A German counterterrorism investigation was a key source for a claim by Central Intelligence Agency director Gen. Michael Hayden that Al Qaeda is now deploying operatives who look and sound like Westerners.

Appearing on "Meet the Press" last Sunday, Hayden told host Tim Russert, "It's very clear to us that Al Qaeda has been able, over the past 18 months or so, to establish a safe haven along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area that they have not enjoyed before, that they are bringing operatives into that region for training, operatives that … wouldn't attract your attention if they were going through the customs line at Dulles [International Airport] with you when you're coming back from overseas." Russert asked whether such suspects would look "Western." Hayden said they would, and therefore could "come into this country … without attracting the kind of attention that others might."

According to U.S. and European intelligence and counterterrorism officials, Hayden was referring to recent information indicating that Al Qaeda and its affiliates are making a concerted effort to recruit and activate operatives who, by virtue of their Western appearance, can more easily slip through heightened airport and border security nets—particularly in the United States. The 9/11 hijackers were all from Middle Eastern backgrounds—most were Saudi—and U.S. and Western agencies long ago greatly increased surveillance of travelers coming from that region.

"Al Qaeda has an obvious interest in attracting individuals who can gain access to Western societies despite the higher levels of scrutiny given to travelers there," a U.S. intelligence official told NEWSWEEK. (The official, like others quoted in this article, declined to be named talking about sensitive matters.) "That not only means converts to Islam from Western nations and people with legitimate identity documents from those places, but militants from anywhere who simply look Western." The official added, "These guys are resourceful. They learn. They think about different means and methods to try to place operatives in the countries they target."

There is little hard information on how many Al Qaeda recruits actually fit the mold Hayden was talking about. But the CIA chief's concern was triggered by an inquiry, made public last summer by German authorities, into the activities of an alleged jihadist cell purportedly linked to the Islamic Jihad Union of Uzbekistan (IJU). Originally an Islamic militant group based in the former Soviet republic of Uzbekistan, elements of the IJU migrated to the tribal areas of Pakistan and loosely affiliated themselves with other jihadist factions in that region. Those factions, it is believed, sometimes take direction from the fugitive central leadership of Al Qaeda, headed by Osama bin Laden and his Egyptian sidekick, Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri.

Last summer German authorities arrested a handful of alleged IJU operatives who came under suspicion after they were spotted by U.S. personnel apparently casing American military bases in Germany. Particularly alarming to both U.S. and German investigators was the early discovery that the leader of the group, Fritz Gelowicz, was a Caucasian native-born German who had converted to Islam. Gelowicz, who attended an Islamic center in southern Germany, became a radical and traveled with two fellow suspects to Pakistan for indoctrination and training by militants in the tribal region where Al Qaeda leaders are thought to be hiding out.