Commission: Bio attack likely in next 5 years

[JohnP]

Commission: Bio attack likely in next 5 years

By Pamela Hess - The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Dec 1, 2008 22:16:52 EST

WASHINGTON — The United States can expect a terrorist attack using nuclear or more likely biological weapons before 2013, reports a bipartisan commission in a study being briefed Tuesday to Vice President-elect Joe Biden.

It suggests the Obama administration bolster efforts to counter and prepare for germ warfare by terrorists.

“Our margin of safety is shrinking, not growing,” states the report, obtained by The Associated Press. It is scheduled to be publicly released Wednesday.

The commission is also encouraging the new White House to appoint one official on the National Security Council to exclusively coordinate U.S. intelligence and foreign policy on combatting the spread of nuclear and biological weapons.

The report of the Commission on the Prevention of WMD Proliferation and Terrorism, led by former Sens. Bob Graham of Florida and Jim Talent of Tennessee, acknowledges that terrorist groups still lack the needed scientific and technical ability to make weapons out of pathogens or nuclear bombs. But it warns that gap can be easily overcome, if terrorists find scientists willing to share or sell their know-how.

“The United States should be less concerned that terrorists will become biologists and far more concerned that biologists will become terrorists,” the report states.

The commission believes biological weapons are more likely to be obtained and used before nuclear or radioactive weapons because nuclear facilities are more carefully guarded. Civilian laboratories with potentially dangerous pathogens abound, however, and could easily be compromised.

“The biological threat is greater than the nuclear; the acquisition of deadly pathogens, and their weaponization and dissemination in aerosol form, would entail fewer technical hurdles than the theft or production of weapons-grade uranium or plutonium and its assembly into an improvised nuclear device,” states the report.

It notes that the U.S. government’s counterproliferation activities have been geared toward preventing nuclear terrorism. The commission recommends the prevention of biological terrorism be made a higher priority.

Study chairman Graham said anthrax remains the most likely biological weapon. However, he told the AP that contagious diseases — like the flu strain that killed 40 million at the beginning of the 20th century — are looming threats. That virus has been recreated in scientific labs, and there remains no inoculation to protect against it if is stolen and released.

Graham said the threat of a terrorist attack using nuclear or biological weapons is growing “not because we have not done positive things but because adversaries are moving at an even faster pace to increase their access” to those materials.

He noted last week’s rampage by a small group of gunmen in Mumbai.

“If those people had had access to a biological or nuclear weapon they would have multiplied by orders of magnitude the deaths they could have inflicted,” he said.

Al-Qaida remains the only terrorist group judged to be actively intent on conducting a nuclear attack against the United States, the report notes. It is not yet capable of building such a weapon and has yet to obtain one. But that could change if a nuclear weapons engineer or scientist were recruited to al-Qaida’s cause, the report warns.

The report says the potential nexus of terrorism, nuclear and biological weapons is especially acute in Pakistan.

“Were one to map terrorism and weapons of mass destruction today, all roads would intersect in Pakistan,” the report states.

In fact, commission members were forced to cancel their trip to Pakistan this fall. The Islamabad Marriott Hotel that commission members were to stay in was blown up by terrorist bombs just hours before they were to check in.

“We think time is not our ally. The (United States) needs to move with a sense of urgency,” Graham said

It's time to think, troopers.

[03_SHOOTER]

Not to repeat myself from the other thread, but this is precisely why we need to have the vast majority of resources, especially in the area of WMD response and disaster relief, directed toward our National Guard units, and away from the AD component.

The era of the Soviet Union is over, and the possibility of our having to face massed troop concentrations, multiple divisions of armor screaming through the Fulda Gap, and the sky blackened with Bear and Backfire bombers dropping all manner of WMD's, Hell bent on the destruction of Western Europe are over. While it is possible that our AD troops may, at some time during the course of the GWOT, face WMD's in the field, the chances of their facing the sheer overwhelming amount previously predicted are somewhere between less than 1/10th of slim, and none, while the very real possibility of a massive strike happening here at home increase with every day that passes, given the nonchalant attitude of our elected mis-representatives toward securing our borders as well as ensuring that everyone that is already here on any type of Visa is in fact who they say they are, and that they are in fact here on the "business or pleasure" for which they purported to be here on their Visa application.

Let us not forget that the 9-11 terrorists, who came here (albeit under false pretense) were here on expired Visa's issued by our own State Department, and it was that same said State Department who failed to ensure that they were rounded up and thrown out once their Visa's expired!!

