U.S. Weighs Gains, Risks in Warnings on Terror

Recent pre-millennial terrorist scares have forced U.S. authorities to walk a delicate tightrope--seeking to warn the public about potential danger without creating mass hysteria.

Chastened by bitter reaction to the withholding of terror warnings to the flying public before the Pan Am 103 explosion a decade ago, the federal law enforcement community prefers to err on the side of overexposure--alerting the public to possible threats even if they are unsubstantiated and not necessarily “credible.”

But the tack they are taking--advising the public almost daily to look out for suspicious characters and packages or odd occurrences--could prove counterproductive, triggering false alarms and encouraging harassment of Arab Americans, some activists and security experts warn.

In covering these government alerts, some in the media may have given extremist groups just what they crave most--publicity, says Brian Levin, a terrorism expert at Cal State San Bernardino. “Even if nothing happens, the terrorists have won,” he said.

Indeed, shop owners in Las Vegas and elsewhere say they’ve already seen a run on gas masks and bulletproof vests.

“I’ve sold 350 German-made Israeli gas masks, and I could sell that many more if I could get them in stock--they’re going like crazy,” said Larry Hahn, owner of Hahn’s World of Surplus in Las Vegas. “These are purchases by people who are convinced that terrorists are going to knock down power lines or worse, and they want to be ready.”

With millennium malaise and Y2K phobia already dampening interest in many New Year’s Eve events, the last weeks’ reports of possible foreign and domestic terrorist threats have prompted some cities to scale back crowd estimates even further.

Near the Canadian border point where an Algerian man, Ahmed Ressam, was arrested earlier this month for allegedly transporting 130 pounds of explosives, Seattle is scrapping plans to set 17 sculptures ablaze as part of a New Year’s gala. Officials are worried about security.

Both that suspect and Lucia Garofalo, a Canadian woman arrested Sunday in Vermont after she allegedly crossed the border illegally may have ties to Islamic terrorist groups. Those links have triggered heightened concerns about impending attacks.

The Islamic activists say all the attention threatens to unleash a new wave of harassment against Arab Americans.

“We understand being vigilant, but we resent the attitude from some media and government officials who have allowed the hysteria to be directed at a particular ethnic and religious group, linking it all to Islamic fundamentalism,” said Hussam Ayloush, executive director for the Southern California chapter of Council on American-Islamic Relations.

After the Federal Aviation Administration this week stepped up security at airports, Islamic leaders claim that Arab Americans appear to have been searched more often than other people.

They also complain about warnings last week in which authorities asked people in Washington, D.C., to look out for a mysterious blue van, in which the occupants--reportedly Middle Eastern--were spotted acting “suspicious” at a gas station. The concerns now appear to have been baseless, officials say.

How real is the threat of terrorism in America?

State officials in California say they are confident that, with a massive deployment of law enforcement officers, they will be well-prepared for whatever happens at New Year’s Eve festivities.

“There has been no credible threat . . . 1/8and 3/8 we’re not discouraging anyone from going anywhere they want,” said Tom Mullins, spokesman for Gov. Gray Davis’ Office of Emergency Services.

In Los Angeles County, officials said they are beefing up security.

Lt. Randell Taylor, watch commander for the Pasadena Police Department, said, “We are doing what everybody else is doing. We are listening and watching and keeping an eye out for anything unusual and anything special.

“We don’t anticipate any Y2K issues of a technical nature. But we expect a large crowd of folks and we have beefed up our forces--our department, the Sheriff’s Department and the California Highway Patrol--to man the parade route,” he added. “We have augmented the forces. We will have intelligence folks out there, not only from our department and the Sheriff’s Department but also from the Federal Bureau of Investigation because of the million or so people who attend every year. We do that every year. But we are paying closer attention this year because of the Year 2000.”

Officials at Los Angeles International and Burbank airports also said that security is more intense but declined to elaborate.

The FBI says it is ready to cope with any problems, particularly over the possibility of some cult or anti-government militia group will choose the end of the millennium for a terrorist strike.

One Clinton administration official said that, in recent days, amid top-level White House meetings on possible terrorist threats, “there have been constant discussions” about how much information should be publicized and what tone should be adopted and that “everyone’s all over the board.”

Authorities are debating a number of vexing questions, the official said. “Are you creating more panic than anything? Are you feeding into the desires of the terrorists? Are you tipping off a terrorist to the fact that maybe they should just change their target?”

An FBI official, who asked not to be identified, said: “There’s a balance that has to be struck between protecting an investigation, making the public aware of what we know and not creating hysteria.”

Figuring out what to tell the public is a lesson learned the hard way after the 1988 explosion of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. Two Libyans suspected of terrorism are soon to go on trial. Angry families of the 259 victims on the flight discovered that, weeks before the disaster, the U.S. State Department had sent warnings to its embassies--but not to the flying public--about a possible bomb threat.

U.S. officials say the Lockerbie experience has pushed them to warn the public whenever possible.

As a result, last Thursday Americans woke up to TV and radio reports about an FBI warning to look out for “bombs in small parcels” that might arrive from Frankfurt, Germany. The tip that led to that warning was unsubstantiated, but FBI officials had decided to put out a predawn advisory on the matter anyway.

When postal officials in Sandwich, Mass., couldn’t locate the recipients of a package sent from Germany this week, they called in the state police. An X-ray detected a timing device and power source, and state police evacuated about a dozen neighboring businesses before detonating the package.

It turned out to contain a music box--and some chocolate.

But the potential gains from issuing a warning like the one about the German parcels far outweigh the risks, one Clinton administration official said.

If the tip proves baseless, people may have wasted a few moments double-checking the return addresses on their parcels. But if the tip is valid, the official said, “Boom--maybe we just saved a life. What harm is that?”

Times staff writers Geraldine Baum, John Glionna, Dan Morain and Josh Meyer contributed to this story.