Can't Keep Track of the Players Without a Scorecard

New intelligence has emerged warning Washington that its upcoming confrontation with the Islamic State may leave it blind to a more sinister and direct threat from a much lesser known terrorist group that has arisen from the ashes of the Syrian war.

Very little information is being released at the moment by anyone within American intelligence circles, but the group calling itself Khorasan is said by officials to have concrete plans for striking targets in the United States and Europe as a chosen modus operandi – more so than the Islamic State (IS), formerly known as ISIS.

  RT

Good grief. We haven’t even “accomplished” our mission with IS yet!

“What you have is a growing body of extremists from around the world who are coming in and taking advantage of the ungoverned areas and creating informal ad hoc groups that are not directly aligned with ISIS or Nusra,” a senior law enforcement official told the NY Times on condition of anonymity.

The CIA and the White House declined to give comment.

Wait for the official propaganda.

Although the first public mention of the group was only this Thursday, American intelligence is said to have been tracking it for over a decade.

And creating it at least that long.

George W. Bush once mentioned the name of its leader in 2005 in connection with a French oil tanker bombing in 2002 off the coast of Yemen.

Only he wasn’t the leader of Khorasan then, I imagine.

Like many other groups taking up the power vacuum in war-torn Syria, Khorasan has on occasion shifted its alliances.

And there’s your “money quote.” Khorasan and all others will continue to shift their alliances as it becomes advantageous to them.

[T]he US may be surprised by how difficult it soon may be to pinpoint the origin of the next threat.

I take it back. THERE's the money quote.

Sources tell CBS News the group includes technicians trained by al Qaeda's master bomb-builder, Ibrahim al-Asiri. The Yemen-based Asiri built the infamous but ultimately unsuccessfulunderwear bombs and two cargo bombs concealed in printer cartridges.

He is considered one of the most innovative bomb-builders in the jihadist world, and he's still operating freely -- at least for now.

CIA chief John Brennan recently told Orr that U.S. officials were "doing what we can" to track Asiri down, and predicted that his "time will come."

[...]

At the moment, U.S. officials say there is no specific, credible threat to the homeland. But as information about Khorasan becomes available, it's clear that al Qaeda remains obsessed with bombs, airplanes, and attacking the United States.

  CBS

But, we’ll get ‘em.