Gov Report: " Americans will likely die on American soil, possibly in large numbers"

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Commission: "Americans will die on American soil" from high tech terror

SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM Thursday, September 23, 1999

WASHINGTON -- The United States is increasingly vulnerable to high-technology terrorism, particularly a biological weapons attack, that could result in massive casualties, a presidential commission says.

The Commission on National Security, sponsored by President Bill Clinton and Congress, released a 143-page report on Tuesday that presented a dire forecast of the prospect of terrorism in the United States. The commission was composed of 25 former defense officials who served under U.S. administrations.

"For many years to come, Americans will become increasingly less secure," the report said. "America will become increasingly vulnerable to hostile attack on our homeland, and our military superiority will not entirely protect us. Americans will likely die on American soil, possibly in large numbers. Threats to American security will be more diffuse, harder to anticipate and more difficult to neutralize than ever before."

The key threat is terrorist use of biological weapons. The report says terrorists are acquiring biological weapons and other technological tools for attacks.

"The most serious threat to our security may consist of unannounced attacks on American cities by sub-national groups using genetically engineered pathogens," the report said. "In the hands of despots, the new science could become a tool of genocide on an unprecedented scale."

The report says terrorists have greater access to technology and can launch cyber attacks that disrupt air traffic control systems and create hundreds of air collisions and accidents.

Commission members said the report reflects intelligence reports and follows similar studies by the Pentagon and Congress. "This report is hardly apocalyptic," former Senator Warren Rudman said. "I have all the facts."

The report follows similar studies released by the Pentagon in 1997 and Congress last assessing the post-Cold War threat of terrorism to the United States.

U.S. President Bill Clinton agreed. "The possibility that terrorists will threaten us with weapons of mass destruction cannot be met with complacency," he said at the United Nations in New York.

Clinton and Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov called for international cooperation to stop the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction to terrorists. Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said Russia would support a UN conference or a special session of the General Assembly in 2000 on ways of combatting terrorism.

"Militant nationalism, separatism, terrorism and extremism regardless of their forms, have no borders," he said. "Nobody is safe."

Thursday, September 23, 1999

-- Roland (nottelling@nowhere.com), September 23, 1999

Answers

Link: www.worldtribune.com/index-two-text.html

Looking for the report...

R.

-- Roland (nottelling@nowhere.com), September 23, 1999.


I believe the report is here, but I can't get in...

www.nssg.gov/index.htm

-- Roland (nottelling@nowhere.com), September 23, 1999.


I don't know what will be worse....the terrorists or the way we will overreact to them.

-- coprolith (coprolith@rocketship.com), September 23, 1999.

The sad thing is that there was a time when we were the most admired country on the planet. Then we started going around and sticking our noses in everybody's business. You reap what you sow.

-- Uncle Deedah (unkeed@yahoo.com), September 23, 1999.

I'm not defending Communisim. The only difference between the USSR of old and the US is. The USSR spread Communisim by getting countries to sympathize with it's philosophy(for the most part), The US spreads Democracy(even if they are puppet democracy's) by saying- "you WILL become a democracy and adopt the system WE want you to, or you will die(politically, economicly or by black opps[like Noreiga who was set up after defying US, the nerve!]).

Gee, I wonder which is worse. We have become the evil empire, pushing our weight around and soaking up countries. Don't misunderstand, I still love America, just not the current attitude it portends. You're right-- Reap what we sow.

-- CygnusXI (noburnt@toast.net), September 23, 1999.



I don't care how "oppressed" some people are. Anyone who tosses a bomb into a school bus or gasses a subway station is pure fecal scum in my book! On the other hand, bombing and waging war frivolously is sometimes difficult to discern from terrorism.

My original point wasn't that terrorists shouldn't pay dearly for the evil they do. It was that the only way to really "control" bioterrorism in the US will be to sell away our liberties for the "security" of living in a carefully-monitored, hermetically sealed, orwellian police state. There is no other way. And I have the greatest confidence that our own citizens will quietly sign away our rights to fascist, control-freak despots. Some of these despots may well even be benevolent and lovable. But eventually power will corrupt them as it does all human beings.

Oh i'm sure that it would seem just fine...no Bergen-Belsons or Aushweitz's _in plain view_ for people to ponder and concoct odd patterns of daily denial aroumd. Yes, it will be Fascism with a "kind and gentle" face, euphemized and anesthetized and sanitized for our dull consumption. People will love this fascism. Those that are most rewarded will be the ones that conform the most to it. Those that oppose it will disappear without fanfare, or be shuffled and relegated to positions of poverty or pillory, ridiculed as kooks, crazies, anachronisms, criminals.

