FBI Forecasts New Threats to the United States
February 24, 2005
Globalization and the trend of an increasingly networked world economy will become more pronounced within the next five years. The global economy will stabilize some regions, but widening economic divides are likely to make areas, groups, and nations that are left behind breeding grounds for unrest, violence, and terrorism. As corporate, financial, and nationality definitions and structures become more complex and global, the distinction between foreign and domestic entities will increasingly blur. This will lead to further globalization and networking of criminal elements, directly threatening the security of the United States.
Most experts believe that technological innovation will have the most profound impact on the collective ability of the federal, state, and local governments to protect the United States. Advances in information technology, as well as other scientific and technical areas, have created the most significant global transformation since the Industrial Revolution. These advances allow terrorists, disaffected states, weapons proliferators, criminal enterprises, drug traffickers, and other threat enterprises easier and cheaper access to weapons technology. Technological advances will also provide terrorists and others with the potential to stay ahead of law enforcement countermeasures. For example, it will be easier and cheaper for small groups or individuals to acquire designer chemical or biological warfare agents, and correspondingly more difficult for forensic experts to trace an agent to a specific country, company, or group.
In the 21st Century, with the ready availability of international travel and telecommunications, neither crime nor terrorism confines itself territorially. Nor do criminals or terrorists restrict themselves, in conformance with the structure of our laws, wholly to one bad act or the other. Instead, they enter into alliances of opportunity as they arise; terrorists commit crimes and, for the right price or reason, criminals assist terrorists. Today’s threats cross geographic and political boundaries with impunity; and do not fall solely into a single category of our law. To meet these threats, we need an even more tightly integrated intelligence cycle. We must have extraordinary receptors for changes in threats and the ability to make immediate corrections in our priorities and focus to address those changes. And, we must recognize that alliances with others in law enforcement, at home and abroad, are absolutely essential.
Counterterrorism Forecast
Terrorism is the most significant threat to our national security. In the international terrorism arena, over the next five years, we believe the number of state-sponsored terrorist organizations will continue to decline, but privately-sponsored terrorist groups will increase in number. However, the terrorist groups will increasingly cooperate with one another to achieve desired ends against common enemies. These alliances will be of limited duration, but such “ loose associations” will challenge our ability to identify specific threats. Al-Qaeda and its affiliates will remain the most significant threat over the next five years.
The global Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) threat to the United States and its interests is expected to increase significantly in the near term. We expect terrorists to exploit criminal organizations to develop and procure WMD capabilities. Globalization will make it easier to transfer both WMD materiel and expertise throughout the world. The basic science and technologies necessary to produce WMD will be increasingly well understood. Similarly, raw materials will be more available and easier to obtain.
Violence by domestic terrorists will continue to present a threat to the United States over the next five years. The number of traditional left-wing terrorist groups, typically advocating the overthrow of the U.S. Government because of the perceived growth of capitalism and imperialism, have diminished in recent years. However, new groups have emerged that may pose an increasing threat. Right-wing extremists, espousing anti-government or racist sentiment, will pose a threat because of their continuing collection of weapons and explosives coupled with their propensity for violence. The most significant domestic terrorism threat over the next five years will be the lone actor, or “lone wolf” terrorist. They typically draw ideological inspiration from formal terrorist organizations, but operate on the fringes of those movements. Despite their ad hoc nature and generally limited resources, they can mount high-profile, extremely destructive attacks, and their operational planning is often difficult to detect.
Sources: Federal Bureau of Investigation, US Department of Justice
