Frustration and terror raids.
This week has been deeply frustrating, not having the internet at home, my entire phone line still being completely dead, although Tiscali have finally put BT engineers onto the case, because despite it being ostensibly a "holiday" week with parliament in recess, the news has hardly been slow, what with the emergence of the video footage of Ian Tomlinson being assaulted, the arrest of the two boys in Doncaster in what seems like a chilling echo of the murder of James Bulger, which the tabloids have predictably leapt upon, as have the equally shameless Tories (although only following Labour's own politicisation of the Bulger killing), with Chris Grayling reprising his somehow worse than Labour front on tackling youth crime, and then finally with the anti-terror raids in the north-west.
It's the latter that's most intriguing because of the way already in which the "plot", if indeed there was one, is starting to be downplayed. Yesterday the Sun was headlining its website with "BOMB PLOT TO KILL THOUSANDS", as it is wont to do, while now spooks' friend Frank Gardner is briefing that it had been at "the aspirational, rather than operational" stage. This is quite a change from yesterday: then sources had been claiming, to the Guardian in particular that the attack was expected to have taken place by Monday at the latest, and that the raids, triggered by Bob Quick's slowness had successfully disrupted a soon to come to fruition plot. Others talked, even this morning, of suicide attacks on up to four locations, with the Daily Star yesterday going out on its usual limb (or as usual simply making it up) claiming that Anfield and Old Trafford were potential targets.
Equally, other stories claimed that those involved had been under surveillance for months; now the Guardian suggests that the intelligence alerting the authorities to the alleged plot had only arrived in the past couple of weeks, with the raids triggered because further intelligence had suggested that the attack was imminent. The only "incriminating" thing that appears to have been found so far is photographs of the Trafford centre, the Birdcage nightclub, St Ann's square and the Arndale centre, along with claims that officers watched and listened in as they took them.
It's enough to make you wonder whether already the police and security services are preparing for another "ricin plot"/Forest Gate style fiasco. This is the obvious problem when relying almost solely on intelligence rather than good old fashioned surveillance and police work; it tends, more than often, to be inaccurate. If the Guardian's take on the intelligence only coming in in the last two weeks is correct, it explains why both ministers and indeed the head of MI5 were up until very recently beginning to suggest that the general level of threat from terrorism had begun to diminish. If we assume for a moment that those arrested are at some level connected with jihadism, even if any attack they were planning was still way off, it does also suggest a step change in tactics. Until recently almost all those involved in past plots were either British citizens or had lived here for significant periods of time; only one of those arrested this time round is of British origin. Whether this is because those indigenous to this country had miserably failed, whether they be those involved in the fertiliser plot, the "liquid bomb" attacks or the Tiger Tiger/Glasgow airport patio gas canister debacle or because those at the top thought Pakistani student "clean skins" would have a better chance of going undetected, as well as being probably far better trained is unclear, but it does also suggest that the threat from actual Brits is declining, as suggested by Jonathan Evans when he said al-Qaida had no "semi-autonomous" structure in the country at present.
It could of course yet turn out to be everything which security sources initially briefed on, but as always it's equally difficult to know just how cynical to be, with Craig Murray getting his in early, especially regarding the coincidences regarding the Ian Tomlinson evidence and the continuing furore over parliamentary expenses. Always worth keeping in mind is that however much ministers and police attempt to exaggerate the threat, or what might have happened had a plot not been foiled, so far jihadists in this country have exposed their incompetence and ignorance on numerous occasions, while only succeeding once. The IRA used to say that they only had to be lucky once, which is true, but the odds are overwhelmingly, nonetheless, in our favour.
It's the latter that's most intriguing because of the way already in which the "plot", if indeed there was one, is starting to be downplayed. Yesterday the Sun was headlining its website with "BOMB PLOT TO KILL THOUSANDS", as it is wont to do, while now spooks' friend Frank Gardner is briefing that it had been at "the aspirational, rather than operational" stage. This is quite a change from yesterday: then sources had been claiming, to the Guardian in particular that the attack was expected to have taken place by Monday at the latest, and that the raids, triggered by Bob Quick's slowness had successfully disrupted a soon to come to fruition plot. Others talked, even this morning, of suicide attacks on up to four locations, with the Daily Star yesterday going out on its usual limb (or as usual simply making it up) claiming that Anfield and Old Trafford were potential targets.
Equally, other stories claimed that those involved had been under surveillance for months; now the Guardian suggests that the intelligence alerting the authorities to the alleged plot had only arrived in the past couple of weeks, with the raids triggered because further intelligence had suggested that the attack was imminent. The only "incriminating" thing that appears to have been found so far is photographs of the Trafford centre, the Birdcage nightclub, St Ann's square and the Arndale centre, along with claims that officers watched and listened in as they took them.
It's enough to make you wonder whether already the police and security services are preparing for another "ricin plot"/Forest Gate style fiasco. This is the obvious problem when relying almost solely on intelligence rather than good old fashioned surveillance and police work; it tends, more than often, to be inaccurate. If the Guardian's take on the intelligence only coming in in the last two weeks is correct, it explains why both ministers and indeed the head of MI5 were up until very recently beginning to suggest that the general level of threat from terrorism had begun to diminish. If we assume for a moment that those arrested are at some level connected with jihadism, even if any attack they were planning was still way off, it does also suggest a step change in tactics. Until recently almost all those involved in past plots were either British citizens or had lived here for significant periods of time; only one of those arrested this time round is of British origin. Whether this is because those indigenous to this country had miserably failed, whether they be those involved in the fertiliser plot, the "liquid bomb" attacks or the Tiger Tiger/Glasgow airport patio gas canister debacle or because those at the top thought Pakistani student "clean skins" would have a better chance of going undetected, as well as being probably far better trained is unclear, but it does also suggest that the threat from actual Brits is declining, as suggested by Jonathan Evans when he said al-Qaida had no "semi-autonomous" structure in the country at present.
It could of course yet turn out to be everything which security sources initially briefed on, but as always it's equally difficult to know just how cynical to be, with Craig Murray getting his in early, especially regarding the coincidences regarding the Ian Tomlinson evidence and the continuing furore over parliamentary expenses. Always worth keeping in mind is that however much ministers and police attempt to exaggerate the threat, or what might have happened had a plot not been foiled, so far jihadists in this country have exposed their incompetence and ignorance on numerous occasions, while only succeeding once. The IRA used to say that they only had to be lucky once, which is true, but the odds are overwhelmingly, nonetheless, in our favour.
Labels: argh, jihadists, Manchester April 2009 terror raids, personal shit, security services, terror, terrorism
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