Then-CIA Director George Tenet wrote: “In December 2001 a sharp WMD analyst at CIA found the initial lead on which we would pull and, ultimately, unravel the al-Qa’ida anthrax networks. But of all al-Qa’ida’s efforts to obtain other forms of WMD, the main threat is the nuclear one. I am convinced that this is where UBL [Usama bin Ladin] and his operatives desperately want to go. They understand that bombings by cars, trucks, trains, and planes will get them some headlines, to be sure. But if they manage to set off a mushroom cloud, they will make history. Such an event would place al-Qa’ida on a par with the superpowers and make good Bin Ladin’s threat to destroy our economy and bring death into every American household. Even in the darkest days of the cold war, we could count on the fact that the Soviets, just like us, wanted to live. Not so with the terrorists. Al-Qa’ida boasts that while we fear death, they embrace it.” [The 15th of the month used for date sorting purposes only.]
– George Tenet with Bill Harlow, At the Center of the Storm, Pages 278-279