Top FBI official: al-Qaida 'still our no. 1 concern'

WASHINGTON - Pull out your cell phone, start writing a text message and you'll probably notice the device guessing what words you are writing. It will even offer to finish them for you. It's called predictive text.

Federal law enforcement and intelligence authorities have adopted the idea, along with a new way of thinking. New shadowy, transnational terror organizations forced U.S. Homeland Security authorities to change the way they work, says Michael J. Heimbach, assistant director of the FBI's Counterterrorism Division.

The FBI's goal is to stay a step ahead of these threats.

The predictive method is broken down into an interlocking, three-pronged approach called "find, fix and finish."

"The 'find' element is extremely crucial. When you have the fix on someone, you know exactly who they are. It's known. It's the find part; it's predicting that is the challenge," says Heimbach.

Once authorities have the identified the threats and have figured out where terrorists operating, rounding them up presents another set of challenges. Such was the case in the Mumbai attacks this past November. Indian authorities knew about the threat, but experts say the inability to allocate resources for an indefinite period of time to track the threat created a window of opportunity for the attackers.

"This was something which really got the attention of people all around the world," says Robert Grenier, former director of the CIA Counter Terrorism Center.

"Suddenly hotels in New York are very concerned about their security. London and Paris and other world capitals are very, very concerned about what happened in Mumbai."

Grenier, now managing director of the security firm Kroll, says the attack, which reportedly was planned 15 years ago for New York City, has left one major question unanswered: Was this a one time occurrence or will this will represent a more permanent change in the tactics used by global terrorists?

2009 THREATS

Heimbach, perched comfortably on the edge of a chair in his office, facing the bright sun streaming down on Washington and the street below along Pennsylvania Avenue, carefully listed, in order of importance, terror threats the country is facing.

"Al-Qaida and like minded individuals are still our No. 1 concern. Hamas and Hezbollah are quite concerning to us. The whole entire entity surrounding homegrown extremism is still a significant focus of ours. And then we can't lose sight of the domestic terrorism issues: White supremacists, neo-nazi groups, the Animal Liberation Front, the Earth Liberation Front. They still remain on our radar."

So has something taken place to keep al-Qaida at the top of the list, even though it has not been able to successfully launch an attack on the U.S. since 2001?

"There's significant intelligence out there that says their focus remains on the U.S. and on Western allies. There's no doubt about that.We and the interagency partners have effectively through a lot of different means disrupted some plots over the past seven years," says Heimbach.

The FBI has provided a partial list of disrupted terror attacks. To see the list, click here.

There is another threat that is rarely discussed in public: Sleepers.

"We know the trade craft of our adversaries is to try to penetrate our borders, sit idle in the U.S. and wait for further instructions."

PEELING THE ONION

The weekend before the historic Inauguration of President Barack Obama, U.S. Intelligence and Homeland Security officials scrambled to trace a threat made by the Al Shabab terror organization to disrupt the inauguration. A U.S. official, who spoke on the condition on anonymity, said the concern about unanswered questions related to the threat was so great that it "certainly overshadowed my entire weekend. Very senior people were very concerned."

Authorities left nothing to chance because there was strong evidence the Somalian group with ties to al-Qaida has active members in the U.S.

On that day, Department of Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke put the scramble into perspective.

"The FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, including the U.S. Secret Service and the intelligence community, are coordinating with other law enforcement authorities to investigate and analyze recently received information about a potential threat on Inauguration Day."

Sources say behind the scenes, every scrap of information was studied and re-studied. Two hours before the inaugural ceremony began, Knocke said they weren't sure exactly with what they were dealing.

"This information is of limited specificity and uncertain credibility. Authorities at all levels are vigorously pursuing any lead relating to this threat information. The Transition Team has been briefed and is fully integrated into the process."

Heimbach and his team were doing what he calls "peeling the onion." The mission, as with any threat is "to drill down - as I say - peeling it down until there's no onion left, and so we've gotten down exactly as far to figuring out who sent this anonymous letter or who posted this possible threat on the Internet."

The threat, according to a top military official, turned out to be the handiwork of one of Al Shabab's rivals hoping to create problems for them. It's not clear who the rival organization was.

Heimbach's "Peel the Onion" process, which is based in large part on intelligence sharing, appeared to work.

He says the goal is to make sure that intelligence goes through 56 field offices, and that the Joint Terrorism Task Force is on the same page with our state and local partners. Heimbach wants to make sure everybody is informed, and there is a seamless exchange of information, so everybody is on the same sheet throughout the continental U.S.

(Copyright 2009 by WTOP. All Rights Reserved.)