WASHINGTON –Speaking with one voice, President Bush’s top intelligence and militaryofficials said Wednesday that terrorists are regrouping for possible newstrikes against the United States.
They said thebest defense was for Congress to approve the president’s military andanti-terror budget. But some in Congress, including prominent Republicans, werequestioning some of that spending.
Offering fewspecifics on terror threats, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told a Househearing that the government could reasonably predict attacks would come fromterrorism, weapons of mass destruction and other means.
Meanwhile, newCIA Director Porter Goss told the Senate Intelligence Committee the Iraq warwas giving terrorists experience and contacts for future attacks, and FBIDirector Robert Mueller expressed worry that a sleeper operative in the U.S.may have been in place for years, awaiting orders for an attack.
“I remain veryconcerned about what we are not seeing,” Mueller said in remarks he submittedto the senators.
Rumsfeld toldthe House Armed Services Committee that the proposed $419 billion defensepackage for 2006 would set an ambitious course to “continue prosecuting the warand to attack its ideological underpinnings.”
Yet theRepublican-controlled Congress may exercise its considerable authority overfederal spending and reject White House requests to simply sign the checks.
House MajorityLeader Tom DeLay and Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Calif., the new chairman of the HouseAppropriations Committee, said lawmakers were questioning billions in foreignaid and State Department spending that Bush requested in an emergency bill thisweek.
DeLay, R-Texas,said some of Bush’s foreign aid proposals “probably do not qualify” for theexpedited treatment he’s seeking.
The currentcongressional debate over how to allocate billions of dollars on initiativesaimed at spreading peace and ensuring security follows three years of massivespending in response to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
