RENEE MONTAGNE, Host:
NPR's Rob Gifford reports.
ROB GIFFORD: In his interview, Michael Chertoff talked of the importance of the close links between Europe and the United States, but he said his concerns about that interaction were twofold.
MICHAEL CHERTOFF: Second reason is we've watched the rise of homegrown terrorism. We're obviously mindful of the Madrid bombings, the attempted bombings in Germany. And that suggests to us that the terrorists are increasingly looking to Europe both as a target and as a platform for terrorist attacks.
GIFFORD: The visa waiver program, which applies to 27 countries in all worldwide, presents the U.S. and European governments with a problem. Any kind of measures to target those of certain ethnic or religious background would be hugely controversial. Chertoff reassured that was not the plan.
CHERTOFF: We have no interest or intention to shut down the visa waiver program. To the contrary, the president argued, we fought very hard to expand the program. But we do want to elevate some of the security measures in the program by having an advanced travel authorization, which will be an online registration process for people who want to travel to the U.S. That will allow us to clear them in advance, but do it in a way that's minimally inconvenient.
GIFFORD: Dr. Peter Neumann, director of the International Center for the Study of Radicalization at King's College London, doubts that such postings mean that al-Qaida cells have been set up in Britain.
PETER NEUMANN: They are calls to arms, and the people who publish them hope that people - people who are radicalized hope to feel inspired and are actually taking up arms and are heeding that call. It doesn't mean, I think, that there is an actual structure in place, that there are cells operating in this country. That would surprise me very much.
GIFFORD: But the security minister for the opposition Conservative Party, Pauline Neville-Jones, herself a former head of the Joint Intelligence Committee in the British government, said it was still not something that could be ignored.
PAULINE NEVILLE: Even if it in the end actually doesn't represent any kind of burgeoning organization, let alone anything that's really fledged, it does represent a move in the propaganda game, and the propaganda game is something which we shouldn't ignore. I mean, this is in the end an ideological struggle. And this is just the sort of thing which is designed to motivate those who might be tempted to join.
GIFFORD: Rob Gifford, NPR News, London.