Jakarta bombings highlight 'soft target' fragility
Updated
A week after two suicide bombers attacked luxury hotels in Jakarta, killing themselves and seven others, Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono says the nation must remain vigilant against further attacks.
The Jakarta attacks again highlight the security challenges facing 'soft targets' like hotels.
Presenter: Sen Lam
Speakers: Scott Stewart, vice president Tactical Intelligence, STRATFOR
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STEWART: Yeah I believe so in the, really in the post-9/11 era we have really seen a shift towards the targeting of hotels and that has a lot to do with the hardening of embassies and airlines and other traditional terrorist targets, and so hotels have become the target of choice in this modern era.
LAM: So what are some of the challenges facing those in charge of security at world-class hotels?
STEWART: Well it's important to understand that the hotels are so large and by their very nature they're a commercial entity. Unlike an embassy that you can lock down and pretty much control access to, in order to make money at a hotel you need to have a pretty steady stream of customers, and in a lot of these cities, like Jakarta or Peshawar or Islamabad, these large hotels are really social centres for people. People meet there to eat at the fine restaurants, they will use the health club there, they will go shopping there, they really are a cultural centre in these cities.
LAM: And of course there's also the question of delivery vans as well, you have all these people delivering supplies to hotels?
STEWART: Yes 24 hours a day, you have all that food coming in, there are goods coming in for the shops, many times there are shops inside the hotels, of course you have luggage and baggage and with international air travel happening 24 hours a day you have guests constantly coming and going. There are repairmen, florists, gardeners; it really is a very busy environment.
LAM: As you say it is a huge security challenge, but is there more that world-class hotels can do to address this threat of terror attacks?
STEWART: Well they've done a lot, really since 2004 a lot of the hotel chains like Marriott and some of the others have really taken a lot of security measures to try to harden their facility, and it's because of this that we're seeing the shift now towards smaller devices being taken in by suicide bombers rather than a large car or truck bomb being deployed against the hotel. So they are putting these security measures in place and now what we have are the militants are taking counter measures to try to get by those security measures. So it's really kind of a game of cat and mouse; as security improves the attackers will change their tactics.
LAM: Is there any evidence to suggest that the terrorists and the militants seem to think that it's beneficial, for want of a better word, to attack these luxury hotels, to target these hotels?
STEWART: Oh certainly and if you look at some of the statements that have come out in attacks where there have been claims of responsibility for hotel attacks, they basically will call the hotels a nest of spies and den of decadence and things like that, and so in the perception, from the Jihadist point of view, that is what you have. There's alcohol is served, there is immorality and sex outside of marriage, plus you do indeed have foreign businessmen, foreign diplomats and basically the ruling elite from the host country who also will frequent that kind of establishment.
LAM: And just quickly Scott, for travellers are there specifics to watch out for in terms of hotel choice and security?
STEWART: Oh yes certainly and one of the things that you want to do is make sure that the hotel that you're going to stay at does have adequate security, because what will happen people and attackers will tend to go towards the softest target they can find. So if they have two targets of equal value they will go towards the one that has lesser security as opposed to the harder one to attack. So you want to find a hotel that has good security. Secondly you want to try to avoid as much as possible the kind of vulnerable places that have been attacked. We really see the lobbies are attacked a lot, whether it's by car bomb or one of these pedestrian suicide bombers, so you want to try to avoid the bar, avoid the lobby area if at all possible, try to stay on an upper floor in a room that faces away from the front of the hotel, which is where a lot of the times where the bombs will go off.
