The FBI says the number of Americans who are traveling, or seek to travel to join the Islamic State in has dropped since a year ago. But Director James Comey is taking little comfort in the trend.
Comey told the House Homeland Security Committee Thursday that reason for the decrease in unclear. “That may be a function of the fact that the message has gotten out that people will spend a long stretch in jail if they attempt to travel,” Comey said, and that “people have discovered that the so-called glory of the Islamic State is nothing but a mirage and it’s hell on earth.”
But he added, “It could also be something that involves people staying home to try and do something on behalf of the Islamic State.”
Comey warned the greater threat now is terrorists fleeing the self-declared caliphate, as it continues to lose territory in Iraq and Syria
“We all know, there will be a terrorist diaspora out of the caliphate as military force crushes the caliphate,” Comey testified. “Those thousands of fighters are going to go someplace. Our job is to spot them and stop them before they come to the United States to harm innocent people.”
That raised questions about the capabilities of Islamic State terrorists to enter the United States using forged passports, visas, and other travel documents, as they reportedly did last year to travel to Europe.
Neither Comey nor Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson wanted to discuss U.S. countermeasures in a public setting, but Johnson assured lawmakers it was a concern his department is taking seriously.
“Within DHS, we have a very sophisticated fraudulent detection capability when it comes to identification documents, travel documents. It’s getting better all the time,” Johnson said.
Comey added he has little doubt the Islamic State and other terrorist organizations are “looking to develop and use the capability” to create high-quality forgeries.
“We know it’s a part of ISIL’s tradecraft,” Comey said.
Comey added that he prefers to use the acronym ISIL, for the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, instead of ISIS, which stands for the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.
“I think the name ISIL actually better captures the danger and the aspiration of that this group of savages than ISIS does. Because it’s bigger than just Syria.”
