OK, WHAT DO WE KNOW
The government says it has multiple credible sources, and we know they hate raising the alert level because they're afraid the more they do so the more people (amazingly) just stop paying attention. (What really gets me is that people seem to be ignoring the raised alerts based on the peverse logic that every other time the alerts have been raised, well, nothing's happened. A friend of mine who's an intelligence expert, and who taught this stuff for years, calls this the "warning paradox." The simple act of providing warning can stop the bad guys from being able to carry out their plans. Maybe they decide since you seem to aware now isn't a good time and bail. Maybe because you are more alert you catch something that utterly throws them off -- maybe without even realizing that's what you've done, say by not letting someone into the country with a questionable visa. But when nothing you suggested might happen does happen, rather than thanking you, the people you warned all look at you and you and say, "well? where's the big bad?" and it leads everyone, including you, to question your next warning.)
We also know that the word has been that al Queda was most likely too disrupted to launch another September 11-style terrorist spectacular. But that assumes one where the planning got underway after we disrupted their base in Afghanistan. Assuming it generally took them roughly two years or more from planning through execution, it's plausible something was set in motion prior to the time they were rendered incapable of pulling something that elaborate off, and it's just now coming close to fruition. Possible that the wheels were set in motion and left to roll independently even as the rest of the al Queda hierarchy went crashing down and went into hiding? Possible, if they had preplanned for the financing and control to move independently on the assumption these operatives would be cut off.
We also know that there had been a history of attacks coming after tapes from the al Queda leadership in the past, enough of a correlation that when tapes come in from the very top spokespeople, it always gets analysts' attention.
As to targets, obviously New York and Washington will always be targets, but we also know al Queda likes to return to the scene when it has tried and failed -- and it failed in Los Angeles with the Millenium bombing plot. Too often we forget to worry about threats to the west coast.
Are we safer than we were on September 11th? Immeasurably. But lets be realistic. For one thing that's because on the morning of September 11th, we thought it was good enough to basically have ticket agents ask you if you packed a bomb in your suitcase, and if you said no, they took your word for it. Looking to make improvements in the security of commercial air travel was like being the first guy with a telescope and hoping to make some interesting observations -- it just wasn't going to be that hard. By the same token, there was so much to get done, and it was going to be so difficult to do quickly, that looking to find things that haven't been done yet, well, we're still talking about our guy with a telescope. Ports. Air freight. Chemical plants. Nuclear plants. And on and on and on.
I went to a conference on Homeland Security once. Smart people, none of them struck me as alarmist, all very dedicated. I left with enough scenarios in my head to keep me awake for a week.
There are often legitimate criticisms made of this administration that boil down to disputes over the speed with which resources have been distributed. There are other criticisms which boil down to disputes over priorities -- you say ports should come first, I say air freight, he says chemical plants.
But be advised, there are other criticisms that are just cheap shots. Because since terrorism is a target of opportunity player, you can never, at some level, pay enough or do enough. If you hear some politician complaining that first responders haven't gotten the equipment they need, stop and ask: which first responders? Surely every First Responder within, say, 50 miles of New York City should be able to communicate, if need be, on the same frequency and have whatever hazmat suits they deem prudent. Does the Fire Department in lovely hamlet of North East Central Nowhere in Upstate New York really need the latest in hazmat gear in fear of a biological terrorist strike? Don't think so.
We'll hear all sorts of things about the motivation behind raising the alert level. I do think it's absurd that in two years we haven't been able to come up with something a little bit more calebrated than a national alert level. It sounds like in this case it suits -- they know something's up, but not a particular geographic target, aren't even completely convinced they know of a given sector of the economy (in other words, they wouldn't be completely comfortable only putting air travel on alert, as opposed to say, trucking, or retail areas of downtowns.) Still, we should have an alert system that allowed for that.
Just the same, we may hear that this is a "cya" move, or that it's somehow motivated by something other than real concern about a possible attack. Put it this way -- even Howard Dean gets it. (Hat tip: Buzzmachine.)
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