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| 5/23 |
| 2007/5/8-12 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Domestic/911] UID:46562 Activity:high |
5/8 Fairly incompetent terrorist plot to attack Fort Dix foiled.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070508/ap_on_re_us/fort_dix_plot
\_ Thank goodness torturing suspects in gitmo, warrantless spying on
terrorists, and the Patriot act yielded valuable intel which
allowed the government to catch these guys!
\_ There's a point to be made but "warrantless spying on terrorists"
is probably not the message you were looking for.
\_ Isn't this an ideal time to raise the terror alert to orange?
What? You mean the sheeple see through it now? What about
the scary Canadian spy coins???
http://www.csua.org/u/ink
\_ Terror alerts only happen right before elections.
\_ To op: Nice editorial. People would have thought Cho was
incompetent before he killed 32 students. Oh, and 3 of the guys
were in the country illegally.
\_ Oh, I wasn't trying to say it wasn't a good thing to stop them.
I'm very happy they caught these bozos, as they probably would
have succeeded in killing a few people. Nevertheless, the plan
was pretty incompetent. For one thing, Cho didn't attack an
army base. -op
\_ Bringing their videos to a store wasn't the smartest move but
beyond that, they were training, they had weapons, they had
jihadi propaganda videos, they had scouted out the base and
if some video clerk hadn't reported them this would have been
headlines about an attack that killed X many American soldiers
on an American military base on American soil. You don't
think that would have had the impact they were looking for?
\_ I can't speak for the impact, but they can't have had
many weapons. "The six were arrested Monday night trying to
buy AK-47 assault weapons, M-16s and other weapons from an
FBI informant." And they had unrealistic expectations
'"You hit four, five or six Humvees and light the whole
place (up) and retreat completely without any losses."'
Incompentents can still kill people, it's not hard.
\_ Missing the point. They don't have to kill hundreds or
even a dozen. Or any. Just launching the attack would
get them what they're looking for. They are terrorists,
not a formal army looking to seize territory.
\_ What do you think they are "looking for"? Another
irrational over-response by the American people?
\_ Yes. And a propaganda victory. What else do
terrorists want? They can't win any sort of
conventional fight so what else can they do?
\_ Well, they are "winning" in Iraq and
Afghanistan, aren't they? If they can convince
the US to start enough silly pointless wars,
they can win for real.
\_ No one is winning in Iraq or Afghanistan,
so no they aren't. And no, they can never
win for real. It is just an endless
stream of nicks and cuts that wear down
society. Unless you're one of the people
who thinks that an internal movement of
Muslims are going to rise up in this country
and take over or something like that. If so
then we're done because I don't have time
right now to talk with crazy people. If not
then I'm still here.
\_ Even Bin Laden does not have "overthrow
the American government and replace it
with a Muslim theocracy" as one of his
\_ You're kidding? Go read some of
the English versions of the various
terrorist web sites. The long term
goal is stated quite clearly as
nothing more than world domination.
stated goals. The general goals of Al
Qaeda have been to drive the infidel
from the Holy Land (check), drive the
infidel from Iraq (checking), and drive
the infidel from Isreal. They also want
\_ You forgot that whole bit about once
a land is Muslim land it is always
Muslim land. You might want to talk
to Spain about how they're looking
forward to being 'rescued' from the
evil West after they rejoin The
Grand Caliphate.
to replace the secular governments of
various Muslim states with theocracies.
The idea that they even want to occupy
America is just a fantasy cooked up by
Coulterites to scare the sheeple.
\_ I don't read Coulter. I read and
listen to what the various bin laden
types are actually saying and they
say what their goals are quite
loudly and clearly. It's about
taking over the world and nothing
less. Now then, given that, I still
don't believe there is some sort of
large scale conspiracy among
American Muslims you'll find in
Coulterite style op/eds, but the
foreign extremist types absolutely
have world domination as their long
term goal.
\_ Sure, a few very isolated and
very weak extremists have as
their goal "world domination."
