Can the U.S. Prevent This?

By SALLY B. DONNELLY

In Iraq, improved explosive devices--homemade bombs also known as IEDs--have caused more than half of the 2,300 U.S. troop deaths. In terrorist attacks in Madrid and London, those devices were the plotters' weapons of choice, and bomb experts believe it is only a matter of time before an IED strike takes place in the U.S. But Washington has done little to prepare a national strategy for the threat. According to government sources and bomb experts, efforts to coordinate Administration plans to deal with the danger have stalled in part because of inexperienced leadership and bureaucratic infighting. The Bush Administration created a national IED Task Force, but it has met only once--last November in Washington--and provided no clear steps forward. No more meetings are planned. "Everybody wants things to go faster," says a White House spokeswoman. "But we're moving as fast as possible."

One problem is that most explosives experts--and their respective bureaucratic fiefs--are deeply entrenched in their agencies, including the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and the FBI. Those two organizations, which have a long history of rivalry, are battling over such issues as which agency can use the name Bomb Data Center. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has sown confusion as well by replicating some of the efforts of the ATF and the FBI. It is even duplicating its own work: at least two sections of DHS are scrambling to create bomb centers. Left out of this already complex equation are state and local bomb squads, who were not invited to the task-force meeting even though they will almost certainly be the first responders to a crisis.

Bomb experts warn that the confusion in Washington only increases the level of risk. "Everybody is worried about the kinds of IEDs we're seeing in Iraq ending up in the U.S.," says an expert. He believes the U.S. should be better prepared for such an attack. "The question," he says, "is whether we will be."