is this something that changes year after year wholly or do we see the nypd responding to threats that they ve seen over the course of the year? effectively, what you have is a constant evolution of trying to prevent terrorist attacks. so, for example, in 2014 with the emergence of isis as a terrorist entity and caliphate for a short period of time in syria. my time as commissioner we significantly enhance what my commissioner kelly has put together in terms of counterterrorism capability after 9/11. we added to that almost 1,300 uniformed officers and you are showing the officers equip would the helmets and the long guns. that was part of that evolution. what is going on in times square, a significant increase in numbers of personnel.
like saudi arabia and our friends in the gulf. and so we do worry about how to effectively maneuver pakistan out of support for the rebls or the taliban in afghanistan. and so far no administration has figured out how to do this. so is the president right when he says we re losing the war in afghanistan? and if he is right, what does winning look like? well, i think we re basically in there for intelligence purposes to prevent the emergence of ungoverned spaces in which a new terrorist entity like an isis could take form and then muster resources to threaten u.s. interests elsewhere in the world. so we re in there for our own purposes right now. but the afghan government that we re supporting is not able to maintain control of all the province and districts in the country. and that s why people say we re losing those privilege insz or those districts are one by one suck cumming to taliban attack
i would think, sean, it would on be if there were some time of imminent threat to the united states of america. a direct tie or close tie to a terrorist organization, terrorist entity, someone with known connections to terror. maybe under those circumstances. but i got off the phone with two former cia officials right before i came on with you. both of them, they don t even know each other. but both of them said that her comment that, well, when i see something interesting, basically i ask for more information. both of them said that s just not how it works. you have to have a specific reason for pulling the identity of an american that s caught up in one of these webs. she gave the scenario of the american bomb maker. that s obviously not what was going on here. sean: my understanding and the intelligence sources that i have tell me that for you to
schools as well. that s certainly going to take some time. we know that lapd is working with the fbi on this. they are certainly going to sweep through all schools and make sure they are safe before students can return to school, if that happens, tomorrow. miguel, stand by. joining me now, nbc news law enforcement animal cyst, retired atf special agent jim cavanaugh. jim, let s talk about the process here. if this report is accurate here, this threat according to the associated press was sent to a school board member and appeared to come from overseas. how would they determine that? well, it might of course the ip address if they checked it. they could have had some language or language they believe maybe was from a terrorist entity by what they were threatening. the school superintendent did say it was a rare threat. that they get a lot of threats in schools but this threat was rare and unusual so they took those steps. as you ve been so accurately
that s the other piece here. you have the pr military component going forward an the serious diplomatic track. such a three dimensional chess game. think of all the interest groups in there, the saudis, iranians in there, who isn t in there and tied to some other terrorist entity. iranians with hezbollah. we could go on and on and on. this is not a simple problem to solve by any stretch of the imagination. that s certainly true but there are precedence. there was a civil war in lebanon solved. the key thing having these various groups they are the iranians, saudis, having them at the table, forcing iranians, saudis, the turks to deal with each other and come to some sort of accommodation and have a cease fire and negotiated settlement in syria is essential and for the first time in four years we are looking at that as a real possibility.