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...and it's back to orange...
The government on Sunday raised the national threat level to orange, indicating a high risk of terrorist attack, and said threat indicators are "perhaps greater now than at any point" since Sept. 11, 2001, with strikes possible during the holidays.
Americans were promised "extensive and considerable protections" around the country and told to stick to their travel plans despite intelligence indicating the al-Qaida terrorist network is seeking again to use planes as weapons and exploit suspected weakness in U.S. aviation security.
Some of the intelligence information gathered in the past few days suggests that "extremists abroad" are anticipating attacks that will rival or exceed the scope of those of Sept. 11, Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge said.
"We expect al-Qaida will strive for new attacks designed to be more devastating than the Sept. 11 attack, possibly involving nonconventional weapons such as chemical or biological agents," the State Department advised.
At a hastily arranged news conference at Homeland Security headquarters, Ridge said credible intelligence sources "suggest the possibility of attacks against the homeland around the holiday season and beyond. The strategic indicators, including al-Qaida's continued desire to carry out attacks against our homeland, are perhaps greater now than at any point since Sept. 11," he said.
The alert level had stood at yellow, an elevated risk and in the middle of the five-color scale, since May.
...I really wish they would stop using the word 'homeland'. It's really creepy. |
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