Abdulmutallab: More Like Me In Yemen

ABDULMUTALLAB: More Like Me In Yemen Accused Northwest Bomber Says More Bombers On the Way; Al Qaeda Promises to Hit Americans By BRIAN ROSS and RICHARD ESPOSITO

American officials have cause to worry there may be more al Qaeda-trained young men in Yemen planning to bring down American jets.

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, charged with the attempted Christmas Day bombing of Northwest Airlines flight 253, told FBI agents there were more just like him in Yemen who would strike soon.

And in a tape released four days before the attempted destruction of the Detroit-bound Northwest plane, the leader of al Qaeda in Yemen boasted of what was planned for Americans, saying, "We are carrying a bomb to hit the enemies of God."

Yemen has become a principal al Qaeda training ground and the accused suicide bomber told the FBI he was trained for more than a month in Yemen, given 80 grams of a high explosive cleverly sewn into his underpants, undetected by standard security screening.

"They know that this is a weakness and an Achilles' heel in our airport security system," said ABC News consultant and former counterterrorism czar Richard Clarke.

Law enforcement authorities say tragedy was averted only because the bomb's detonator did not work.

If they can smuggle PETN onto a plane, imagine the damage they could do to simultaneous attacks on the subway and commuter trains?

I have been thinking along the same lines, this attempt does not have the hallmarks of an AQ stile attack. I am sure they would have been happy if they brought the plan down but in terms of totally beating security the mission was a complete success.

The next step would seem to be to lunch multiple coordinated strikes around the world. However this may also just be a distraction to keep us focused on the airline industry when the real target is something completely different.

Here's an idea.

What if all passengers, from this date forward, refuse to board any plane where security has not cavity searched all Muslims on the plane?

A complete boycott of all air travel until they start profiling and strip searching the Mohammedans?

This would end all bombing on the day it was implemented.

DECEMBER 1992 : (YEMEN - AL QAEDA'S FIRST ATTACK ON THE US TARGETS TWO HOTELS IN ADEN USED TO HOUSE US MARINES, BUT THE MARINES HAD JUST LEFT; EUROPEAN TOURISTS WERE KILLED INSTEAD) MINITER: "Indeed, it is possible that Clinton and his national-security team learned of bin Laden even before the 1993 World Trade Center attack. My interviews and investigation revealed that bin Laden made his first attack on Americans was December 1992, a little more than a month after Clinton won the 1992 election. His target was 100 U.S. Marines housed in two towering Yemen hotels. Within hours, the CIA's counterterrorism center learned that the Yemen suspected a man named Osama bin Laden. (One of the arrested bombing suspects later escaped and was detained in a police sweep after al Qaeda attacked the USS Cole in 2000.) Lake says he doesn't remember briefing the president-elect about the attempted attack, but that he well might have.So it is safe to conclude that Clinton knew about the threat posed by bin Laden since 1993, his first year in office."----- "Clinton’s Loss? How the previous administration fumbled on bin Laden. A Q&A by Kathryn Jean Lopez, September 11, 2003, 11:45 a.m
******
In late 1992 bin Laden was involved in the bombings of hotels in Aden, which hosted American soldiers en route to serve in the framework of the United Nations troops in Somalia. Bin Laden confirmed this fact in an interview with a Pakistani newspaper and boasted that “the US received the warning and gave up the idea of setting up its military bases in Yemen.”[3]
----------- "The Bombing of the USS Cole : An Analysis of the Principle Suspects," Dr. Ely Karmon ICT , Oct 24, 2000, http://www.ict.org.il/articles/articledet.cfm?articleid=138

BARF ALERT!!

(New York Times, 6 June 2009)

(Post Obama Cairo Speech)

"“Barack Obama is not just trying to reach out to Muslims for the sake of it,” says Mr. Gerges, a professor of Middle Eastern studies at Sarah Lawrence College and an authority on modern jihad. “He’s trying to hammer a deadly nail in Osama bin Laden’s message.” What President Obama understood more than his predecessors, Mr. Gerges says, is that it is not a war that can be won militarily, but only ideologically. Jarret Brachman, a former West Point terrorism expert and author of a recent book, “Global Jihadism,” said the speech “was the most important strategic step we’ve taken in this war.” “That’s why Al Qaeda is so nervous,” he said. If the medium were the message, the contrasts could not have been more stark. The American president was polished and poised, his speech broadcast from the elegant surroundings of an ancient Arab university, and watched worldwide. Mr. bin Laden’s was on an audiotape, crackling and hard to hear, broadcast on Al Jazeera. “Osama bin Laden and Ayman Zawahiri have been reduced to a static voice on the radio, a static voice on TV and a static image and message,” Mr. Gerges says. “The message no longer resonates with Muslims the way it did in the late 90s and after 2001.” Has the message from Al Qaeda just become fossilized, a missive from a coelacanth that no longer dares venture out of its deep sea cave, where it slakes its predatory appetites in the dark? “We have to put this in a little bit of perspective,” says Shibley Telhami, a University of Maryland professor who runs an annual poll of Arab public opinion. “Bin Laden still has some support, his intense admirers, but the real difference is that the rest of the Muslim world were embracing him out of anger toward America, and now they’re not.”The anger toward America remains, but most people have rejected Al Qaeda as well, Mr. Telhami says."

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.