So do a lot of extremist, kooky,
powerless groups. The only way
you give them power is by paying
too much attention to them. Show
me the Bin Laden statement where
he claims "world domination" as
a goal. You cannot because he
does not.
\_ I bet to differ. Plenty of people are
'winning' in Iraq. In fact it looks like
the political aims of just about fucking
everyone in the world EXCEPT THE UNITED
STATES is winning in Iraq. Remember when
people were interviewed that Bin Laden
told them it would be really funny
if he could taunt the United States into
getting into an unwinnable war that would
overextend its resources? REALLY FUCKING
FUNNY.
\_ Mission Accomplished!
\_ Please elaborate on who is winning and
in what way. The Suni who once ruled
the country are reduced to pathetic
road side bombings. The Shia now sort
of rule the country but in a very weak
way and various Shia leaders get blown
up every day. The Iranians are looking
desperately for an 'in' but the best
they could pull off was capturing and
humiliating some British navy people.
The Saudis had the Americans move a
bunch of military bases to other nearby
countries or further out in the sand
which is sum-zero. The Syrians get a
minor perverse pleasure in driving thugs
to the Iraqi border but aren't getting
any real benefit. The Turks now have a
semi-autonomous Kurdish state on their
border which is the last thing they
wanted. Ah yes, we have found a winner.
The Kurds now have a semi-autonomous
state. Ok, you're right, someone is
winning in Iraq. It's the Kurds who
finally have peace and freedom after
decades of abusive near-genocidal policy
from both Hussein and the Turks.
\_ The Iranians are clearly the regional
winners, because one of their enemies,
one that had fought two wars with them
and had blocked their expansiion, is
now eliminated. The Iraq War has
clearly shifted regional power to
the Iranian/Shi'ite block, which
is agreed upon by most foreign
analysts. Many of predicted that
analysts. Many of us predicted that
this would be the outcome of the US
lead invasion of Iraq, so it's not
led invasion of Iraq, so it's not
like we didn't try to warn you...
\_ Unsealed complaint against Mohammed Ibrahim Shnewer containing
details of the arrest:
http://www.csua.berkeley.edu/~erikred/01_07_mj_02045_JS.pdf |
| 5/23 |
|
| news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070508/ap_on_re_us/fort_dix_plot FBI says was foiled when the men asked a store clerk to copy a video of them firing assault weapons and screaming about jihad. ADVERTISEMENT The defendants, all men in their 20s from the former Yugoslavia and the Middle East, include a pizza deliveryman suspected of using his job to scout out the military base. Their goal was "to kill as many American soldiers as possible" with mortars, rocket-propelled grenades and guns, prosecutors said. In fact, when you look at the type of weapons that this group was trying to purchase, we may have dodged a lot of bullets," said FBI agent JP Weis. "We had a group that was forming a platoon to take on an army. They identified their target, they did their reconnaissance. Authorities said there was no direct evidence connecting the men to any international terror organizations such as al-Qaida. But several of them said they were ready to kill and die "in the name of Allah," according to court papers. Investigators said they infiltrated the group with two informants well over a year ago and bided their time while they secretly recorded the defendants, five of whom lived in Cherry Hill, a Philadelphia suburb about 20 miles from Fort Dix. "This is what law enforcement is supposed to do in the post-9/11 era -- stay one step ahead of those who are attempting to cause harm to innocent American citizens," US Attorney Christopher Christie said. Weis saluted the unidentified New Jersey store clerk who noticed the suspicious video as the "unsung hero" of the case. "That's why we're here today -- because of the courage and heroism of that individual," the FBI agent said. In addition to plotting the attack on Fort Dix, the defendants spoke of assaulting a Navy installation in Philadelphia during the annual Army-Navy football game and conducted surveillance at other military installations in the region, prosecutors said. One defendant, Eljvir Duka, was recorded as saying: "In the end, when it comes to defending your religion, when someone ... attacks your religion, your way of life, then you go jihad." The six were arrested Monday night trying to buy AK-47 assault weapons, M-16s and other weapons from an FBI informant, authorities said. They appeared in federal court Tuesday in Camden and were ordered held without bail for a hearing Friday. Five were charged with conspiracy to kill US military personnel; the sixth was charged with aiding and abetting illegal immigrants in obtaining weapons. Four of the men were born in the