development in counterterrorism, it does pose a number of new and arguably more daunting challenges.

In other cities around the world, terrorists have successfully detonated explosive devices in subways, train stations and on buses.

At least so far, no terrorist attack on the scale of Madrid in 2004 or London in 2005 has been accomplished in New York since 2001.

"Not all of these guys are terribly bright," said Brian Michael Jenkins, a security expert at the Rand Corp. and the Mineta Transportation Institute at San Jose State University.

But just six weeks ago, a New Jersey man pulled off another kind of terrorist attack officials had feared. A 29-year-old Uzbek national drove a rented truck at high speed down a recreational path in lower Manhattan, killing eight people.

Police shot the man and took him into custody.

In May, a man drove a car into a crowd of people in Times Square, killing one person. The attack might have been worse if recently erected bollards, or barriers, had not prevented the vehicle from doing more damage.

John Miller, the New York Police Department's deputy commissioner of intelligence and counterterrorism, said authorities have foiled 26 terrorist plots in New York since 9/11.

"We have prevented a significant number of plots," Miller told reporters Monday.

Jenkins said more than 80% of potential terrorist attacks are thwarted through intelligence and surveillance.

Before Sept. 11, only about a third of terrorist plots were foiled, according to Rand Corp. research.

Discoveries from state, local and federal law enforcement agents, working primarily undercover, are the most effective tool, according to Rand.

Tips from the public about terrorism-related activity also have proved instrumental, which is why officials Monday repeated their "see something, say something" request.

Here are some of the attacks that have been foiled:

? In 2003, an Ohio man was arrested after he scouted various locations in New York for al Qaida to bomb, including the iconic Brooklyn Bridge. Iyman Faris, a U.S. citizen born in northern India, was convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

? In 2004, Shahawah Matini Siraj, a Pakistani immigrant, was arrested before the Republican National Convention at Madison Square Garden, based on a tip from a police informant.

He was later convicted and sentenced to 30 years in prison for plotting to blow up the Herald Square subway station beneath Macy's flagship department store.

? In 2006, foreign terrorists plotted to blow up the Port Authority Trans-Hudson train tunnels to flood New York's financial district. Assem Hammoud, a Lebanese national, confessed to masterminding the plot, which may have been ordered by Osama bin Laden.

? In 2007, four men were indicted on charges of planning to blow up jet fuel storage tanks at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, N.Y.

? In 2009, Najibullah Zazi, who had attended an al Qaida training camp in Pakistan, plotted for suicide bombers to detonate explosive devices in their backpacks on subway trains at at Grand Central Terminal. Zazi became a government witness and testified against a co-conspirator. He also provided information about other plots.

? In 2010, Pakistani immigrant Faizal Shahzad attempted to blow up a homemade bomb in a Nissan Pathfinder in Times Square, but it failed to detonate.

? In 2016, authorities stopped an Islamic State-inspired plot to blow up subway lines, concerts and landmarks from three men who hoped to create another 9/11. The plot was foiled before it ever took root.

Homegrown, smaller-scale plots those like the one Monday in Midtown, October's truck attack, and May's incident in Times Square can be very difficult to detect, Jenkins said.

"Your intel operations are looking for indicators," he said. "They don’t have an X-ray for a man’s soul."

On Monday, the crude device was based on a pipe bomb, and the suspect attached it to his body, Miller said. Instructions on how to construct such a device is readily available on the Internet.