For the better part of the 50's, and into the early 60's, many Americans lived under the daily knowledge that we were but a hairs breadth from nuclear attack, and we were as prepared for it as our society could be without "losing our souls", yet today the vast majority of the sheeple are wandering around, completely oblivious of the very real threats we face. Perhaps it is because the enemy we face today isn't a Nation State, with their own flag, and their own massive military industrial complex, constantly rattling their sabers in an attempt to cow us into submission, with the avowed policy of subjugating us, but a much more insidious enemy, who operate in small cells, and who aren't the slightest bit concerned with subjugating us, their only desire is to KILL us, and if they die in the process, so much the better, and the average American simply cannot comprehend such hatred, and therefore chooses to not believe it at all.

To exacerbate the problem, there is no such Nation State as "Al Qaeda" or "Talibanistan" that we can simply bomb back to the stone age, for as we have seen, the nations that these cells operate out of are still IN the stone age. They have no central base that we can attack, there are not massed formations that we can call air strikes in on, they don't even have a central "Command and Control" that we could strike in order to decapitate their leadership. Instead we already face the Lernaean Hydra, but unlike Hercules, we are not (contrary to popular myth) the direct descendants of the Gods and possessed of super human strength, so we must instead, like Hercules and Iolaus, rely on cunning, wit, all of the weapons at our disposal (especially the unconventional ones), and the assistance of our allies to destroy our enemy before he can destroy us.

Perhaps our biggest obstacle though are the "domestic enemies" in the form of our own brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, fathers, mothers, 'friends', and neighbors who not only refuse to acknowledge the threat we face, but who, whether it be through ignorance, stupidity, or what has come to be known as BDS (Bush Derangement Syndrome), but actively seek to damage or destroy our means and ability to fight the real enemy. These people are of the same ilk as the ones that Lenin referenced when the spoke of "useful idiots", and whether we choose to admit it or not, they are every bit as dangerous to us as a sheet-headed terrorist with 30 lbs of VX and C-4 on a suicide vest in the middle of the stands on Super Bowl Sunday. There is an old saying that "Dissent is patriotism", and to an extent that is true, BUT once battle has been joined, the form of dissent that has permeated the "lunatic fringe left" can only be classified as one thing, TREASON!

Their activities, including their most visible proponents in our own government like Pelosi, Reed, Murtha, Sestak, Carney, McDermott, Bonior, Mike Thompson, Gilchrest, Kucinich, Kerry, Kennedy, and others, have for the past 8 years, and they continue to do so daily, by their words and deeds, demonstrate their adherence with, and provide "aid and comfort" to our enemies. These traitors, as the legions of others who populate the Daily Kooks, Dim-O-Crap Underground, Moron.org, Huffingbiotch Post, et al, regardless of their protestations to the contrary, have consistently demonstrated that they not only don't care about America, but have continually cheered the loudest at every set-back and defeat we've suffered both here and abroad. It was they who were screaming that "the war is taking too long" less than 2 weeks into combat operations. It was they who were cheering when the Blackwater troops were ambushed, beaten, burned alive, decapitated and dismembered, and their corpses hung from the bridge in Fallujah, and had the temerity to call it "patriotic dissent". It was they who gleefully hailed the incident at Abu Grabass as proof of our inability to conduct a war, and vindication of their opposition to it, and it is they who have used the deaths and injuries of our best and brightest as window dressing for their movement.

Prompted on, or led by, depending on your point of view, the lamestream media who has had a very difficult time in finding column inches recognizing the truly heroic Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, and Coast Guardsmen in Afghanistan and Iraq, have no trouble making a full page available in order to accuse the Commander of those troops in Iraq of betraying us. They can't be bothered to write about the hospitals, schools, and infrastructure projects that are going on in our effort to rebuild Iraq, but they've got lot's of time to write about a lack of body armor, or uparmored Hummers, totally disregarding the fact that in every War in the 20th century, the only "body armor" a Soldier had was a GI shirt and a "steel pot", and that we traversed the world, defeating our enemies in totally unarmored Willys MB's, Ford GBW's, M-38s and M-151's, and that's only when we weren't transported in our own unarmored issue "LPC's" (Leather Personnel Carriers). They had plenty of room in their pages, and hours on their broadcasts to revile Walter Reed for the conditions in the hospital, and conveniently neglecting to mention that it was caused because Congress couldn't be convinced to fund the projects, but not a second or column inch about those who were being treated there, or the dedicated men and women who were, and continue to perform the treatment itself. These are the ones who intentionally and excitedly printed highly classified information about our intelligence gathering capabilities resulting in the loss of that capability, claiming no other reason than "First Amendment Freedom". It is the reports from these news agencies who have time and time again willingly and intentionally endangered the lives of our troops in the field, and DEMANDED to be able to photograph the Flag draped results of their work to put on their front pages the same way a hunter has a trophy mounted and hung on his wall, and they call themselves "patriots".

