The Latest from National Terror Alert Response Center

Cheney: Obama Policies Risk Catastrophic Terror Attacks Posted: 04 Feb 2009 05:40 PM PST Former vice president Dick Cheney has warned that President Barack Obama’s anti-terror policies risk exposing the United States to a catastrophic nuclear or biological attack. In his first interview since Obama’s inauguration, with Politico Tuesday, Cheney was unapologetic about the bitter controversies surrounding his own influential role in president George W. Bush’s “war on terror.” Cheney said Obama would regret his commitment to closing down the Guantanamo Bay internment camp and ending harsh interrogations of terrorism suspects. “These are evil people. And we’re not going to win this fight by turning the other cheek,” he said in the interview, conducted at an office near Cheney’s new home in Washington’s Virginia suburbs. He said the “ultimate threat” facing the country since the September 11 attacks of 2001 was if extremists can unleash “a nuclear weapon or a biological agent of some kind” in the center of a US city. “That’s the one that would involve the deaths of perhaps hundreds of thousands of people, and the one you have to spend a hell of a lot of time guarding against,” Cheney said. “I think there’s a high probability of such an attempt,” he added. “Whether or not they can pull it off depends whether or not we keep in place policies that have allowed us to defeat all further attempts, since 9/11, to launch mass-casualty attacks against the United States.” Source This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for homeland security news and information.

Mexican Drug Cartels Armed To The Hilt, Threatening National Security Posted: 04 Feb 2009 05:33 PM PST In November, along the border with Texas, Mexican authorities arrested drug cartel leader Jaime “el Hummer” Gonzalez Duran — one of the founders of “Los Zetas,” a paramilitary organization of former Mexican soldiers who decided there was more money to be made in selling drugs than in serving in the Mexican military. As El Hummer was being transported to the airport in an armed vehicle, his fellow cartel members launched a brazen attack against the federales. They were armed to the teeth. Their arsenal ranged from semi-automatic rifles to rocket-propelled grenades. When the smoke finally cleared and the government had prevailed, Mexican federal agents captured 540 assault rifles, more than 500,000 rounds of ammunition, 150 grenades, 14 cartridges of dynamite, 98 fragmentation grenades, 67 bulletproof vests, seven Barrett .50-caliber sniper rifles and a Light Anti Tank (LAW) rocket. This is modern Mexico, where the leaders of the powerful drug cartels are armed to the teeth with sophisticated weapons, many of which are smuggled over the border from the United States. It is with this array of superior weapons that drug cartels are threatening the very stability of their own country. And it’s why America’s outgoing CIA Director, Michael Hayden, says violence in Mexico will pose the second greatest threat to U.S. security next year, right after Al Qaeda. “Americans are understandably focused on the flow of drugs and migrants into the U.S. from Mexico,” says Andreas Peter, author of “Border Games: Policing the U.S.-Mexico Divide.” Source This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for homeland security news and information.

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