al Qaeda has been badly splintered, and smaller groups will bring ‘the next wave’ of anti-U.S. violence
Law Enforcement should be aware of the continued domestic terrorist threat by smaller factions of the global al Qaeda organization. Police1 and other organizations have recently received information about al Qaeda terrorists operating “sleeper cells” scattered throughout the United States. These small groups silently move into the general population and assist in the acquisition of safe houses and equipment, conduct pre-attack surveillance, and relay messages from terrorist leaders and planners.
FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III said Tuesday during a Senate hearing there are “strong indications” that al Qaeda remains focused on striking a number of U.S. facilities that it has targeted in the past, including the White House and the U.S. Capitol. He said the terrorist network “retains a cadre of supporters within the United States,” and is seeking to recruit more. While most are engaged in fundraising, recruitment and logistics, he said, others have been involved in operational planning.
CIA Director George J. Tenet warned that a wave of smaller, scattered terrorist organizations was eclipsing al Qaeda as the most serious threat to the United States and its allies, and that Iraq was increasingly seen as a “golden opportunity” for jihadist groups to rally their cause.
Tenet told the Senate panel that al Qaeda had been badly damaged by military and intelligence operations after the Sept. 11 attacks, but that the network had splintered into a collection of smaller franchises -- and inspired the proliferation of others -- that see the United States as their main enemy and prime target.
Describing the rise of such organizations as “the next wave of the terrorist threat,” Tenet said al Qaeda’s message and methods have spread so swiftly that “a serious threat will remain for the foreseeable future, with or without al Qaeda in the picture.”
“These far-flung groups increasingly set the agenda and are redefining the threat we face,” Tenet said, pointing to attacks by these organizations in countries from Morocco to Indonesia. “They are not all creatures of [Osama] bin Laden, and so their fate is not tied to his. They have autonomous leadership, they pick their own targets, they plan their own attacks.”
This all pointed to a disturbing rise in anti-American sentiment around the world and suggested that Iraq is emerging as a rallying point for jihadists and a potential training ground for future terrorists.
Tenet said that al Qaeda continues to lose operational havens and that “Bin Laden has gone deep underground.” But he stressed that al Qaeda remains committed to striking the United States and cited several previously undisclosed plots.
Terrorists linked to al Qaeda have sought to recruit pilots during the last year, Tenet said, adding that “catastrophic attacks” on the scale of Sept. 11 remain within al Qaeda’s reach. Such concerns have prompted the cancellation of a number of transatlantic flights recently.
“Across the operational spectrum -- air, maritime, special weapons -- we have time and again uncovered plots that are chilling,” Tenet said. He said that al Qaeda and “more than two dozen other terrorist groups” are seeking to obtain chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear weapons.
“We particularly see a heightened risk of poison attacks,” he said. “Extremists have widely disseminated assembly instructions for an improvised chemical weapon using common materials that could cause a large number of casualties in a crowded, enclosed area.”