-- coprolith (coprolith@rocketship.com), September 23, 1999.


Cygnus, you forgot one small difference between the Communist countries such as Red China and the Soviet Union: the >100 million of their own people whom they murdered in this century. You were aware of this, weren't you? Perhaps this book would be of interest to you: "The Gulag Archipelago" by Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

Our government is pretty socialist, and getting more socialist fairly quickly, but it's not THAT socialist just yet. Ayn Rand's 1957 book "Atlas Shrugged" depicts what a late-stage socialist America might look like. Of course, the Clinton's wish list is a pretty good indication, too...

www.y2ksafeminnesota.com

-- MinnesotaSmith (y2ksafeminnesota@hotmail.com), September 23, 1999.


Terrorists can do ALL this but 2 digits is just a 3 day storm.

-- 40 cans of crisco (Is @that .enough), September 23, 1999.

LOL, Coprolith!

-- lisa (lisa@work.now), September 23, 1999.

Response to Gov Report: " Americans will likely die on American soil, possibly in large numbers"

Yes, give up all your freedoms and we'll protect you from the terrorists with the genetically-altered pathogens. Bwahahahahhahahha

-- Schlemiel (shla@scho.schmu), September 23, 1999.


There will be NO, I repeat NO system failures as a direct result of Y2K.

There will, however, be numerous disasters as a result of those oportunistic, rougue terrorist that will seize upon Y2K as a chance to melt down our nuclear plants, blow up chemical facilities, cause airplanes to crash into each other and bring down the grid.

Which will make declaring martial law and seizing control of public facilites so much easier to justify. Those troops in the street are hunting down the evil forces that are trying to destroy your liberty and security!!!

The timing of the release of this report is quite interesting...

R.

-- Roland (nottelling@nowhere.com), September 23, 1999.


Patriot/Terrorist = hero to some, scourge to others. I'm with you, Unc,...once upon a time those nasty terrorists did their work upon oppressors closer to home. Isn't potential terrorist attack part of the price imperialist states expect to pay?

How much mileage do you all think TPTB expect to get from the "fear the terrorist" scam? How many 'citizens' fear anthrax more than Y2K?

-- Donna (moment@pacbell.net), September 23, 1999.


Or is terrorism, at the level the govt is telling us to be worried about at least, a govt y2k spin covering their ass for not dealing in a more expedicious manner with y2k problems. Easy way for govt to get themselves off the hook - pointing fingers at the unholy infedels has _always been an honored way to deflecting public from one's own internal incompetance, bungling, and outright creepiness.

Getting people worked up over terrorism, then pointing to failures and telling us it was cyberterrorism, or just plain terrorism is surely a fairly easy way, if underhanded, to achieve completion of the demolition of constitutional rights.

-- Mitchell Barnes (spanda@inreach.com), September 23, 1999.


i agree about the timing and the reasoning behind it. how many people will realize that their government is lying to them yet again? how many will just lay down?

-- sarah (qubr@aol.com), September 23, 1999.

to quote chief joseph-of the nez perce am. indian,''today is a good day to die'' or maranatha=come LORD JESUS.

-- beam me up lord. (dogs@zianet.com), September 23, 1999.


Thanks, Al.

(To think I hit "refresh" for that).

R.

-- Roland (nottelling@nowhere.com), September 23, 1999.


Why this, "Nobody is safe."? Why now?

Why is this now such a high profile position? Very strange. So coincidental.

Mike

===================================================================

-- Michael Taylor (mtdesign3@aol.com), September 23, 1999.


i guess i am trying to understand when oh when did this terrorist threat happen? here we are beefing up agencies to handle terrorism, spending millions of dollars, sponsoring conferences on it, training for it....i am not totally stupid and realize there is always a risk of something like this. but is the risk so huge in just the last few years to warrant all this increased activity and expenditure? or is the government attempting to manipulate us into something--i.e., giving away freedoms, setting up new systems that may actually have another purpose?

-- tt (cuddluppy@yahoo.com), September 23, 1999.

tt,

Well, a lot of these "terrorists" used to work for "us." Bin Ladin was closely connected to us when he/we were/was fighting the Russkies in Afganistan. Same thing with Noriega. We train these guys, and then over and over, our media paints horns on them and they assume the new role of "ENEMY NUMBER ONE!" Subsequently, more "anti-terrorist" (read anti-U.S. Constitution) measures are greased up and rammed through a languid, pliant Congress. Are we being j*+#ed-off? You tell me.

Liberty

-- Liberty (liberty@theready.now), September 23, 1999.


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