ISSUE 107 : Jul/Aug - 1994 - Australian Defence Force Journal

50 AUSTRALIAN DEFENCE FORCE JOURNAL NO. 107 JULY/AUGUST 1994Having observed the attempt, the terrorists wouldhave been prepared for any future similar attempt. Inthe worst case, some of the hostages may have beenkilled in retribution. The law enforcement agencieshave an inherent responsibility to protect innocent lifeand their negative reaction to some requests from themedia will often be driven by that motive.The implication for crisis managers, however, is thatthe incident should be managed to avoid creating a situationwhere an emergency assault is necessary. The useof force to end an incident should be a deliberate policydecision and a last resort. This requires clear decisionsin advance concerning the limits of negotiations and theacceptable threshold for the use of violence.The final phase is the investigation where the policehave to draw together all the available evidence tofacilitate prosecutions and inquiries. This is normalpolice work, but in the case of terrorism, some additionalconsiderations are present. For example, theterrorist may have come from thousands of kilometresaway to commit the crime and may or may nothave known the victims. Thus the collection of evidenceabout the motives of the terrorists will requirethe cooperation of overseas agencies and little will beavailable locally. There is also an additional dimensionwhen non-police agencies (such as the ADF) areinvolved in activities which result in the deaths of terrorists.Arrangements for this are included in theNATP. but much of the detail will need to be workedout at the time.Public Information and MediaManagementThe problems of public information and mediamanagement are perhaps the most difficult to manageeffectively because of the conflicting interestsbetween law enforcement agencies and the media.These are problems that the SAC-PAV has beenattempting to resolve for some years with only limitedsuccess. No one would deny that the law enforcementagencies are responsible ultimately to the public, butthe nature and amount of detail that can be releasedmust be balanced against the need to protect innocentlife. Those in the greatest danger are undoubtedly thehostages, so great care is taken to ensure that no informationthat could irritate the hostage takers to theextent of causing them to cause injury to or kill ahostage is made public. The lack of substantial successhas, in part, been due to the lack of a real appreciationBrrnmigS^V *;' - -/.BTS-ymff~ r &LA&fcThe media are always there.