WASHINGTON — A steady stream of Western recruits to al-Qaida camps on the Pakistani border bolsters the group’s ability to strike the United States, the nation’s top intelligence official said Tuesday.
Those camps are preparing recruits to launch terror attacks around the world, and are also a staging ground for assaults on neighboring Afghanistan, said National Intelligence Director Michael McConnell.
“Al-Qaida is improving the last key aspect of its ability to attack the U.S.: the identification, training and positioning of operatives for an attack on the homeland,” McConnell said before the Senate Intelligence Committee.
McConnell offered a mixed assessment of the Bush administration’s progress in the war on terror: On the one hand, he said, it was “no accident” there had been no major attacks against the U.S. or most of its allies in the last year.
Working with its European counterparts, the U.S. has helped unravel extremist plots in Spain, Denmark and Germany, he said. He also described the recently reported death of Abu Layth al-Libi, one of al-Qaida’s military commanders, in a missile attack in Pakistan, as “the most serious blow to the group’s top leadership” since December 2005.
But while al-Qaida had suffered setbacks, including significant casualties in Iraq and a declining reputation among some segments of the Muslim community as a result of its attacks on civilians, he said, the group continues to pose a serious threat.
He noted an influx of Western recruits to al-Qaida training camps since mid-2006.
And despite the declining violence in Iraq, he said, “I am increasingly concerned that as we inflict significant damage on al-Qaida in Iraq, it may shift resources to mounting more attacks outside of Iraq.”
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