Intelligence computing capabilities will need to be substantially improved to counter terrorism.–Ed
There were a lot of computers in and around WTC. Somebody’s going to have to replace them.
This will be rather good news for some vendors, but it will still be little more than a drop in the bucket compared to worldwide sales.
No, where I see growth is in something I’m calling the Terrornet.
The reason why is simple. Terrorism is like weeds in an unkempt field. You can pull out, torture, incinerate and perform all the crimes against weedity you like, but so long as the field is unkempt, new weeds will grow.
While it would be helpful to do something about the ground, for reasons I’ll talk about at a later time, even under the best of circumstances, it will take a long, long time to keep the ground from growing weeds. Probably not in my lifetime, and certainly not in a few years.
So what you end up doing if you don’t want weeds is to watch the field constantly and nip any new weeds in the bud.
Intelligence and Communications
Western intelligence desperately needs to improve human intelligence. This will be very hard to do and will take a lot of time, simply because they don’t exactly put want ads out for executive positions in terrorist organizations. I don’t even want to know the what and wherefors on that.
However, besides getting more and better information, we also desperately need to make better, faster use of what we’re getting now.
And what others are getting, too.
I’m sure the negotiations will be . . . interesting, but, starting fairly shortly behind the scenes, and over the next few years, expect to see an explosion in orders for the creation of the “Terrornet.”
There’s certainly some elements of that now, but what we’re talking about is the ability to access data from a variety of different sources and different countries from one place.
We’re talking about building SECURE international networks, and somehow I don’t think the Internet is going to cut it.
More computers everywhere, especially for Third World intelligence organizations. Networks to back them up. Extreme encryption. Plenty of much more exotic stuff. And Uncle Sam footing most of the bill.
Vendors, start your engines. 🙂
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