JTF-2 commandos were ready to swoop

The commandos of Joint Task Force-2, the Canadian army's elite special forces unit, were put on standby just a few minutes' flight away from where suspected terrorists were conducting "training camps" at an isolated site north of Toronto, sources have told the National Post.

About 25 members of the JTF-2's counterterrorism unit were at a nearby military base with their helicopters, ready to swoop down should police decide they were needed, said a military source speaking on condition of anonymity.

"They were within a few minutes' flying time of this training camp," said the source, who was familiar with JTF-2 operations. "Basically they were on standby in case things got out of hand and the police couldn't handle it."

Police arrested 12 adults and five youths on Friday under the federal Anti-terrorism Act for allegedly plotting to bomb targets in Southern Ontario.

The 17 who were arrested on the weekend are to appear in court today for a bail hearing on a variety of charges, including knowingly participating in a terrorist group and either receiving or providing terrorist training.

The National Post has located an isolated rural property just outside the small town of Washago, 150 kilometres north of Toronto, that neighbours said was used as an assault training ground.

Residents reported seeing up to a dozen men dressed in camouflage coming and going from the wooded acreage and hearing automatic gunfire from the property last December and January.

Sources say that while the men were at the makeshift training camp police had the entire area under surveillance and were prepared for the worst, including keeping the commandos of JTF-2 nearby as a force of last resort. "They're the counterterrorism unit [of the Canadian Forces], so of course they'd be involved," said another officer familiar with the operation. "But their involvement was pretty minimal. There were, like, 400 cops in on this so they never got the call."

The soldiers, along with a pair of Griffin helicopters of 427 Special Operations Aviation Squadron from Petawawa, were kept on alert at CFB Borden and CFB Meaford, the two nearest Canadian Forces bases, the source said.

Officials at the Department of National Defence would neither confirm nor deny JTF-2's involvement in the lengthy investigation into the alleged terror plot. "For reasons of operational security, National Defence does not discuss the activities of its special forces," spokesman Jay Paxton said yesterday.

Michelle Paradis, a spokeswoman for the RCMP, confirmed that the military was included in the task force handling the case, but would not give details on which units were involved or what role they played.

However, security experts said they would not be surprised that JTF-2 was involved in the case, if only on standby. "It makes sense that they would have them there," said John Thompson, the director of the Mackenzie Institute, a defence and security think-tank. "If there were some sort of siege or standoff, or if a police officer had been shot ... they're the ones who would've been called in."

Mr. Thompson said JTF-2 has filled a similar role in other potentially violent situations, such as the 1995 Gustafson Lake blockade, a standoff between native leaders and police. In the case of the alleged terrorist training camp, he said JTF-2 would likely only have been called in if things escalated well beyond the ability of police to deal with the situation.

"A couple of guys with assault rifles determined to martyr themselves could cause a lot of trouble, possibly even kill a few police officers," Mr. Thompson said. "[But] a JTF-2 assault would clear the mat in a matter of minutes ... without taking any friendly casualties. In a case like this they'd be like a 10-pound sledgehammer hitting a 10-penny nail."

Military spokesmen said there was no heightened state of alert for military personnel in the Toronto area as a result of the case, and no regular or reserve army units were involved.

In emergencies, civil authorities can request that Ottawa send in the Canadian Forces' Immediate Response Unit, up to 300 regular force soldiers based at CFB Petawawa in the Ottawa Valley.

In Toronto, there is also a Domestic Response Company, a unit of more than 100 part-time soldiers drawn from a number of army reserve regiments based in the city.

Heads Up!

Connections (links at the site)
http://varifrank.com/archives/2006/06/canada_17_more.php

Two of the men arrested in Canada, now known as the "Canada 17" were arrested in Buffalo New York in August 13, 2005.
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/08/13/canada.weapons/index.html

What did they do? Oh, well they apparently were trying to smuggle handguns into Canada by taping them to their bodies. You'll remember Buffalo as the location of one of the cells that were broken in the days just after 9/11.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_Six

Now, what would you boys need handguns for in lovely liberal progressive Canada?

Oh, and on the Georgia Tech angle? In October 2005, Explosive devices were fond near the campus.
http://www.11alive.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=70306
Is there a connection? well not yet, but its awfully interesting.

The most shocking thing about the Canada 17 is the fact that several of them are underage, meaning we dont know their identities, but this is not a new thing to the Canadian Jihadis. One of the most controversial inmates in Guantanamo is Omar Khadir.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omar_Khadr
So what did he do? Well little Omar was picked up in Afghanistan by our troops. Apparently our troops dont take kindly to having hand grenades thrown at them.

