Yesterday, the threat level was raised to High due to intelligence intercepts of suspected terrorist chatter. Of course, we have to pay attention to such things. Intelligence work is at best imprecise, and ignoring an important intelligence indicator would leave us open to another 9-11 (or worse) attack. With the benefit of hindsight, it's easy to see how many warnings were not acted on because of several factors, such as different agencies failing to share key pieces of the puzzle.

Still, I can't help but wonder if they're toying with us. Anyone who has studied 20th century military history knows about Patton's "Phantom Army". In the months leading up to the Normandy invasion, it was vitally important that Hitler continued to believe the attack would come at the obvious place, Pas-de-Calais. In that end, the Allies created a phantom army around General Patton. They used decoy tanks and trucks to fool enemy aerial reconnaissance, and they used radio operators to create chatter simulating the normal signals sent by an army-sized group. It worked so well that even after forces stormed ashore at Normandy, Hitler held back his reserves waiting for the "real invasion" under the command of Army Groupe Patton.

It would be an easy and effective way for the terrorists to disrupt America by creating false chatter. Using a small number of people and at almost no cost, they could hope to cause economic disruption in the airline industry and perhaps drive down the stock market (doesn't seem to be working right now), cause interference and drive up security costs. In effect, some chatter could cost us billions. As part of a longer term strategy, it could also lull us into ignoring future intelligence indicators. As the Boy Who Cried Wolf learned, you can only fool people so many times. Do the chatter routine several times, then hit.

So, the conflicting thing is that we have to pay attention to such intelligence indicators but not let them bother us unduely. Have a good holiday season, go about your daily lives, but keep your powder dry.