An Al Qaeda Summer Break
Some, probably most, of us think that the Summer break is a great time to go on vacation to another city, place, or even another country, to see something of the world, to walk on paths you did not yet walk on, to enjoy life to the fullest. Others have different plans:
A secret U.S. law enforcement report, prepared for the Department of Homeland Security, warns that al Qaeda is planning a terror “spectacular” this summer, according to a senior official with access to the document.
“This is reminiscent of the warnings and intelligence we were getting in the summer of 2001,” the official told ABCNews.com.
U.S. officials have kept the information secret, and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said today on ABC News’ “This Week with George Stephanopoulos” that the United States did not have “have any specific credible evidence that there’s an attack focused on the United States at this point.”
As ABCNews.com reported, U.S. law enforcement officials received intelligence reports two weeks ago warning of terror attacks in Glasgow and Prague, the Czech Republic, against “airport infrastructure and aircraft.”
German officials have taken a different approach to the terror threat: whereas American officials try to keep the public calm and confident, their German counterparts have informed the German people that there is a major risk of 9/11-ish terrorist attacks this Summer.
Jules Crittenden remarks that he find it “hard to know what to make of this.”
Al-Qaeda undoubtedly has had a lot of “spectacular†plans. Execution not always feasible. Meanwhile, what intelligence agent/agency in the post-9/11 Commission era is going to downplay any suggestion of al-Qaeda’s desire to do us harm?
All true, of course, but if I look at the three failed terrorist attacks in Great Britain these last couple of days, I think it is safe to assume that Al Qaeda does indeed have big plans for the summer. The good news is obviously that American authorities know about Al Qaeda’s plans (well, not in detail, but that they are up to something). All we can hope now is that those authorities have learned from 9/11 – and by all accounts they have. 9/11 was only possible because many mistakes were made. If those mistakes are not made this time around, Al Qaeda might be stopped.
And what’d ya know:
A car bomb exploded at the site of an ancient temple in Yemen’s northeast province of Mareb on Monday, killing eight people and wounding at least seven, police said.
Police in Mareb said six of the people killed were tourists, believed to be mostly from Spain. The other two were Yemenis, they said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
Authorities in the province said the blast was caused by a car bomb, and witnesses reported seeing a car enter a gate at the temple’s site before exploding.
Will we see worldwide terrorist attacks this summer?
Cross posted at my own blog.
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7 Responses to “An Al Qaeda Summer Break”
No, because we’re fighting them over there.
I can now see that I couldn’t be on the left even if I wanted to be because I lack the required glibness to the possibility of terrorist attacks possessed by Davebo.
Therefore, no predictions from me, but I can certainly see the motivation by AQ to merge the occasions of attacks outside of Irag along with what will be billed as the defeat of the infidels in Iraq to achieve exactly what terrorists exist to achieve…….a state of fear.
Michael,
Please, please, please, tell me you’re joking. For the past five years, any chance this administration got to scare the public into voting against their best interests they took it. From Bush’s ‘They want to kill your children, David’, to Cheney’s ‘Vote democrat and the terrorists win’, not forgetting Tom Ridge’s admission that he was often at a loss as to why terror alerts were being issued, and these boys have proved themselves adept at practacing ‘fear up’ on the American people.
Where in the name of God have you been living, The White House?
This seems to be true. But perhaps we should remember that just because a threat can be exploited politically doesn’t mean that the threat itself isn’t real.
Al-Qaeda is real. Their desire to kill Westerners is real. Their desire to kill Westerners came about before the Bush administration and will persist long after Bush is back to clearing brush in Crawford.
Can someone for a change actually read what I write? I was referring to this particular terrorism threat. And yes, in this particular case the White House handled it as I described.
Anyway – I do agree with those who say that Bush et al. used fear whenever they could normally, but in this particular case they did not and I was writing about this particular case.
Al-Qaeda is definitely a threat. They are also generating blowback since they seem to think that Muslims will think it’s OK to kill fellow Muslims as long as they can get some Westerners too. Do they really think that Yemenis are going to ignore that two of their own were killed by that attack?
al-Qaeda’s Plans For Summer
Multiple car bombs designed to slaughter hundreds of civilians and strikes against critical infrastructure are daily events in Baghdad, and al-Qaeda in Iraq has decided to put its experience in mass murder on the internet