former Yugoslavia, one was born in Jordan and one came from Turkey, authorities said. two had green cards allowing them to stay in this country permanently; One defendant, Mohamad Ibrahim Shnewer, spoke of using rocket-propelled grenades and other weapons to kill at least 100 soldiers, according to court documents. "My intent is to hit a heavy concentration of soldiers," he was quoted as saying. "You hit four, five or six Humvees and light the whole place (up) and retreat completely without any losses." "It doesn't matter to me whether I get locked up, arrested or get taken away," another defendant, Serdar Tatar, was alleged to have said. The men trained by playing paintball in the woods in New Jersey and taking target practice at a firing range in Pennsylvania's Pocono Mountains, where they had rented a house, authorities said. Osama bin Laden , a tape containing the last will and testament of some of the Sept. Asked if those arrested had any links to al-Qaida, White House spokesman Tony Snow said it appears "there is no direct evidence of a foreign terrorist tie." The FBI's Weis said the US is seeing a "brand-new form of terrorism," involving smaller, more loosely defined groups that may not be connected to al-Qaida but are inspired by its ideology. "These homegrown terrorists can prove to be as dangerous as any known group, if not more so. In court documents, prosecutors said the suspects came to the attention of authorities in January 2006 when a Mount Laurel, NJ, shopkeeper alerted the FBI to a "disturbing" video he had been asked to copy onto a DVD. The video showed 10 young men "shooting assault weapons at a firing range ... while calling for jihad and shouting in Arabic 'Allah Akbar' (God is great)," the complaint said. The 10 included six of those arrested, authorities said. Within months, the FBI had managed to infiltrate the group with two informants, according to court documents. One of the suspects, Tatar, worked at his father's pizzeria and made deliveries to the base, using the opportunity to scout out Fort Dix for an attack, authorities said. "Clearly, one of the guys had an intimate knowledge of the base from having been there delivering pizzas," Christie said. The men also allegedly conducted surveillance at other area military installations, including Fort Monmouth in New Jersey, Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, and a Philadelphia Coast Guard station. Besides Shnewer, Tatar and Duka, the other three men were identified in court papers as Dritan Duka, Shain Duka and Agron Abdullahu. Fort Dix is used to train soldiers, particularly reservists. The arrests renewed worries among New Jersey's Muslim community. Hundreds of Muslim men from New Jersey were rounded up and detained in the months after the Sept. "If these people did something, then they deserve to be punished to the fullest extent of the law," said Sohail Mohammed, a lawyer who represented scores of detainees after the 2001 attacks. "But when the government says Islamic militants,' it sends a message to the public that Islam and militancy are synonymous." in Trenton and Jeffrey Gold in Newark contributed to this story. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. |
| www.csua.org/u/ink -> news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070507/ap_on_go_ot/spy_coins;_ylt=AgF0WzL9QwDktV2YvLrFUVBh24cA AP 'Poppy quarter' behind spy coin alert By TED BRIDIS, Associated Press Writer Mon May 7, 3:56 PM ET WASHINGTON - An odd-looking Canadian quarter with a bright red flower was the culprit behind a false espionage warning from the Defense Department about mysterious coins with radio frequency transmitters, The Associated Press has learned. ADVERTISEMENT The harmless "poppy quarter" was so unfamiliar to suspicious US Army contractors traveling in Canada that they filed confidential espionage accounts about them. The worried contractors described the coins as "filled with something man-made that looked like nano-technology," according to once-classified US government reports and e-mails obtained by the AP. The silver-colored 25-cent piece features the red image of a poppy -- Canada's flower of remembrance -- inlaid over a maple leaf. The unorthodox quarter is identical to the coins pictured and described as suspicious in the contractors' accounts. The supposed nano-technology on the coin actually was a protective coating the Royal Canadian Mint applied to prevent the poppy's red color from rubbing off. The mint produced nearly 30 million such quarters in 2004 commemorating Canada's 117,000 war dead. "It did not appear to be electronic (analog) in nature or have a power source," wrote one US contractor, who discovered the coin in the cup holder of a rental car. "Under high power microscope, it appeared to be complex consisting of several layers of clear, but different material, with a wire-like mesh