WASHINGTON (AP) -- New terror warnings have not prompted U.S. officials to raise the nationwide alert status because the intelligence on possible attacks is too vague, Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge said Tuesday.
For example, predictions that terrorists may target unnamed apartment buildings wasn't enough to change the alert from "yellow" -- the third highest of five stages -- and retain the system's credibility, he said.
"It wasn't actionable in the sense that we're going to change a national level of awareness, but it was informational," Ridge told the World Economic Forum at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
Faced with criticism for belatedly releasing terrorist information it had before the Sept. 11 attacks, the administration may routinely release intelligence information, he added.
"We have two choices: You can either keep it to yourselves or you can share it," Ridge said. "And under the circumstances, depending on the source and the specificity and a few other circumstances and conditions, we may share it."
Ridge was the latest member of the Bush administration to predict that more terror attacks on Americans are "not a matter of 'if', but 'when."'
The predictions are based in part on new intelligence suggesting plotting by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network has been on the rise over the past few weeks, said a senior U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
But this sort of increase in volume has happened several times before -- even since Sept. 11.
The official portrayed the intelligence as a new peak in a high-and-low cycle of terrorist threats that counterterrorism authorities have tracked for years. The last peak was in March, when al-Qaida financial activity and communications stepped up. That was linked to al-Qaida leader Abu Zubaydah, who was subsequently captured in Pakistan.
Another peak in threat reporting took place last summer and is now regarded as evidence of al-Qaida's preparations for the Sept. 11 attacks on New York City and Washington. Other peaks have come and gone, and no attack has taken place.
Publicly, officials are making sobering warnings.
"There will be another terrorist attack. We will not be able to stop it," FBI Director Robert Mueller told a meeting of the National Association of District Attorneys on Monday. "It's something we all live with."
He said suicide bombers like those who have attacked Israeli buses and restaurants are inevitable in the United States. His words -- "I wish I could be more optimistic" -- came one day after Vice President Dick Cheney said it was almost a certainty the United States would be attacked again by terrorists.
The blunt new warnings are designed to give Americans better notice and protect Bush against second guessing in the event of another attack, said a senior administration official with knowledge of U.S. intelligence and White House strategy.
Under fire for its handling of terrorism intelligence before the September attacks, the administration is fighting Democratic-led efforts to have an independent commission rather than existing congressional intelligence committees study its performance.
Democrats last week pointed to the disclosure of a July 10 memo from a Phoenix FBI agent who was concerned about a large number of Arabs seeking pilot, security and airport operations training at at least one U.S. flight school, along with the disclosure that Bush had been told in an Aug. 6 intelligence briefing that al-Qaida might attempt a hijacking aimed at Americans. The administration has said the information was not specific enough for it to take concrete action.
The Justice Department said Monday that Attorney General John Ashcroft did not learn until weeks ago of the Phoenix memorandum.
"The attorney general was not briefed in any detail with any specificity about the document known as the Phoenix memo until approximately a month ago," a Justice official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
But The New York Times in Tuesday's editions reported that Ashcroft and Mueller were told a few days after Sept. 11 about the Phoenix memo. The newspaper said neither Ashcroft nor Mueller briefed Bush and his national security staff until recently about the contents of the memo.
White House press secretary Ari Fleischer, asked repeatedly Tuesday whether Bush had seen the memo, said he was not entirely certain about that, but said Bush has "heard of it now."
Fleischer said it immediately became known in the moments after the Sept. 11 attacks that the hijackers had been trained at American flight schools.
In fact, just hours after the hijackers' identities were determined, government officials had tracked their paths through the flight schools and sent FBI agents to them.
Fleischer repeatedly refused to criticize the FBI or Justice Department for not telling Bush until recently about the Phoenix memo and said that Bush will not make judgments about the agencies based on "the snippet of the day."
A top White House aide said last week's criticism prompted a two-pronged political response: Bush accused Democrats of playing politics with the issue as his advisers reminded voters that America is still a target.
But national security adviser Condoleezza Rice denied that the administration's new spate of warnings was tied to last week's criticism. "We need to keep reminding the American people of our vulnerabilities. Sunday was not the first time (White House officials) have talked about vulnerabilities," she said.
Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the intelligence "chatter" was coming from Mideast groups such as Hezbollah and the Egyptian Islamic Jihad in addition to al-Qaida.
