editorials

Almost nine years after 9/11, terrorism is a fast-evolving, mostly underestimated worldwide threat, and America may be more vulnerable to attacks today than it was on that sunny September morning.

That grim assessment was the consensus of experts who spoke at a recent journalism conference on terror and security issues held, fittingly, in an office tower on Times Square in New York.

The panelists assembled in New York listed myriad types of current threats, from suicide bombing to nuclear weapons and cyberterrorism. One security expert described how an attack using the radioactive material from an X-ray machine in a veterinary clinic could shut down Times Square for months. Another said there is growing concern that terrorists will hack into medical devices or records. One especially chilling scenario: A terror network hacks into a large hospital database and changes patient drug prescription data.

The growing number of weak and failed states around the world provide an expanding breeding ground for terror, and Somalia is at or near the top of the list.

That should not be shocking to Minnesotans, who have read news reports of as many as 20 young Somali-American men from the state being recruited by the terrorist group Al-Shabaab in the past two years to return to fight in Somalia's civil war. Five of them have died, including one who killed others in a suicide attack. A sixth man, a Muslim convert from Minneapolis, also is believed to have been killed in Somalia.

Neumann said the apparent radicalization of the 20 men while still in the United States has drawn the attention of a concerned Department of Homeland Security. And federal officials told the Star Tribune last year that the threat of homegrown attacks in the United States -- such as the failed May 1 Times Square plot -- is increasing.

The United States and its allies appear to have weakened Al-Qaida, but other affiliated and independent networks such as Al-Shabaab are growing more active and dangerous, according to several of the expert panelists.

For Minnesotans, especially those in the local Somali community and law enforcement officials throughout the state and federal government, that's a chilling reminder that the lessons learned on 9/11 must not be forgotten as we grapple with a new set of threats today.