Peter Gutmann may be close to the truth about Echelon's role in the Wassenaar changes. The NYT reports today that the US is proposing to NATO a combined intelligence center to combat use of Weapons of Mass Destruction by rogue states and non-state terrorists like Usama Bin Laden. There is some dissent among the Europeans over the US's attempt to frighten the populace with a new worldwide menace to replace the boogies of the Cold War. Still, it appears that intelligence on the threat of terrorist use of WMD is being whispered in ears of those holding out for privacy protection. And a correlative threat of strong encryption is surely part of those scenarios. As in the US, it's probable that domestic restrictions on strong crypto are being advanced to combat domestic terrorism in countries around the world, following the precedent set during the Cold War, which, as we all know was the evil parent of Wassenaar's predecessor COCOM. GAO put out a report (GGD-99-7) a few days ago on the FBI's expenditures for counterterrorism from 1995-98. It shows a dramatic increase year by year, with big leaps authorized by Congress following each "terrorist incident," for funds for a host of domestic agencies. GAO wonders (as does Congress which asked for the report) if it's all being put to beneficial effect. Its description of CT activities carefully excludes the classified, and also omits the global efforts of US military -- not least of which is its vast intelligence apparatus, tidbits of which are surely being tossed to the Wassenaar puppies to get them to go along with the Terrorism War Machinery. The NYT has been running a series on how long the TLAs and military have been tracking Usama Bin Laden (at least since 1991, maybe longer). It appears that if he did not exist he would have to be invented for the counterterrorism agenda. It's even possible that Bin Laden is their invention, cultivated, strung along, not arrested, for that purpose. The African bombings were probably preventable, and it will be interesting if Congress lets this possibility go uninvestigated. More interesting to Americans, maybe, is that there also appears to be an effort to boost domestic militia, particularly the religious brand, as the homefront Bin Laden. The rise of religion-based terrorism is explored at length in Bruce Hoffman's recent "Inside Terrorism." Hoffman claims that religious terrorists may be the worst enemies ever, for they do not believe in political compromise: they want to kill every single opponent, and have no reservations about using WMD. If this theory is correct (and Hoffman has worked with RAND for years on the issue) then the menace of terrorism is worse than that hawked during the Cold War. The enemy is not distant, not even ICBM seconds away, but rather it lives amongst us, it's our neighbors readying Armageddon not merely a familiar commie takeover. Hoffman says to expect more OKCs around the globe. To be sure, that's his business to say that.