Warning Made on Homeland Terror
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
WASHINGTON – National intelligence director Mike McConnell said today that American authorities are worried about “sleeper cells” of would-be terrorists inside America and are remaining vigilant against any new attacks.
On the sixth anniversary of the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people in New York, Washington, and in western Pennsylvania, Mr. McConnell also said plots against America have been thwarted. But he said he can make no safety guarantees.
“We’re safer but we’re not safe,” he said in an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”
Mr. McConnell said that Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda terrorist network “intends to have an operation in the United States that will result in mass casualties.”
“We have stopped some efforts and we must stop all efforts. We’re not sure we can stop 100% of them,” he said.
Mr. McConnell spoke as American intelligence experts continued to assess the latest messages from Mr. bin Laden. In a new video released today, Mr. bin Laden urged sympathizers to join the “caravan” of martyrs and he praised one of the September 11, 2001, suicide hijackers.
The intelligence czar said he could not immediately read anything substantial into Mr. bin Laden’s tape.
“We look at these tapes very, very closely,” he said. Mr. McConnell said that Mr. bin Laden remains a prodigious threat to America, but said the “intellectual leader” of Al Qaeda is an Egyptian, Ayman al-Zawahiri.
The search goes on for Mr. bin Laden, believed to be hiding in the mountains of Pakistan near the Afghanistan border, but he remains elusive.
“Finding a single human being in the billions that are on the earth, that wants to remain hidden … makes it very, very difficult,” Mr. McConnell said, acknowledging that Mr. bin Laden has been “virtually enjoying a safe haven.”
” … Even if we did find him and remove him from the scene, he would be seen as a martyr,” he said of Mr. bin Laden.
“We worry about sleeper cells in the United States,” Mr. McConnell added. “There are Al Qaeda sympathizers … but so far we have not been able to identify them.”
“The worry is that we have to maintain our vigilance,” he said. “We have stopped many efforts to come into the United States, so we have been successful. But we cannot let our guard down.”
Mr. McConnell also said that, so far, American authorities have not been able to “identify” any groups which may have gained access to nuclear materials.
