[CrimsonTide4]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...d=542&ncid=716


Attorney General John Ashcroft (news - web sites) and FBI (news - web sites) Director Robert Mueller scheduled a news conference Wednesday to outline an intensive effort by law enforcement, intelligence and homeland security officials to detect and disrupt any potential plots. And the FBI was dispatching a bulletin to some 18,000 state and local law enforcement agencies warning of the threat.


Beginning with Saturday's dedication of the new World War II Memorial in Washington, the summer presents a number of high-profile targets in the United States. They include the G-8 summit in Georgia next month that will attract top officials from some of America's closest allies, plus the Democratic National Convention in Boston in July and the Republican National Convention in August in New York City.


The FBI and Homeland Security Department also are concerned about so-called soft targets such as shopping malls anywhere in the United States that offer a far less protected environment than a political convention hall.


Of special concern, the counterterrorism official said, is the possibility that terrorists may possess and use a chemical, biological or radiological weapon that could cause much more damage and casualties than a conventional bomb.


Despite that, the official said there was no immediate plan to raise the nation's terrorism threat level from yellow, or elevated, to orange, or high. The threat level has been at yellow — midpoint on the five-color scale — since January.