"Before September 11th, I think people would be very offended to think that they could be tracked in a theme park," said Feng Chi Wang, president of MetaSignal Inc. "People are more giving now in terms of their civil liberties." -- Associated Press, 16 November 2001

"You can make an easy kind of a link that, if you have a protest group protesting a war where the cause that's being fought against is international terrorism, you might have terrorism at that (protest). You can almost argue that a protest against that is a terrorist act." -- Mike Van Winkle, Anti-Terrorism Information Center, California Department of Justice, 2 April 2003

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin, 1759 Historical Review of Pennsylvania

It has been widely noted that both "the American intelligence community" (approximately 15 different agencies) and the various military and civilian agencies in charge of fighting terrorism (at least 40 of them) utterly failed to anticipate, prevent or minimize the severity of the devastating terrorist attacks on civilian and military targets in New York City and Washington, D.C., on 11 September 2001, despite the facts that every year the United States spends approximately $30 billion on intelligence-gathering and analysis, and another $11 billion on counter-terrorism.

(We're aware that it's quite possible that this "intelligence failure" wasn't as complete as it appears. Perhaps a few of these agencies collected pertinent raw data that was ignored or misplaced or wasn't processed or acted upon quickly enough to prevent the disaster from taking place. Perhaps a few of them received tip-offs or warnings that weren't acted upon quickly enough or were ignored. Unfortunately, it's also possible that there was in fact no intelligence failure at all. It's possible that a few of these agencies -- or a few "rogue" elements in a one agency or in several agencies -- knew about the attack in advance and did nothing to stop it because they helped to plan it, sympathized with its targets, goals and/or motives, were ordered by higher ups to do nothing or were the victims of a "triple cross." In sum, it's difficult to discount the possibility of a cover-up of some kind. Nevertheless, in what follows, we assume that no cover-up has taken place.)

But the "feds" weren't the only ones taken by surprise on 11 September 2001. So were the New York Police Department (NYPD), which of course maintains at least one "Intelligence Division," and all of the security firms that had clients at the World Trade Center (WTC) complex. There's an important parallel to be drawn here: in the same way that the CIA and the National Security Administration (NSA) have devoted far too much of their money, time and personnel to intercepting electronic communications and using satellites to take increasingly sophisticated photographs, the NYPD and the city's numerous security firms have devoted far too much of their money, time and personnel to laptop computers, digital radios, microwave transmitters and surveillance cameras. It might be said of both the CIA and the NYPD that -- if the taxpayers agree to continue funding them -- they (the CIA and the NYPD) should assign more agents to "the field," to "walking a beat" -- and leave the hi-tech spy gadgetry alone.

The New York Surveillance Camera Players (NY SCP) can report from first-hand experience that, prior to the attacks, there were so many surveillance cameras in operation in the WTC area that their locations couldn't possibly be counted or mapped out, at least, that is, using the simple tools available to the NY SCP. No doubt some of these cameras were installed and operated by the FBI (and the CIA too?) in the wake of the first terrorist attack on the WTC in 1993; most of them were probably installed and operated by either the NYPD or security firms hired by the WTC or the businesses that rented space in it. None of these surveillance cameras did what they were supposed to do: anticipate or prevent another attack; provide security; keep thousands of people safe from harm. Like the NSA's orbiting satellites, surveillance cameras are a colossal waste of money.

And so, for the NY SCP, nothing has changed since 11 September 2001. As we announced on 13 September 2001, the position of the group remains the same as it was prior to the attacks. We are unconditionally opposed to the installation of any and all surveillance devices in public places. Surveillance cameras did not and will never prevent a major crime or terrorist attack. It is clear to us that the problems -- of crime, of terrorism -- must be solved in other ways. (As for hate-mail, we won't let it bother us.)

11 September 2001 wasn't the first time that surveillance cameras failed to do anything but violate basic human rights. In countries such as England, where the authorities keep accurate and complete records of the number of arrests and convictions that can reliably be ascribed to the use of surveillance cameras, the results are clear. Either the criminals simply move out of the sight of the cameras or the police arrive on the scene too late to make an arrest. Note well the following news report from Scotland, dated 27th August 2001.

Surveillance Camera Players

# posted by alvaro @ 8:05 a. m.