Nearly eight years after the attacks of September 11, 2001, al Qaeda remains "very capable" of attacking the United States, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen said Sunday. Al Qaeda is "still very capable, very focused on it," Mullen said on NBC's Meet the Press.
"They also are able to both train and support and finance, and so that capability is still significant," he said. Mullen, the top US military officer, added that the US military is "very focused on making sure that it doesn't happen again," referring to the potential for another such attack on US soil.
Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the 9/11 attacks, in which extremists hijacked jetliners, struck the World Trade Center and Pentagon and killed some 3,000 people.