Posted on 08/10/2006 3:00:54 AM PDT by HAL9000
Police statement on airline bombing plot
LONDON (Reuters) - Following is the full text of a statement issued by London Deputy Commissioner, Paul Stephenson on Thursday morning:
"We are confident that we have disrupted a plan by terrorists to cause untold death and destruction and commit mass murder.
The Commissioner has been fully briefed and he is at New Scotland Yard today. He and I want to pay tribute to officers from the Met's Anti-Terrorist Branch and the security services for the work they have undertaken to disrupt these activities.
We believe that the terrorists' aim was to smuggle explosives onto airplanes in hand luggage and to detonate these in flight.
We also believe that the intended targets were flights from the UK to the USA.
Overnight we have arrested 21 people. The majority of those arrests have been in London but we have also made arrests in Thames Valley and Birmingham. We are currently searching a number of addresses.
We are grateful to our colleagues in other force areas for their support.
As the operation got under way we spoke to community leaders to make them aware that a major anti-terrorist operation was taking place but without giving specific details about locations. This extensive dialogue will continue throughout the operation.
We would like to reassure the public that this operation was carried out with public safety upper most in our minds. This is a major operation, which will inevitably be lengthy and complex. The UK is now at the highest possible level of alert.
We will consider the threat in its wider sense and take whatever action is necessary to protect people in London and throughout the country.
Measures have already been put in place to restrict hand luggage taken onto aircraft. This will inevitably cause significant delay and we ask people to remain calm, patient and vigilant at this very difficult time.
Put simply this was a plot to commit mass murder on an unimaginable scale."
I seem to remember not long after 9/11 a woman wrote about how she watched Arab-looking (or some such phrase) men board with fast food bags and small electronics, make odd successive trips to the bathroom along with small glances and signals to each other.
Still looking for that link.
"I believe this is huge and covers the USA."
You and me both FRiend!
This has now become the netblog/Daily Kos party line. Callers to C-SPAN this morning were already spouting it. When the C-SPAN moderator mentioned that this news came out of the UK, the response was that Blair was part of the plot. At least another half-dozen callers on the Dem line echoed this charge. We are really dealing with a lunatic fringe in this country.
"We live in the time where we have fictitious election results that elects a fictitious president. We live in a time where we have a man sending us to war for fictitious reasons". Michael Moore
These people Hate this country..
sw
The Dems think we shouldn't be fighting this war. Bubba just ignored it and passed out "rose colored" glasses.
I completely agree!
We have a client who gets all his news from NPR and CNN and Yahoo. He thinks any war is far in the future. He doesn't think there is any connection between Reuters, AP and what he consumes as *news*. He is intelligent, a compassionate liberal and even as he finds out various bitter truths in the leftwing *community*, he denies that it means anything or can be extrapolated beyond one person or, at most, two.
I wouldn't characterize him as a moonbat, but he is indicative of how otherwise intelligent people can be duped by the concerted media barrage.
Good.
IT was from WomensWallStreet.com. Look for the TerrorInTheSkies series.
What constitutes an Islamic country? Would it include UK muslims like those who just got caught in this plot or those responsible for bombing the subway? I assume that diplomats and their families, those holding green cards, and those married to amcits would be exempt. Would your ban include businessmen coming here to do conduct business, tourists, etc.?
The policy you are advocating would be counterproductive and very difficult to administer. It would alienate many of our allies like Pakistan, Turkey, Indonesia, etc. India is not a "Muslim country" yet it has the second largest Muslim population. It would also radicalize the 4 to 6 Muslims in the US.
Unfortunately, yes, we have to line up those little blue-eyed blond babies and their parents. These terrorists are evil, but not stupid. They are more than willing to delegate their evil to others (more than likely Muslim converts) who are more likely to slip through the safeguards the sane western world is trying to put up.
You can put it in, and the mods can take it out. Do it too often and you'll be out for a while. (Universal "you", not direct personally at anyone).
"This is Project Bojinka - known about - even in the American press since 1995 - prior to TWA 800, prior to Al Gore's watered down post-TWA 800 security recommendations, prior to 9/11 (elements included in Bojinka) - all during X42's "watch".
Similarities, I agree, but not entirely and thus I respectfully disagree. I am aware of the above. The wording of the threat makes me believe that this was indeed going to be worse than the casualty count expected if 10 airplanes were blown up. It was indeed to inflict a higher toll than 9/11...I believe there are specifics we are not being told.
"mass murder on an unimaginable scale"
Strong wording from the Brits...indicitive of something much larger, I'm afraid....IMO.
Love the tagline many still will not though. By the way I like Vimto as well.
Correction: 4 to 6 million Muslims in the US.
The New York Times will soon be issuing editorials asking "where did we fail these misunderstood people", while certain politicians continue to pander for the vote.
We'll know alright, as soon as the NY Times knows; damn them.
Yer darned tootin'. This would be the time to do it, too. Let the lines be drawn between those that want to do the necessary things to assure security and the ACLU and the moonbat left. Such a call would be universally decried by the lefty RATS, and their ilk, then the electorate could choose how they want things to go and which party they want in charge.
Maybe we'll see an MSM poll, late today, showing just such sentiment among the populace -- yeah, right!
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