The Hostage Rescue Team demonstrates an entry at the Tactical Firearms Facility at Quantico. Part of the FBI's Critical Incident Response Group, the team is called when an American is taken hostage anywhere or when there is a barricade situation, high-risk arrest, manhunt or threat of weapons of mass destruction. rdt View and ORDER more photos.

FBI's Critical Incident Response Group in North Stafford stands ready for crises.

By PAMELA GOULD

Date published: 3/28/2004

When Elizabeth Smart was spirited away from her Salt Lake City bedroom, they responded.

When the USS Cole was attacked in a Yemeni port, they were quickly airborne.

And when sniper attacks terrorized the Washington region, they were in the air and on the ground in the hunt.

Whenever there's a major crisis--anywhere in the world--the FBI looks to North Stafford.

There, at locations both on and off the FBI Academy grounds, is a cadre of highly trained specialists known as the Critical Incident Response Group.

It's a crew of 300-plus men and women who thrive on crisis and keep "ready bags" at hand--packed with the essentials so they can pick up and go.

"We're expected to be on the cutting edge in crisis management in whatever skill it might be," said J. Stephen Tidwell, CIRG's newly appointed leader.

From tactical assaults to negotiations, from command posts to aerial surveillance, from crime analysis to criminal profiling, CIRG (pronounced "serg") is counted on to provide the expertise needed.

It's a group whose original mission was counterterrorism and which, as it prepares to celebrate its 10th anniversary next month, is constantly honing its skills in anticipation of the next challenge.

For Tidwell, the special agent in charge, managing this group of ever-ready men and women is the best assignment possible.

"This," he said, "would be my dream job."

After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III shifted the bureau's crime-fighting focus to counterterrorism.

But while CIRG made some adjustments after that directive, this segment of the FBI didn't need to make dramatic changes.

The first component of what would eventually become the Critical Incident Response Group was created in 1983.

The FBI's Hostage Rescue Team was established after a call from top Justice Department officials for a special counterterrorism unit somewhere in law enforcement. HRT was to be equipped for tactical response to any terrorist threat nationwide.

Today, HRT's response range has no borders, and it is part of the Tactical Support Branch--one of four components that make up CIRG.

CIRG was formally established in April 1994 in response to the Branch Davidian standoff in Waco, Texas, one year earlier.

FBI Director Louis B. Freeh, who took office five months after the siege, wanted a team to better handle incidents involving hostages and barricades.

Date published: 3/28/2004