suspended on top." The confidential accounts led to a sensational warning from the Defense Security Service, an agency of the Defense Department, that mysterious coins with radio frequency transmitters were found planted on US contractors with classified security clearances on at least three separate occasions between October 2005 and January 2006 as the contractors traveled through Canada. "We'll have a good laugh over it," said John Regitko, who writes a newsletter for a leading coin-collecting organization, the Canadian Numismatic Association. "We never suspected there was such a thing (as spy coins) anyway." Regitko predicted the quarter will become especially popular among collectors because of its infamy as the culprit behind the spy warning, despite the quarter's wide availability. One contractor believed someone had placed two of the quarters in an outer coat pocket after the contractor had emptied the pocket hours earlier. "Coat pockets were empty that morning and I was keeping all of my coins in a plastic bag in my inner coat pocket," the contractor wrote. The Defense Department subsequently acknowledged it could never substantiate the espionage warning, but until now it has never disclosed the details behind the embarrassing episode. In Canada, senior intelligence officials had expressed annoyance with the American spy-coin warnings as they tried to learn more about the oddball claims. "That story about Canadians planting coins in the pockets of defense contractors will not go away," Luc Portelance, now deputy director for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, wrote in a January e-mail to a subordinate. Others in Canada's spy service also were searching for answers. "We would be very interested in any more detail you may have on the validity of the comment related to the use of Canadian coins in this manner," another intelligence official wrote in an e-mail. "If it is accurate, are they talking industrial or state espionage? Intelligence and technology experts were flabbergasted over the warning when it was first publicized earlier this year. The warning suggested that such transmitters could be used surreptitiously to track the movements of people carrying the coins. "I thought the whole thing was preposterous, to think you could tag an individual with a coin and think they wouldn't give it away or spend it," said H Keith Melton, a leading intelligence historian. But Melton said the Army contractors properly reported their suspicions. "You want contractors or any government personnel to report anything suspicious," he said. "You can't have the potential target evaluating whether this was an organized attack or a fluke." The Defense Security Service disavowed its warning about spy coins after an international furor. The US said it never substantiated the contractors' claims and performed an internal review to determine how the false information was included in a 29-page published report about espionage concerns. The Defense Security Service never examined the suspicious coins, spokeswoman Cindy McGovern said. While these coins aroused suspicion, there ultimately was nothing there." A numismatist consulted by the AP, Dennis Pike of Canadian Coin & Currency near Toronto, quickly matched a grainy image and physical descriptions of the suspect coins in the contractors' confidential accounts to the 25-cent poppy piece. He added that the coin's protective coating glows peculiarly under ultraviolet light. Some of the US documents the AP obtained were classified "Secret/Noforn," meaning they were never supposed to be viewed by foreigners, even America's closest allies. The government censored parts of the files, citing national security reasons, before turning over copies under the US Freedom of Information Act. Nothing in the documents -- except the reference to nanotechnology -- explained how the contractors' accounts evolved into a full-blown warning about spy coins with radio frequency transmitters. Many passages were censored, including the names of contractors and details about where they worked and their projects. But there were indications the accounts should have been taken lightly. Next to one blacked-out sentence was this warning: "This has not been confirmed as of yet." The Canadian intelligence documents, which also were censored, were turned over to the AP for $5 under that country's Access to Information Act. Canada cited rules for protecting against subversive or hostile activities to explain why it censored the papers. A display of Canadian Fluorescent Coins, illuminated by a black light, shown in Washington, Wednesday, May 2, 2007. An odd-looking Canadian coin with a bright red flower was the culprit behind the US Defense Department's false espionage warning earlier this year, The Associated Press has learned. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. |