As Infamous Anniversaries of U.S. Terrorism Loom, Nation Asks Why

In the coming week, Americans will mark two infamous anniversaries, back to back, that underscore how a nation enjoying peacetime prosperity remains disturbingly vulnerable to acts of mass violence.

Next Wednesday, the nation will remember the worst act of terrorism on U.S. soil: the April 19, 1995, bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. A day later, the spotlight will turn to Littleton, Colo., site of the worst act of school violence in the nation’s modern history: the shooting spree on April 20, 1999, at Columbine High School.

The approach of these two dates has convened what amounts to a national seminar on violence. From coast to coast, citizens, politicians, psychologists and law enforcement officials are talking about why bloody rampages happen in this country and how to stop them, or at least contain them.

The twin anniversaries serve public notice of the unnerving power of random lethal strikes, said Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Rand Corp., the Santa Monica-based think tank. “That’s what scares people a lot: You don’t know who’s a ticking time bomb.”

Gauging Potential Schoolyard Threats

Last week in San Francisco, the Secret Service gave campus security chiefs the latest advice on how to gauge potential schoolyard threats. On Capitol Hill, some lawmakers are reviewing federal counter-terrorism programs launched since the Oklahoma City bombing. President Clinton plans to appear in Colorado today to promote gun control and in Oklahoma City a week later to dedicate a new national memorial to the bombing victims on the three-acre downtown site where the Murrah building once stood.

Oklahoma City also will host a three-day conference on terrorism at a new institute founded to study its roots and help prevent it.

Across the country, fear of violence persists even though crime has been dropping steadily for years. In a proclamation Monday for a national week to honor the rights of crime victims, Clinton noted that the rate of criminal victimization is at a 25-year low.

But the public naturally focuses on singular events, reported and analyzed exhaustively: The 168 killed in the Oklahoma City blast. The 15 dead in Littleton, including the two shooters. The tragic aftermath in both communities.

Other traumatic events echo in the two dates. Before Oklahoma City, there was the government’s fiery confrontation with Branch Davidian cultists near Waco, Texas, which left about 80 cult members dead on April 19, 1993, gave the militia movement a rallying point and left a deep impression on Oklahoma City bomber Timothy J. McVeigh. The Columbine anniversary also falls on Adolf Hitler’s birthday, a fact apparently known to school killers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold.

Those who monitor racist and radical anti-government groups so far have not detected any significant upsurge in hate incidents or propaganda keyed to this confluence of occasions. Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center noted that apocalyptic predictions fizzled when the nation weathered the Year 2000 transition on Jan. 1 without major problems and that the calendar is strewn with anniversaries of events that could have dark meaning for those inclined to view them that way.

But federal agencies, including the FBI, are on alert for potential threats.

Top officials in the General Services Administration, which manages 8,300 federal buildings around the country and has spent more than $1 billion to bolster security since 1995, met this week to review precautions.

“We are aware of the upcoming anniversaries and are taking the appropriate steps to prepare,” the agency said in a statement. “Our challenge is to continue to enhance security without succumbing to a bunker mentality and denying the public legitimate access to the buildings that exist to serve them.”

Paul Bresson, an FBI spokesman in Washington, said: “We’re working closely with the entire law enforcement community to minimize the threat or the potential for violence.”

At the San Francisco conference, more than 40 school security officials--including representatives of Los Angeles, Long Beach, Pasadena and Santa Monica--gathered to study weapon detection, crisis response and officer training.

They heard from the Secret Service, which last year began a review of 40 cases of school violence in search of clues to help spot potential killers. But the depressing conclusion so far from the experts is that school shooters defy a general profile. The school security chiefs also heard from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, which explained how explosive devices such as pipe bombs and propane canisters are smuggled onto campuses.

At one point, those in attendance were asked how many had dealt with bomb threats in their schools. Hands shot up all around. And how many had dealt with threats via the Internet? Same response.

But Bill Modzeleski, the federal government’s coordinator of school safety programs, said it is unclear whether threats of violence are actually increasing “or whether we’re more vigilant.”

Is Nation Getting Its Money’s Worth?

In Washington, emergency-response experts came last week to Capitol Hill for a hearing on domestic terrorism. Members of Congress were asking whether the nation is getting its money’s worth from an investment of more than $10 billion a year in terrorism response and readiness. Rep. Tillie K. Fowler (R-Fla.), a senior House Republican who chairs a panel that oversees emergency response, introduced a bill to coordinate terrorism readiness in a new office under the president. The official who would head the office would be similar to the White House director of national drug control policy.

To capitalize on publicity surrounding the anniversary, Fowler invoked the famous photograph of a dying infant in the arms of a firefighter in Oklahoma City five years ago. “We must do everything in our power so not one more mother or father across America experiences such a nightmare.”

Los Angeles County Fire Chief Michael Freeman, who testified before Fowler’s panel, said that Southern California authorities had made great strides in the last five years. Next month, for instance, 2,784 Los Angeles County firefighters will get new training in “mass decontamination” procedures to be used in the event of a chemical explosion.

But Freeman, a leading expert on terrorism among the nation’s fire chiefs, suggested that many communities are not as well prepared because the nation lacks common standards for readiness. “Right now, it’s still to some extent in the eyes of the beholder.”

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Times staff writers Robert L. Jackson and Eric Lichtblau and researcher Sunny Kaplan contributed to this story.