Mission Indefensible

International terrorism may have been on the wane in recent years, but Friday's simultaneous bombing of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania indicates what may be a new trend: "With airline security having been beefed up and U.S. embassies in the Middle East now heavily fortified, we may see an increase in car-bomb attacks at more vulnerable facilities," says TIME correspondent Douglas Waller. "Africa has traditionally been a low-risk area and our embassies there aren't heavily protected. But these attacks show that terrorists prefer the path of least resistance."

Although no group has claimed responsibility, the coordination of the two attacks suggests a professional operation. That, together with the absence of any major local anti-U.S. militancy, is leading U.S. intelligence to concentrate on outside Islamic fundamentalist groups -- although there is little to indicate the involvement of any state-sponsored group. "The growing number of non-state actors committing such acts is a problem for intelligence agencies," says Waller, "because they're much more difficult to penetrate."