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Officials see trucks, reactors as targets©Washington Post
© St. Petersburg Times, WASHINGTON -- Federal and state officials are taking steps to prepare for an escalation of terrorism that experts say could include truck bombings and attacks on nuclear power plants as well as more hijackings. Since the FBI issued its second national terrrorism alert Monday, administration officials and congressional intelligence experts have studied myriad terrorist threats, including the outside possibility of the use of portable nuclear weapons. Concrete steps taken by state and federal officials point, in particular, to concern about assaults on power plants and utilities, truck explosions in tunnels and on bridges, and attacks on ships carrying hazardous materials. "If you're asking for a scenario of things that could go wrong, it's a mighty long list," said House Intelligence Committee Chairman Porter Goss, R-Fla., a former CIA officer. Wednesday, the governors of Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi ordered National Guard troops to strengthen security at nuclear facilities in their states, following a recommendation from homeland security director Tom Ridge, according to a spokesman for Entergy Corp. in Arkansas. The Treasury Department's bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, meanwhile, has begun intensive inspections of all 9,500 mining and construction companies and others licensed to use explosives across the country. New York Gov. George Pataki said that more than 1,500 National Guard troops patrolling in and around New York City will be armed for the first time by week's end. Federal and local officials also remain concerned about the possibility that terrorists would attack ships carrying propane and other fuels. The nation has been awash in special warnings and alerts since Sept. 11, many of them focused on the types of potential terrorist targets that have been used in previous attacks or identified as possibilities by intelligence officials. One example is commercial trucks, which have been used by terrorists around the world as delivery vehicles for makeshift but highly effective bombs. Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida terrorist network has been particularly fond of explosives packed into trucks or cars, using the method in the first attack on the World Trade Center in 1993 and on the coordinated 1996 assaults on U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. A homegrown U.S. terrorist, Timothy McVeigh, used a Ryder truck to deliver the bomb that exploded in Oklahoma City. Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, the FBI and the Department of Transportation have warned the trucking industry to watch for suspicious activity in connection with hazardous chemicals, including radioactive waste and other substances that can be used to create weapons of mass destruction.
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From the Times wire desk
From the AP |