Omar Khadir is controversial not because hes thrown grenades at troops in a war zone, but by the fact that he is 14 years old and not been shot dead on the battlefield, but is instead a detainee at Guantanamo Bay Cuba, and so his inlaw Abdurahman Khadr.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdurahman_Khadr
More on Khadir family can be found here.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khadr_family

Oh, and where is he from in Canada? Vancouver? Ottowa? Nah, he's from Toronto.

More to follow...

UPDATE: Profiles are now available of some of those that have been arrested.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20060605.wterrorwho05/BNStory

UPDATE II: "FBI Special Agent Richard Kolko said U.S. authorities have been co-operating with Canadian police since they discovered that the two Georgia students travelled to Toronto in March 2005 and met at least three of the Canadians who were arrested." More info here.
http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2006/06/04/sleuths-sun.html

Ok, so thats how the Georgia Tech sideshow fits in.

UPDATE III: The story continues to come into focus. From Canadas National Post:
http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=de3f8e90-982a-47af-8e5e-a1366fd5d6cc&k=46849

"The Toronto busts are linked to arrests that began last August at a Canadian border post near Niagara Falls and continued in October in Sarajevo, London and Scandinavia, and earlier this year in New York and Georgia. The FBI confirmed Saturday the arrests were related to the recent indictments in the U.S. of Ehsanul Sadequee and Syed Ahmed, who are accused of meeting with extremists in Toronto last March to discuss terrorist training and plots. “There is preliminary indication that some of the Canadian subjects may have had limited contact with the two people recently arrested from Georgia,” Special Agent Richard Kolko, the FBI spokesman, said in an e-mail to the National Post."

August is when the two Toronto geniuses were busted at the border for trying to smuggle handguns into Canada from Buffalo.

Update: Welcome Instapundit and Hugh Hewitt readers! Just to catch everyone up and to give you all the "short version" it looks like this:

The Canada 17 bust is tied to an arrest made in April in Bangladesh, which is also tied to a couple of students at Georgia Tech. Somehow the FBI managed to get custody of the Bangladesh individual, which has raised the hackles of Pakistani public opinion. The two Georgia Tech students recently traveled to Canada and somehow drew attention to themselves. The RCMP were either montoring the mosque, key members of the mosque or the training camp itself and were able to spring a very nice "sting" where the members of the 17 attempted to buy 3 tons of the highest caliber ammonium nitrate. For those of you following along at home, ammonium nitrate and any sort of accelerant ( diesel, gas, propane) makes a very large explosive capable of the worst kind of damage. During the 1990's we saw four examples of ammonium nitrate bombs, The WTC bombing( 1 1/2 tons), Oklahoma City( 1 ton), Khobar Towers( 1 1/2 tons) and Kenyan embassies ( 1 1/2 tons). Keep those numbers in mind whenever anyone says this was "no big deal". Three members of the 17 were already in custody due to being arrested in Buffalo NY last August while attempting to smuggle handguns past the border.

If you want to map out what the attack the Canada 17 could have looked like had it been allowed to continue; here is the analysis of the Kenyan Embassies attack in detail.
http://www.ridgway.pitt.edu/docs/working_papers/Anatomy%20v6--FINAL%20DOCUMENT.pdf
In October of last year, Some sort of explosives were found in and around the campus of Georgia Tech. I do not know if that is connected to this case, but the FBI agent I sourced earlier confirms what the original reporting has stated, that information received from these two individuals was key to the case moving forward at this time.

Summary: While the left was wetting its pants over the "Cartoon controversy" and making everyone go "absolutely flapjack" on the issue of "evil President Bush and his illegal NSA domestic phonetaps",it appears that a group of solid professionals on our side,both at home and abroad managed to stop June 5th from being remembered as something more than the day before D-Day.

Why am I paying attention to Canada and not the case thats going in the UK? First, theres only so many hours in the day, and second, its Canada. Canada is what every single leftist thinks we should be like and act like, from its foreign policy to its health system, and yet, here we are looking at the most dangerous cell of terrorists since Mohammded Atta was at work and yet, these guys were going to attack Canada! Not that there ever is a rational argument but there is no possible rational justification for this attack. This should serve as a marker for anyone about the distance our enemy is willing to go to accomplish its goals. There is no middle ground, no compromise, no "common ground" with these people. It's either victory or death.

While were all chattering away about the "Terrible Mexican border Situation" or "Harriet Miers" or the "UAE controlling our ports" or "Muhammad as a Cartoon" or "The NSA is listening to our phone calls", other people in our communities were working quietly behind the scenes in an effort to kill us. All those made up nightmares pale in comparison to what these people could have accomplished had our professionals not kept their eyes on the ball.

And boys and girls I need to remind you... this was only one cell.

And there are more out there, just waiting for the right moment.

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