Terror Matrix: Current Threats Facing U.S.

WASHINGTON - The day after the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, President George Bush notified Congress that he was renewing the national emergency he announced in 2001 for another year. He also extended the powers that go along with it.

A national emergency gives the president the authority to take over certain elements of the economy that might be an asset, such as companies that work with certain raw materials. He can order the intelligence agencies to take extraordinary actions and he can suspend habeas corpus.

Bush said he extended it because of the "continuing and immediate threat of further attacks on the United States."

What are the threats and how does the intelligence community figure out which are of greatest concern? The best way to answer is to visit the nerve center of counter-terrorism.

Press spokesman Carl Kropf opened the door to a large suite of second floor offices at the National Counter Terrorism Center and led me in to see the director of the center Vice Adm. John Scott Redd -- the man that I often call "E.F. Hutton."

E.F. Hutton & Co. was one of the most respected financial firms in the United States for several decades. The company was best known for its commercials in the 1970s and 1980s based on the phrase, "When E.F. Hutton talks, people listen."

Redd rarely grants interviews. My first and last one until now was late December 2005. It was an eye-opener for me, and several other media organizations that quoted the interview.

This recent interview would prove to be no disappointment. Redd, Chief of Staff Joseph Stewart and NCTC Deputy Director Russ Travers met us at the entrance to Redd's office.

Just as we walked in, Fox News National Security Correspondent Catherine Herridge was doing a liveshot on one of several large wall-mounted flat-screen TV sets. She was talking about a radical Islamic Web site message threatening an attack on Manhattan.

That set the tone for the interview.

"Let me try to put that in context for you -- everyday, NCTC gets thousands of pieces of information related to terrorism."

He said they sort the item, as do all the other elements of the intelligence community.

"We go through each one of them taking nothing off the table automatically. And we try and say which of these are we most worried about."

On that morning, 23 items made the "threat matrix," which is a list of major threats that were reported for that morning. The website threat was one of them. The fact that it made it into the matrix meant it was significant.

It fell into the category of "chatter."

"The specific issue that comes up very often is the issue of chatter. That has been used by a number of people as an indication that something is about to happen," Redd said. "We clearly take it seriously but again each piece of it has to be looked at on its merits. What's the source? Is it credible?"

In this case, the Web site threat turned out to be empty, but halfway around the world in Denmark and Germany, very serious and very real threats were unfolding.

Redd didn't talk specifics, but he did say al Qaida is "moving into a higher tempo of operations."

"What we're not sure of, and what we don't have as much information on, are the more tactical details -- the who, what, where and when of the threat."

The warning the terrorists may be loose somewhere in the country raised a big question. Does the government's terrorist screening process actually work?

Travers said 'yes,' and laid out the proof.

"There have been people who have ultimately conducted suicide attacks overseas that have been prevented from coming into the country."

He would not go any further on that matter because of professional restrictions, but he was referring to cases like the one where a traveler from the Middle East arrived at Chicago's O'Hare Airport in June of 2003 and was turned around because he was on the list. Two years later his fingerprints were found on the steering wheel of truck used in a suicide bombing in Iraq that killed 132 people.

So that part of the system works, but "as we saw on 9-11, the 19 hijackers used 362 odd aliases. That's a challenge for us."

That memory of that aspect of Sept. 11 cuts deeply in the intelligence community and the German plot ripped the scab off it before it was healed.

The reason? The Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks were planned in Germany. And as the details of last week's plot emerge, we're beginning to learn just how serious it was. CIA Director Michael Hayden said to have been concerned enough about it that he traveled there and talked about "threats" in a speech at the Council on Foreign Relations last Friday.

Analysts assess with high confidence that al-Qaida's central leadership is planning high-impact plots against the U.S. homeland. Second, they assess that al-Qaida has protected or regenerated key elements of its homeland attack capability. That means safe haven in the Tribal Areas of Pakistan, operational lieutenants, and a top leadership engaged in planning.

Al-Qaida's success with the remaining element-planting operatives in this country is less certain.

Third, they assess whether al-Qaida is focusing on targets that would produce mass casualties, dramatic destruction, and significant economic aftershocks.

And based on information from German sources, this plot was the real deal and there is evidence that had it not been foiled, today might might have been eerily similar to Sept 11, 2001.