In a Washington, DC, conference room soundproofed to thwart eavesdropping, five linguists working for the government-speaking on condition their names not be published-describe the monumental task they face analyzing foreign-language intercepts in the age of terror.

Around the table are experts in Arabic, Russian, Chinese, and Italian, and a woman who is one of the government's few speakers of Dari, a language used in Afghanistan. They are young; three are in their 20s, the others in their 30s and 40s. But they are increasingly vital to U.S. national security: they are the front-line translators analyzing language that is messy, complicated, and fragmented but may give clues to an impending terrorist attack.