Wake Up and Smell the Terrorism

A British Airways aircraft lands at Heathrow Airport, near London August 10, 2006. British police said on Thursday they had thwarted a plot to blow up aircraft in mid-flight between Britain and the United States and arrested more than 20 people.

OPINION
I normally don't frame my worldview on tripe from bloggers, but I'll admit from the point I first learned early this morning that the British had thwarted a terror plot to blow up American passenger planes, I have been poking around for some definitive statement on the event from the liberal blogs. By early evening (my time) Hunter over at Daily Kos had finally gathered his talking points and posted his thoughts. As I expected, the opinion rendered was framed by anti-Bush, anti-Republican pessimism and spewed a partisan political view rather than a discussion of empirical facts. Hunter praised the, “big difference between U.S. and U.K. efforts in the War on Terror.” He writes:

---

[T]he U.K. is beginning to show a history of wrapping up terror plots and arresting those involved, and seems even to have managed to have done so within the context of law.

---

Hunter forgot to mention that NSA wiretaps were instrumental in the discovery of the terrorist plot. From the Time magazine article, Thwarting the Airline Plot: Inside the Investigation:

---

U.S. intelligence provided London authorities with intercepts of the group's communications.

---

Hunter forgot to mention that a British agent had infiltrated the terrorist group. Hunter forgot to mention that in the UK, the police can act without a warrant on reasonable suspicion. (In the US, the police must have a warrant and probable cause.) Hunter also seems to have forgotten the events surrounding the bombings in the London Underground just over a year ago, where British police were heavily criticized for the use of excess force when they shot and killed an unarmed suspect. Hunter scorns the very policies and programs that have prevented a terrorist act on American soil since 9/11.

You can go read Daily Kos for yourself. I singled out Kos because the blog seems to most clearly echo liberal talking points; the writers fancy themselves to be the new force with whom to be reckoned with in US politics. But then again, Kos' folks are still in the afterglow of the CT primary. Kos and company have devoted more column inches to post after post after post on the "technical difficulties" that caused Lieberman's campaign Web site to crash on primary day than to the terrorist plot. What's that line about protesting too much?

Any intelligent person has to ask the question, though, if the plot had been busted last Monday would Lieberman have lost in the CT primary?

It is a mistake to see the war on terror for anything other than what it is: a war Islamist fanatics are waging on the West. Too, it is a mistake to think that the war is in response to the way the West interacts with Arab countries. The jihadists have declared war on anyone who does not agree with their worldview.

If the plot had succeeded, it would have become the new 9/11. Rightfully so, responsible folks should regard the disruption of the plot with more than passing significance.

RESOURCES

W Post: Britain Thwarts Airline Terror Plot

AP: British: Thwarted Plot Involved 10 Jets

BBC: 'Airlines terror plot' disrupted

CNN: Agent infiltrated terror cell, U.S. says

Tags: terrorism, photography, photo, photos, pictures, images, photojournalism, England, UK, London, travel, threat
Global Tags: Washington DC, News and Politics, News, Politics, Current Events, Current Affairs, Life, Culture, Tension