CIA Director: Top Ten Terror Threats

Outgoing CIA Chief Michael Hayden lists Top Ten Terror Threats

1. Al Qaeda: “It is the organization that has the capacity to most threaten the physical safety of America and Americans. So it remains job No. 1. And we have talked about some successes and so on, but it is resilient, and therefore we have to continue to keep an eye on Al Qaeda,” he said.

2. Violence in Mexico: “Our good friend and neighbor Mexico had this horrible surge in violence that may cause — in fact has caused — us to talk with our Mexican friends, in more meaningful and deeper ways, to discover ways that we can cooperate against what we now view to be, and has always been, a common problem. …

“What you’ve got is President Calderon, very heroically, taking on drug cartels that I think everyone agrees threaten certainly the well-being of the Mexican people and the Mexican state, and taking them on in a very, very progressive way. Now, it is not quite the same thing as Colombia, where you had a politically motivated movement, the FARC, merging with narcotics organizations. Here it is largely in the business of crime but the effects could be just as dangerous, certainly to the well-being of the Mexican people.”

3. Iran’s nuclear program: “I included Iran, in terms of as they move forward in their own decision-making process, as they continue to churn out LEU, low enriched uranium, they do it at great cost, diplomatically and economically with regard to sanctions. They seem to be doing it with a purpose. As that quantity of that stockpile grows, you would think that at some point in that process, they are going to have to make a decision as to what it is they are going to do with it. So that is something we have to keep a close eye on as well.”

Read Full Article

Bin Laden Alive, Hiding and Worried About Own Security

Osama bin Laden is alive and hiding in Pakistan, said CIA chief Michael Hayden today, though the terrorism leader has little oversight of the al Qaeda daily operations.

“American and its friends have taken the fight to the enemy,” Gen. Hayden said in a broad roundup of efforts to fight al Qaeda.

“Al Qaeda has suffered serious setbacks, but it is a determined, adaptive enemy unlike any our nation has ever faced,” he said.

Without directly referring to the CIA’s offensive blitz of unmanned missile attacks in the tribal areas of Pakistan, the CIA boss said the US had successfully isolated the al Qaeda leader bin Laden, referring to him in the present tense.

“He appears to be largely isolated from the day-to-day operations of the organization he leads,” Hayden said in a speech delivered to the Atlantic Council in Washington.

Hayden said the failure to kill or capture bin Laden in the seven years since the 9/11 attacks, could be explained by the “rugged and inaccessible” terrain of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area and “the fact that bin Laden has worked to avoid detection.”

The CIA director provided no other details but it was the first public indication of the intelligence agency’s growing effort to narrow the focus of the search for bin Laden and other top terror leaders.

Source