In a letter to his colleagues, Blair addressed the botched terrorist attack on Christmas Day and stressed the importance of being vigilant. AP
U.S. intelligence chief Dennis Blair called on the intelligence community Thursday to “outthink, outwork and defeat the enemy's new ideas” so that it can better anticipate acts of terrorism.
In a letter to his colleagues, Blair addressed the botched terrorist attack on Christmas Day and stressed the importance of being vigilant.
“Al Qaeda and its affiliate organizations, as well as individual suicide terrorists, have observed our defenses and are designing future attacks to circumvent them,” he wrote. “They are doing so right now, as you are reading this message. These attacks will be even harder to uncover, interpret and stop. We must anticipate other types of attacks that are within the capability of these individuals and groups and improve our defense to stay ahead of them.”
Blair wrote that President Obama’s assessment that the intelligence failures contributed to allowing a terrorist to board a Detroit-bound plane was a “tough message for us to receive.” But as the government reviews agencies’ mistakes, he reminded his colleagues of their victories.
“Whatever shortcomings emerge in these investigations should not obscure the progress the intelligence community has made in developing collection and analysis capabilities, in improving collaboration and in sharing information, both against Al Qaeda and against the many other threats to our national security,” he wrote. “The intelligence community should be proud of its role in weakening Al Qaeda’s ability to plan, organize, finance and carry out highly orchestrated attacks conducted by well-trained teams, like those on 9/11.”
Blair added: “Al Qaeda is diminished as evidenced by the fact they are sending inexperienced individuals without long association with Al Qaeda but susceptible to jihadist ideology. Unfortunately, even unsophisticated terrorists can kill many Americans.”
