ENGINEERING AGAINST TERRORISM: HOW ARCHITECTS TRY TO SECURE US EMBASSIES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000100210005-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 20, 2011
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: February 5, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/20 CIA-RDP90-00965R000100210005-6
ARTICLE A p FEARED
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CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR
5 February 1985
Engineering a4wnst terrorism: ho
architects, try to secure US embassies
By Scott Armstrong _ -
Staff writer of The Chnstian Science Monitor
. Mounting concern over worldwide terrorism is -sending
architects and engineers back to their drafting tables to
come up with building designs less vulnerable to attack.
Perhaps nowhere is the need for blending security with
architecture more pressing today than at United States em-
bassies and other government missions' overseas.
The US State Department is in the midst of one of the
most extensive efforts in its history to upgrade security at
foreign missions, fortified by a $366 million program
passed by Congress last fall.
It is also underwriting research
into ways of making future build-
ings less assailable -and setting
standards for security enhance-
ment - as well as seeking fresh
ideas on everything from new ar-
mor plating for cars to tougher'
window materials.
While the research is just begin.
Wing, one thing seems clear. The
shape of tomorrow's embassies
will not resemble those of the past,
when the stress was on open, airy,
glass structures on easily accessi-
main roadways - symbols, of
ble
America as a free society.
"I think we will never see the
kinds of designs that were,popular -
in the 1950s," says Robert-Lamb,
assistant secretary of state for 'ad-
ministration, who is in charge of
day-to-day management of, State"
Designing structures that will
limit intrusions is not just -a mod-
em challenge. It has been carried
out in one form or another at least
since the days when the first vil-
lages were surrounded by moats
and ramparts. US missions in for--
eign countries,, though, pose :
usual problems of their own..Fbr:'l
starters, there's the obvious one of
embassy compounds being', "ii-
lands" in a host country They are
dependent, to a large degree, on the
local government forprotection -'
be it friendly or not, able or other-
wise to ensure security.
Buildings today also have to be
designed to minimize risk of a vari-
ety of threats: from hostile mobs to
sniper attacks to car-bomb' terror--
ists. There are also local consider-
ations that limit what US officials
can do in altering the design of existing buildings in certain
cases: Some offices are leased or in historic buildings and
can't be modified at will. Underlying any effort to improve
security at foreign missions, though, is one central di-
lemma: the need to balance security without turning em-
bassies - for years, reflections of America's open demo-
cratic values - into bunkerll a structures.
"The State Department's job is to conduct the affairs of
state, and you 'can't do that by going into .biding,". says
Stuart L Knoop, president of Oudens & Knoop, a Wash-
ington, D.C., architecture firm that specializes in designing
US - concern - about buttressing buildings to guard
against terrorism is a recurring one, but over the past year
worries have intensified. They sharpened With the attacks
on US posts in Beirut and Kuwait, as well as with the mur-
ders of US diplomats in Europe and Central. America. Re-
cent terrorist hits on North Atlantic Treaty Organization
targets and a videotaped message of US Embassy officer-
William Buckley, one of five Americans kidnapped in Bei-
rut in the past yeah were painful reminders of the thregt.
acmg_US interests abroad, too.
Between-1979 and 1984, the State Department increased
expenditures on security worldwide -roughly'fivefold. This
year the department is nearly doubling its allotment for se-
curity, again, to $433 million, which includes some of the '
funding from last year's supplemental $366 million pack-
age. In the past four months alone, some 1, 300 requests for
security . projects at missions around the world have piled;
up on the department's desks. Many changes have already.
- been made. Walls, bollards,.. guard booths, and special:
doors, among other things, have been put in at various
-posts Some mmissions .are virtual bunkers~--protec ted -by -
rocketshields andbomb deflec-
t'..tors
More is coming Roughly half of
1 last. year's -special .congressional
package will go for 1'1 new out-
posts and two major renovations at
unusually. .'"high ; risk" sites,
mostly in the .Middle -East. The
new buildings will start going in
next summer. The National Acad-
STAT
emy of Sciences' National Re-.
search Council, meanwhile, has set
up a committee to look into ideas
;for enhancing security-- every-
thing from new building materials
to electronic measures - and will
suggest specific design criteria. -
To be sure, bricks and mortar
alone cannot a - terrorist thwart.
"There . are no miracle solutions
which will make these buildings to- Continued
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000100210005-6
 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000100210005-6
tally safe," says Paul Weidlinger,
president of Weidlinger Associ-
ates, a New York engineering firm
.that has prepared a report for the
State Department on enhancing se-
curity. But experts agree that bet-
ter designs and other security pre-
cautions can repel certain types of
intrusions and limit the damage
others might cause..
Among the changes that Mc
Weidlinger and Mr. Knoop, both
on the Research Council commit-
tee, see at future embassies:
? Fewer windows, particularly
on lower levels. This doesn't mean
that buildings need be fortresses,
says Knoop, who cites some muse-
ums and theaters as. examples of
-attractive but secure structures.
Where windows -are put in, more
will be shatter-resistant. Many in-
juries at last year's embassy attack
in. Beirut were caused by flying
glass:: New high-strength window
materials are being looked at
? The siting of embassies-will become more important.
Fewer will likely be placed right on heavily trafficked thor-
oughfares, says Knoop. They will likely sit on larger par-
cels of land to help distance buildings from outside areas.
Within a building, most people could. be situated so their
offices were away from the street-side.
? Structures with underground parking garages or built
on stilts will probably be avoided. It's too easy for car
bombs to be planted..
? Fewer flammable materials will likely be used in
buildings, to avert damage from bomb attacks.
used more to Help control vehicles and to screen windows
from the view of snipers.
All this, of course;would-be dovetailed with_other pre-
cautions (guards, metal detectors, crash barriers] that are
becoming routine parts of embassy compounds. "If its a
trade-off between openness and human: life,'we are going to
'
go with human life," says Iamb" ; ,
esda`y column
? Landscaping-shrubs, trees, earth. berms can be
2.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000100210005-6