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Folks, while a lot of you have good things to say, you are missing the point.

Many of you have pointed out the many flaws in this supposed plan. But the point isn't whether or not such a plan would "work" or whether or not it made sense. The point is whether or not the AlQaida people believe that this plan (or something like it) will work. If they are operating under a plan that they believe will work, then that is the plan we need to be operating against, whether it makes sense or not, and whether it is effective or not.

I truly doubt that any guy who really knows the full plan is just going to blab the whole thing to some reporter. There is a considerable amount of disinformation and propaganda in here. But there are probably also nuggets of truth, especially where their war aims and broad strategy are concerned. The talk about a plan to do grave damage to our economy is probably genuine. Whether they can succeed or not is not the point -- the point is, this is apparently their intention. Why didn't they just let loose with everything at once? While that might have been the thing that makes the most sense to us, that is not the point. The point is that THEY believe that doing a little bit at a time is what makes sense to THEM, so that is what they ARE going to do.

About the nukes: Getting some stuff from the Russian Black Market is credible. I am more doubtful about the claim that they have gotten anything from Pakistan, mainly because I suspect that the Paks need every single milligram of everything they can get their hands on. They are engaged in an arms race with India and are struggling hard to keep up. It is simply not credible that they are going to let a couple of precious warheads out of their hands. The Russians are another matter. They have more than they can use, and more than they can keep secure, so it is not out of the realm of possibility that AlQaida has indeed gotten a few.

It is also not out of the realm of possibility that AlQaida has snuck these into the US, especially pre-9/11/01. Let's admit it, we were pretty naive, sloppy, and negligent back then. We still haven't completely gotten our act together even now.

Again, while there might be considerable disinformation in this article, this guy might also have let some things slip. We have been very worried about the old Soviet "Suitcase Bombs", but that is apparently NOT what they have. What they have is not that portable and concealable. The good news is that we probably don't need to worry that they are going to put one of these things in the back of an SUV, throw a blanket over it, and drive right up to an especially critical target. The bad news, however, is that we are apparently looking at a considerably larger device. I wouldn't necessarilly presume that they are just using the Soviet devices as-is. My guess is that what they got on the black market were devices minus some critical parts. They may have had to put devices together by combining components obtained from multiple sources. They probably have people with the electronics expertise to develop their own control mechanisms. Several people on this thread have talked about Tritium and its short shelf life. This would be a critical issue with a suitcase bomb; it is less of an issue if they got hold of some of these big guys. They could have canibalized and refabricated into something that would have a much lower yield but still ruin many a person's day. Also, we should not take everything said here as the gospel truth. It could be that contrary to what the guy has said, the devices are not kept ready to go off at any moment, but instead are waiting to be charged with fresh tritium just before being deployed -- tritium that even now they might be able to smuggle in. The talk about the bombs being set up with multiple triggering mechanisms may just be disinformation to discourage the FBI & NEST from tracking them down -- something that they should be urgently doing immediately.