JUSTICE DEPARTMENT, STATE DEPARTMENT TO CONDUCT EXERCISES COMBATING WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION

State And Local Law Enforcement/Emergency Responders From
Illinois, Washington And Canada To Participate

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The Department of Justice and the Department of State have commenced planning and execution of domestic preparedness exercises of how the nation will respond in the event of an attack using weapons of mass destruction.

The Congressionally-mandated response exercise, Top Officials 2 (TOPOFF 2), will take place in the Chicago and Seattle metropolitan areas in May 2003. The exercise series will also include participation by the government of Canada, as events involving weapons of mass destruction near the northern U.S. border would have an impact on Canada and require cross-border coordination.

These exercise scenarios will enable top officials and relevant personnel to practice different courses of action, gain and maintain situational awareness, as well as to assemble appropriate resources. Top federal officials, state governors, mayors, city managers, along with state and local personnel will be key participants and play active roles throughout the exercise.

While the exercise scenario, extent of damage, and level of threat are based on a hypothetical situation and are not intended as a forecast of future terrorist-related events, it does reflect the current threat to the United States. The exercises consist of simulated weapons of mass destruction incidents; there will be no release of any actual agents.

"After the brutal attacks of September 11th, the importance of TOPOFF 2 is greater than ever," said Attorney General John Ashcroft. "I believe that this exercise will significantly improve our nation's ability to respond to a terrorist event."

"TOPOFF 2 embodies the spirit of international cooperation that surfaced in the aftermath of September 11th," stated Secretary of State Colin L. Powell. "It is this cooperation that will help defeat terrorism worldwide."

The first TOPOFF exercise, TOPOFF 2000 was conducted in May 2000, and was a single, no-notice full-scale exercise to combat terrorism. It simulated a terrorist campaign that included a bioterrorism attack in Colorado, a chemical weapons attack in New Hampshire, and in a concurrent exercise (National Capital Region 2000), the detonation of a radiological dispersal device in the D.C. metropolitan area. More than 6,000 federal, state and local participants were engaged in unclassified and classified round-the-clock play.

Unlike TOPOFF 2000, TOPOFF 2 will use a cycle of exercise activity of increasing complexity. The exercise series will culminate in a full-scale exercise in May 2003, allowing top officials to join all participants in the exercise. The TOPOFF 2 exercise series will focus on a limited number of critical crisis and consequence management objectives.

The goals of TOPOFF 2 are to improve the nation's capacity to manage extreme events; create broader operating frameworks of expert crisis and consequence management systems; validate authorities, strategies, plans, policies, procedures, and protocols; and build a sustainable, systematic national exercise program to support the national strategy for homeland security.

The Department of Justice's Office for Domestic Preparedness, in conjunction with the Department of State's Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism, established a group of federal, state, local and Canadian interagency partners to develop the concept and conduct planning for TOPOFF 2. The exercise series formally began on July 17-18, 2002 with the first seminar, "Public Communications in a Weapons of Mass Destruction Incident." A subsequent bioterrorism seminar was held in Chicago on September 17-18, 2002.

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