The Fruits of Bush’s Folly: Homegrown Terrorists

6 Comments

1. 

   Street Kid on June 5, 2006 at 8:58 pm

   three recent domestic incidents in the United States are evidence the U.S. will soon be hit again by a terrorist attack.

   Yeah, and the moon is made of green cheese!

   • 

     Street Kid on June 5, 2006 at 9:00 pm

     Forgot </snark&gt

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     cruz del sur on June 5, 2006 at 9:22 pm

     Must be election time again!

2. 

   Limelite on June 5, 2006 at 9:45 pm

   that the newly “liberated” freedom-loving Iraqis, enjoying their democratic institutions will shortly mount an army, invade the USA, and free us from our home-grown Taliban as part of their war on terror.  No?  

3. 

   Sirocco on June 5, 2006 at 10:13 pm

   There is also another delicate matter.

   Thirty-five percent of Iraq veterans have already sought treatment for emotional problems. And PTSD isn’t conspicuously easy to cure.

   In general, today’s troops are much more competent killers than the grunts in Vietnam. Say hello to a new, considerable and long-term “threat to homeland security.”

   From a domestic US viewpoint, the longer this nightmare lasts, the more DC sniper types and other wackos will be spawned. I’d say it might be wise to wrap it up.

4. 

   spiderleaf on June 6, 2006 at 11:31 am

   I love how the US press has already tried and convicted these guys from Canada.

   How sad. But not surprising. At a time when our own media is questioning the validity of the charges, when we are being constantly reminded by the CBC that these guys are only accused and may indeed be innocent (like the 23 we arrested last year and ended up only convicting of over-staying their visa’s), when people walking the streets of Toronto are saying “meh, not a big deal in my life”, the US press and WH are using it as an excuse to keep American’s living in fear.

   Who knows, they may actually have been planning an attack. But maybe not. We’ll find out at trial. I am a bit suspicious though. It was our illustrious RCMP that told the US Maher Arar was a potential terrorist and go ahead and ship him to Syria… turns out he wasn’t one at all.

   From the Star:

   There may indeed have been a terrorist conspiracy that involved what the RCMP assistant commissioner Mike McDonell yesterday referred to as “training areas,” where militants tramped about in big boots, cooked on outdoor barbecues, built bombs and used a wooden door for target practice.

   That’s the implication from the evidence shown to reporters yesterday: five pairs of boots in camouflage drab, six flashlights, one set of walkie-talkies, one voltmeter, one knife, eight D-cell batteries, a cellphone, a circuit board, a computer hard drive, one barbecue grill, one set of tongs suitable for turning hot dogs, a wooden door with 21 marks on it and a 9-mm handgun.

   Or it is possible that the only thing that these bits of evidence prove is that a group of young men went somewhere where they tramped around in big boots, cooked on barbecues, played soldier and generally acted like jerks — which young men are occasionally wont to do.

   The three tonnes of ammonium nitrate allegedly purchased was, as McDonell said, three times the amount used in the Oklahoma terror bombing of 1995.

   But, as he also said, farmers routinely buy three tonnes of ammonium nitrate “every day.” They use it for fertilizer, not bombs.

   In short, we don’t know much yet about what these men and boys were trying to do. We don’t know if this series of arrests, called Operation O-Sage by the Mounties, pre-empted the kind of actions that in the United Kingdom led to last year’s bombing of the London subway by otherwise unremarkable young Britons.

   That’s one possibility. It’s certainly the explanation favoured by Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who yesterday praised the police.

   Another is that this is a reprise of the infamous 2003 Project Thread fiasco, in which RCMP and immigration officials accused 23 Muslims of terrorism only to acknowledge later that at most the men were guilty of minor immigration fraud.

   Still another possibility is that this may turn out to be Canada’s version of the 2004 Virginia “paintball” trial, in which one man was sentenced to life and another got 85 years.

   In that controversial case (even the presiding judge complained the outcome was unfair), nine Muslim men were convicted of participating in terrorist training — the main evidence being that they had played paintball in the woods outside Washington.

   What we do know about Operation O-Sage is that the RCMP, as well as the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, have been tracking the suspects since 2004. We also know that at least some of their neighbours knew police were watching them. Presumably, some of the suspects did, too.

   If the alleged conspirators knew they were under surveillance, it seems odd that they continued along merrily with plans to make explosives.

   But perhaps they are not bright terrorists. Or perhaps they are not terrorists at all.

   I’d like to see a bit more “innocent until proven guilty” qualifiers from the lefty blogs if that isn’t too much to ask. (and no, I’m not speaking specifically of you Steven, dkos et al are taking the arrests as convictions too and that’s just so wrong on so many levels)