The report comes a week after CIA Director George Tenet warned that Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network is likely to strike against the United States sometime soon and that the current situation is similar to what existed before the Sept. 11 attacks. Tenet previously said a terrorist attack would be more likely if the United States takes military action against Iraq.
Because a year has passed without a major terrorist attack against the United States, the report says, "there are already signs that Americans are lapsing back into complacency."
Few of the ships, trucks and trains that enter the United States each day are searched, the report said. Emergency personnel are unprepared for chemical or biological attacks. Oil refineries and energy distribution lines could be sabotaged. State and local police still lack access to State Department terrorist watch lists.
"When it comes to combating terrorism, the police officers on the beat are effectively operating deaf, dumb and blind," it said.
....Hart and Rudman's latest panel was formed by the Council on Foreign Relations. Its 17 members included former Secretaries of State Warren Christopher and George Shultz, former FBI and CIA Director William H. Webster and retired Adm. William J. Crowe, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
....Among the panel's recommendations:
_Establish 24-hour operations centers in all states to provide terror watch list information.
_Provide federal funds to clear the backlog of state and local government requests for protective gear, training and communications equipment.
_Strengthen security for sea and land transportation.
_Evaluate areas of vulnerability for energy supplies and develop a stockpile of backup components so energy operations could be restored if damaged.
_Strengthen health agencies' ability to detect disease outbreaks.
All the more urgent now, I'd say.
UPDATE
Via Glenn Reynolds, our own Jenn Taliaferro is also following the events in Moscow closely.
8:15 p.m. eastern
This just in from Reuters: - Two hostages taken out of the theater earlier on Saturday where Chechen rebels are holding hundreds captive had suffered wounds, Interfax news agency said.
The agency said one of the hostages, a woman, was wounded in the stomach, while the second, a man, had head wounds. It did not specify how the wounds had been inflicted.
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