These are all, the citizens, the Congresscritters and the press, the exact same type of sick and twisted individuals who will take a child and beat it unmercifully, put out cigarettes on it, and/or sodomize it with a broom handle all the while saying "I have to do this because I love you" and "this is for your own good". :devil:

To add insult to injury, these "useful idiots" have now managed to elect one of their own as our new President, which, if he actually enacts half of the things he campaigned on, will lay all of our throats bare to the swords of those enemies, and like the Vichy French traitors during WWII who turned on their own in order to try to save their own skins, they will cry the loudest when they too are executed by their own new masters, with the singular scream "why?" being their last to cross their lips as the dull rusty knife saws their heads off, just like Nick Berg.

Will we be attacked? I do not know, and I pray daily that we aren't, but rest assured, if we are, in my mind there will be no doubt why, and at the feet of whom to lay the responsibility for it, for I have seen the enemy, and he is AMONGST US!

[JohnP]

'03 tell me how you really feel. You shouldn't hold back otherwise you're going to have a stroke or an ulcer....

Now to respond:

As reported to CBS news in 2005: "Sept. 11 ringleader Mohammed Atta and three other hijackers were identified by defense intelligence officials more than a year before the attacks, but information about possible al Qaeda connections never was sent to law enforcement, Rep. Curt Weldon said Tuesday.

The 9/11 Commission will investigate the claim. Commission co-chairman Lee Hamilton said that Weldon's information warrants a review. Hamilton says the commission "did not learn of any U.S. government knowledge prior to 9/11 of surveillance of Mohammed Atta or of his cell."

Weldon, vice chairman of the House Armed Services and Homeland Security committees, said the hijackers were identified in 1999 by a classified military intelligence unit known as “Able Danger,” which determined they could be members of an al Qaeda cell.

Weldon said that in September 2000 the unit recommended that its information on the hijackers be given to the FBI “so they could bring that cell in and take out the terrorists,” Weldon said in an interview."

The intel is out there, it is not a question of if we get attacked but when and how. Take a look at the latest terrorist attack directed at India. They have the advantage, they know when and how. They are well rehearsed, disciplined, and dedicated. It is how we prepare and respond that will determine our success or failure. We should not cower in our basements waiting for this inevitable crisis. It is time to draw our line in the sand and shout at the top of our lungs, THIS IS MY HOME, YOU MAY COME, YOU MAY DAMAGE IT, BUT YOU WILL DO IT OVER ME!

Rats and roaches fear the light. We need to be the light that sends them scurrying and cowering back into their basements waiting for us.

Oops, sorry another soap box. How did I get on this one?

[HairyEyeball]

I think most of us have some idea of the threat posed by those 'rats and roaches' sworn to destroy us, and possibly some idea of what we may, as individuals and as a nation, do to deter them. The bigger problem is what can be done when they're aided and abetted by the fifth columns within our schools, our media,our own government?

[03_SHOOTER]

I think most of us have some idea of the threat posed by those 'rats and roaches' sworn to destroy us, and possibly some idea of what we may, as individuals and as a nation, do to deter them. The bigger problem is what can be done when they're aided and abetted by the fifth columns within our schools, our media,our own government?

As I said earlier, I already consider that fifth column in the schools, media, and in fact our own government to be willing accomplices in the plans to destroy us, and one has but to look around to see it. Even here at Ft. Bragg, the home of the 82nd Airborne and Special Forces, there was an incident in one of the Publik Skuuls where a teacher verbally assaulted one of her pupils, the child of one of our Soldiers, because she said that she and her parents were supporting McCain. What was the result of this incident in a town that literally owes it's existance to the military? Nothing. The Superintendent of the Skuul Sistum determined that the teacher hadn't done anything wrong, and that no sanctions would be taken against her. MY GREAT BIG HAIRY A$$!!!!

What can be done? At this point I'm not convinced that anything can be done to save us, short of the equivilent of radical chemotheropy, because the cancer is in the bones, the organs, and the lymphatic system. I wrote an essay a few years ago, as some of you may remember, and in it I wrote;
"...Were the consequences to not only our nation, but to it’s people (including the gutless wonders) so abhorrent to me, I would say stop the fighting and bring the troops home now, but not because I agree with the traitors in our midst, but so that we would again be attacked and hopefully our enemy would strike in the middle of a “victory rally” for all of the gutless wonders that actively seek our failure as a nation in order to remove them and the plague of defeatism that they carry from our country. ..."
If "the Messiah" does in fact carry through on his campaign promises, I fear that we will be attacked, and it may well take that attack, to paraphrase Admiral Yamamoto, to awaken the sleeping giant from it's stupor, only this time instead of striking out only at our "foreign enemies" we will be forced to deal with our domestic ones as well, and if they're lucky they will only be treated as the Tories were following our first Revolution, and be allowed to leave for Canada with those few items they can carry with them, instead of the justice they truly deserve, swinging at the end of a rope.