ISIS bluster that threatens the U.S.
Long-known al-Qaida links to south-of-the-border drug cartels.
A porous U.S-Mexico border.
Gunshots at a California power plant.
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The individual reports may not cause immediate alarm, but a panel of experts who have connected the dots on threats against the U.S. is warning that the nation needs to be looking at the big picture – and preparing its defenses appropriately.
Now.
The warnings come from a panel set up by the Secure the Grid Coalition at the Washington-based Center for Security Policy.
At a National Press Club news conference this week were Frank Gaffney, former assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs and now president of the CSP; threat expert Dr. Peter Vincent Pry; Ambassador Henry F. Cooper; actress and activist Kelly Carson; and F. Michael Maloof, a former senior security policy analyst in the office of the secretary of defense and now a senior writer with WND. He's authored "A Nation Forsaken" on the dangers to the U.S. from an attack on its power grid, especially from electromagnetic pulse.
There have been multiple reports of ISIS terrorists in Iraq and Syria making statements threatening an attack on the U.S. homeland. And it's well-documented that al-Qaida, the Muslim terror world's bad boy before ISIS arrived, is linked closely with drug cartels, many of which have a presence inside some 1,200 of America's large cities.
Further, the U.S. southern border now easily can be crossed illegally. And there already may have been a "dry run" attack on the U.S. power grid, which, in a collapse, would leave America's defense capabilities severely handicapped.
Such concerns have been underscored in recent days by an interview Judicial Watch had with U.S. intelligence officials and the Texas Department Safety. It confirmed that ISIS is present across the Texas border in Juarez, Mexico, where an intelligence unit has picked up increased "chatter" in recent days.
While Mexican authorities have denied ISIS' presence in Mexico and its ability to illegally enter the U.S., Maloof pointed out that three hardened Ukrainian criminals walked into the U.S. from Mexico undetected and have yet to be apprehended. Similarly, there has been evidence uncovered that various nationalities from Pakistan and various Arab countries have entered the U.S. undetected, taking advantage of the porous southern border.
Put it all together, panel members said at a news conference in Washington on Wednesday, and the threat the U.S. is facing should be considered immediate and substantial.
"It's all related," Maloof said. "One thing leads to another … It's the domino effect."
He noted a series of incidents at a Metcalf power plant in San Jose, California, that suggest someone – still unknown – has been exploring what it takes to bring down a major component of the nation's grid.
Former Rep. Allen West bluntly called the situation a "'dry run' for something bigger."
WND reported the utility company, whose operation was disabled in the attack, has offered a $250,000 reward for the arrest and conviction of the perpetrators.
West explained, "On April 16, 2013, snipers waged a 52-minute attack on a central California electrical substation. According to reports by Fox News and the Wall Street Journal, the sniper attack started when at least one person entered an underground vault to cut telephone cables, and attackers fired more than 100 shots into Pacific Gas & Electric's Metcalf transmission substation, knocking out 17 transformers. Electric officials were able to avert a blackout, but it took 27 days to repair the damage," he wrote.
"My concern is that this may have been a dry run for something far bigger. We should be demanding an update on the investigation as to the perpetrators of this attack who escaped without detection," he said.
Pry pointed out that jihadists already are aware of the vulnerability of a country's grid system by having knocked out completely the entire grid of the country of Yemen last June.
Read the book that's documenting the worry about the EMP threat, "A Nation Forsaken."
The Metcalf attack came one day after the Boston Marathon bombing that killed three people and wounded 264 others. The Boston Marathon suspects are from the Russian North Caucasus, which prompted the Federal Bureau of Investigation to get involved in the investigation of the sniper attack on the transformers.
There is a large community of Chechen and North Caucasus immigrants in the San Jose area. Chechen jihadists also have been very prominent in Syria where it is battling to overthrow the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
There also were reports only days after the California sniper attack of a shoot-out when a security guard at the TVA Watts Bar Nuclear Plant in Spring City, Tennessee, was confronted by a suspect at 2 a.m.
"TVA spokesperson Jim Hopson said the subject traveled up to the plant on a boat and walked onto the property. When the officer questioned the suspect, the individual fired multiple shots at the officer. The officer shot back, and when he called for backup, the suspect sped away on his boat," reports said.
And just a few days ago, the California plant, after spending millions of dollars on heightened security, again was targeted by a break-in attempt, authorities have reported.
Maloof explained after the news conference that the big picture "underscores the potential for an ISIS threat on the grid."
He pointed out how al-Qaida, which is known to have drug cartel links and likely sleeper agents in the United States through those organizations, has been morphing into ISIS, and the belligerent threats made against the U.S. by that group.
And he noted that the U.S. grid remains vulnerable and taking it down in any significant way could cause calamities for the U.S., since the nation's food, fuel, energy, banking and communications industries all are dependent on electricity.
"Whenever you start tampering with the grid, you're affecting the life-sustaining critical infrastructures," Maloof said. "Our entire survival is based on technology and electronics that, in turn, are based on the electrical flow. If that's interrupted for any period of time, there are catastrophes over a wide geographic area."
Reports just this week revealed social media chatter shows Islamic State militants "are keenly aware of the porous U.S.-Mexico border, and are 'expressing an increased interest' in crossing over to carry out a terrorist attack."
A law enforcement advisory said, "A review of ISIS social media messaging during the week ending August 26 shows that militants are expressing an increased interest in the notion that they could clandestinely infiltrate the southwest border of U.S., for [a] terror attack."
Maloof explained at the news conference that America's enemies know "the vulnerabilities of our grid … they will at some point try" to attack.
"The threat is there," he said. "ISIS operatives can easily come through the [southern] border. And because they [ISIS] have proxies in the U.S.," the potential for a catastrophe exists.
"The president could take his pen and make [the problem] a priority," he said. "At the federal level they don't have a plan, so the state and local level won't have a plan."