The foiled London bomb
10:47am
One of the great delusions of our time is that once Blair, in the UK case, and Bush, in the American one, stepped down from office the terrorist threat would disappear. The news that a car bomb attack was foiled in London last night illustrates just how wrong this belief was. Although, the fact that the vast bulk of planning for the 9/11 attacks was done during the Clinton presidency should have shown people how wrong-headed this idea was in the first place.
One of challenges facing the new Home Secretary Jacqui Smith is developing the authority to reassure the nation in these kinds of situations. At the moment, she has no public profile to speak of and lacks the commanding presence that John Reid had during the airline plot.
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Comments
dizzy
June 29th, 2007 1:10pmerrr "foiled"? More like "incompetent" surely?
Ed
June 29th, 2007 2:19pmJacqui Smith not only has no stage presence, she also has no discernable qualifications for the job. To anybody without the requisite knowledge of her appointment, she could quite easily be a middle-aged divorcee receptionist at a failing suburban solicitors' practice. Not inspiring.
EyeSee
June 29th, 2007 2:21pmJacqui has to set the right tone to get the respect she needs to inspire confidence. Instead she thought talking to people in the mode of a school head teacher was the right approach. It was a measure of how pointless was her speech when she placed all the emphasis on the bravery of the bomb disposal people. True, but always true.This bomb isn't necessarily an indication of a 'continuing terrorist threat', though of course to say so bolsters Labour's liberty removing laws. And this public vigilance they have just discovered the importance of! Outrageous. How many years have we been told to stay out of it, leave it to the police (who WILL let you down)? Let's see how long Brown holds back from spouting irrelevant nonsense about this incident. And well done you ambulance crew.
MarkT
June 29th, 2007 3:21pm> One of the great delusions of > our time is that once Blair, > in the UK case, and Bush, in > the American one, stepped down > from office the terrorist > threat would disappear. If you think that anyone on either side of the political spectrum believes this, then you are the one that is deluded.
Sam
June 29th, 2007 3:44pmThis is a report on Crusade Media News last week: "A new jihadi video, made in the same region, that purports to show a “graduation ceremony” of 300 aspiring suicide bombers headed for the West. According to an account of the tape on the ABC News web site, the ceremony was staged on June 9 at a training camp alleged to be operated by the Taliban and Al Qaeda. The video, recorded by a Pakistani journalist, shows groups of about 150 masked men—supposedly suicide bombers assigned to conduct attacks in Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany and the United States. Some of the would-be bombers were speaking English." http://www.crusade-media.com/news80.html
Sanity
June 29th, 2007 4:13pm"One of the great delusions of our time is that once Blair, in the UK case, and Bush, in the American one, stepped down from office the terrorist threat would disappear" Kindly post statements by reputable people who said that once Blair and Bush step down the terror problem would disappear. I look forward to reading them, if they exist.
Matthew
June 29th, 2007 6:04pm"One of the great delusions of our time is that once Blair...stepped down from office the terrorist threat would disappear" Can you name and shame the prominent individuals who held this ridiculous view?
Gerry
June 30th, 2007 1:38amYou must have some nutroots sites in the UK like in the U.S. - Check DailyKos and DemocraticUnderground and you'll find plenty of people who thought that terrorism would end with the tenures of Blair and Bush.