there s been dismissal for them being responsible for this because they don t necessarily have the capabilities to launch a surface-to-air missiles. what about bomb making? is that in the repertoire of their training? we know that al qaeda attempted to down an airliner over detroit at the end of 2009, what we know as the failed underwear bomber who smuggled unconventional explosives that would have air in igniting on the plane but could have actually had devastating outcome. so terrorist groups have attempted that. groups have things that can down helicopters, for example, but only a maximum of 16,000 feet but they don t have anything more powerful to that. to the bomb making though. al qaeda is known to be a more organized, coherent, hierarchy structure.
so it s a very, very concerning situation because of course the groups like al qaeda are still plotting to carry out mass casualty attacks in the united states by training westerners in bombmaking. not only concern about the affiliates in yemen but concern about the affiliates in syria, the place that barbara mentioned earlier in this hour, al nusra has expanded in recent months. and you could make the argument that al qaeda in syria is stronger than al qaeda in afghanistan was on the day of 9/11 in terms of manpower, resources, territory. the difference so far is that they haven t prioritized attacking the united states. the worry is, of course, that could change down the road. and seems maybe with this statement, that s a little bit of an indication there. paul, stick with us. i want to bring in jim sciutto, chief national security correspondent. talking to paul about this new call coming from aqap. but it also brings to mind, jim, i know you have pointed this out previously, james
of course the intelligence community was trying to find out if he was alive. he is a serious target because of his bomb making. as he serious target because he is a mastermine when it comes to trying to figure out ways to use petn for undetectible bombs. so by him coming out in this video, he is really putting himself at risk. i think it is a rather big surprise that he s come out with this written statement in the past few days. he s taken a very big risk in doing this. because presumably, he would need some kind of courier to transport this message. and of course, the cia got bin laden by tracking couriers. and he admits it in the statement that he ll be criticized by some jihadis, breaking this operational security. and the cia and other western intelligence agencies will be pouring over this statement. it is several pages long for
this bomb maker in the open sas space. tell the story how he took him out. sure. real quick. there was a fierce battle in february 2010. during that battle a afghan was detained and brought back to the combat outpost. he was identified by a tribal leader as a taliban bomb maker. matt was in a position he wasn t able to detain the individual any longer, so he was released. he could have went anywhere in afghanistan after he left the outpost. shortly after that matt and one of the other members of his special forces team sat out to effect ambush if this individual was going to resume bomb making capabilities and was a threat to u.s. forces in the area they were going to engage him.
course. but after that frankly it is speculation. i think the key issue with people these days the lone wolves for example that that radicalization could occur online in the united states. he could be here on family visits and meet others who are like minded. it s hard for investigators to work out that key pivotal moment when someone decides to commit that crime is. they will piece together who he met here to see if there were individuals who gave him a window on ideology but also bear in mind the violence he committed in tennessee doesn t at this stage appear to have required particularly lengthy training like bomb making like other previous al qaeda attackers have had in the middle east. he got high-powered weapons and shot them at relatively open targets. that doesn t necessarily suggest he had to go to a training camp.