Resistance voices from WW2 throw new light on 21st Century terrorism

The memories of Polish migrants who resisted Nazism in France during World War Two have been recorded and analysed in ESRC-sponsored research which aims to throw new light on what draws people into modern- day terrorism. This research is published today as part of the ESRC’s Social Science Week. For the study, Alan Bicker of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Kent interviewed surviving resistors from among the quarter-million Poles who lived and worked in the mining area in the ‘Zone Interdite’ (or ‘prohibited zone’) of Northern France.

Health system unprepared for water terrorism

National public health experts reported today that front-line health care responders are not adequately prepared to identify and control major outbreaks of waterborne disease, including outbreaks resulting from acts of terrorism. The conclusions were reported at a conference convened by the American College of Preventive Medicine on waterborne disease and acts of water terrorism.

Dentists are equal partners in war on terrorism: Surgeon General

U.S. Surgeon General Richard H. Carmona, M.D., sees dentists as equal partners in war on terrorism, he told dental leaders March 27 at a conference on “Dentistry’s Role in Responding to Bioterrorism and Other Catastrophic Events.” The conference was co-sponsored by the American Dental Association and the U.S. Public Health Service. Dr. Carmona, a high school dropout and Army enlistee who later retrieved his education, is the 17th Surgeon General of the USPHS, sworn into office last Aug. 5. He opened the two-day conference with an overview of current threat that invited dentist participation in war on terror.

Study Says Trading Life for Identity is Key to the 'Logic' of Suicide Terrorism

Suicide terrorism seems to many to defy logic. Economists find the idea particularly hard to understand in the context of economic theories that are usually based on ideas of self interest: surely self interest must preclude self killing? But now a new research paper by Professor Mark Harrison an economist at the University of Warwick says that the value placed on personal identity by suicide terrorists provides some of the answers.

Little-Known Organization Finds Innovations for Fighting Terrorism

A little-known organization that canvasses private industry to quickly find and develop innovative solutions to problems inherent in fighting terrorism may be emerging from the shadows. The Technical Support Working Group seeks “better ideas” from industry for use by military and other government and civilian agencies’ counterterrorism missions, said Jeffrey M. David, deputy director of the U.S. Department of Defense’s Combating Terrorism Technology Support Office.

Bioterrorism threat ruins even group showers

Chalk up mass-washings as another activity wrecked by the spectre of terrorism. Thirty years ago, a call for volunteers to strip to their skivvies, as the coy Washington Post puts it, would have signaled some post-Summer of Love fun. These days, it refers to a far more sober scrubbing: the debut of a new $350,000 chemical, biological and radiation decontamination facility at the Inova Fairfax Hospital in northern Virginia.