The United States will use any measure to deal with the al Qaeda terrorist organization, including a military strike inside Pakistan, a senior White House official said Sunday.
"No question that we will use any instrument at our disposal to deal with the problem of (al Qaeda leaders) Osama bin Laden and Zawahiri and al Qaeda," said Fran Townsend, the president's homeland security adviser, when asked if the United States would use direct military force against Taliban or al Qaeda elements inside Pakistan.
In an interview with the CNN news network, Townsend said there were "no tools off the table," and that the United States would use all "our instruments of national power to be effective" to kill bin Laden and other high-ranking al Qaeda leaders.
In a report released last week, the office of Director of the National Intelligence warned that al Qaeda was stepping up its efforts to plot attacks on U.S. soil.
Al Qaeda "is and will remain the most serious terrorist threat to the homeland as its central leadership continues to plan high- impact plots while pushing" other terrorists to "mimic its efforts, " the report said.
Source: Xinhua
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