London bombs suggest local but well-equipped cell

[maddezmom]

By Mark Trevelyan and Mike Holden
11 minutes ago



LONDON (Reuters) - Suspected al Qaeda militants behind the London bombings may well have come from a previously unknown local cell and yet had access to military explosives, European security officials familiar with the probe said.

"The explosives appear to be of military origin, which is very worrying," said Christophe Chaboud, head of the French Anti-Terrorism Coordination Unit and one of five top officials sent by Paris to London immediately after Thursday's attacks.

"We're more used to cells making home-made explosives with chemicals. How did they get them?" he said in an interview with Le Monde newspaper.

"Either by trafficking, for example, in the Balkans, or they had someone on the inside who enabled them to get them out of a military establishment."

more;http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050711/ts_nm/security_britain_intelligence_dc_1

[wakeme2008]

1. I like Richard Clark :)

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/07/10.html#a3851

He said they are bringing terrorist into Iraq and training them and if they make it through training, sending them back to Europe. But what does he know... :grr:

[Nihil]

2. What sort of volume (not weight) would this be?

> Chaboud's comments went further than London police, who have only
> said so far that the bombs contained less than 10 lb. (4.5 kg) each
> of "high explosives" and were small enough to be carried in rucksacks.
>
> By comparison, the 10 bombs that blew apart four commuter trains in
> Madrid last year weighed about 22 LB (10 kg) each. The explosive,
> known as Goma 2 Eco and used in quarrying, had been stolen from a
> mine in northern Spain.

The Madrid bombs were also in "rucksacks" but presumably bigger ones.

What sort of size (volume) would be required for < 10lb of explosive?

Are we talking a sandwich bag or a McDonalds milkshake here?

Just wondering as neither of the above would raise any comment other
than "you messy bastard" if someone left it on the floor when leaving
the train ...

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. A Macdonalds milk shake would weigh a pound and a bit

If the same density as water, then it's 4.5 litres - just over 2 large bottles of soda. So, more than a bit of litter; but it would be a small rucksack, or even just one shopping bag (if it had decent handles).

[allemand]

4. Apparently, even "high explosives" can be "home-made".

Juan Cole quotes a blog entry by Larry C. Johnson:

THE LONDON BOMBING AND IGNORANT REPORTERS

Today's Los Angeles Times story on the terrorist bombings in London contains the following:

Police previously said that each bomb weighed less than 10 pounds and was left on the floor near the door of the subway cars, on the Piccadilly and Circle lines. On Saturday, they added that the bombs were composed of "high explosives," meaning something such as TNT or plastics, not a homemade brew of chemicals.

This is simply not accurate. Perhaps the reporter meant to say it was a commercial explosive. But, high explosives can be made in the privacy of one's home. A favorite explosive of Al Qaeda and other Islamic extremists is TATP, which stands for Triacetone Triperoxide. This is a high explosive. It can be manufactured at home using acetone, hydrogen peroxide, and sulfuric acid. The product is a white crystalline precipitate that can explode violently on heating, impact, or friction. According to the Encyclopedia of Exploisves and Related Items, Picatinny Arsenal, it is one of the most senstive explosives known. It has a detonation velocity of approximately 5290 meters per second when detonated in a clumn 6.3 millimeters in diameter (TNT has a detonantion velocity of 6940 meters per second by comparison).

TATP was found in the bombing of Philippines Airlines flight #434 in December 1994, which was carried out by Ramzi Yousef. Richard Reid had TATP in his shoes when he tried and failed to ignite a paper fuze attached to them. TATP is a high explosive. Friends who are explosive ordnance disposal guys get real nervous around TATP because it is so volatile. Folks who try to make this stuff at home are likely to have a short life. Nonetheless, it can be made without having to import rare chemicals.
http://noquarter.typepad.com/my_weblog/2005/07/the_london_bomb.html

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. On the other hand, for a timed bomb, you don't want something sensitive

You want something stable, that you can transport until you give it an electric current (or until something you can explode with an electric current can explode it).

[muriel_volestrangler]

28. Maybe I need to eat my words a little

BBC TV (Newsnight) tonight said TATP had been found at one of the houses raided in Leeds, and it's mentioned in the latest AP story on this:

Counterterrorism officials have looked at whether the bombers in last week's attacks used plastic explosives, said one official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing. Among those considered, the official said, is a compound called TATP, or triacetone triperoxide.

In 2001, Richard Reid used an improvised shoe bomb rigged with TATP, which is difficult for bomb-sniffing dogs to detect, when he tried to board an airplane and blow it up over the Atlantic.

TATP is a highly unstable explosive made from commercially available chemicals such as acid, acetone and peroxide. Plastics are a broad category of explosives, some with military or commercial uses. TATP, however, is considered too unstable for such purposes.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2005/07/14/international/i145650D32.DTL

On Newsnight, they said manuacturing acetone perxoide was taught by al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and that Reid mixed TATP with another less volatile explosive to make it more stable for use in his shoe.

[daleo]

5. Earlier reports said it wasn't military grade

Now it is. I suppose the forensic analysis could be more advanced at this stage, though.

There could be all kinds of high explosives on the black market, due to the Iraq invasion and other causes.

[stickdog]

12. Yes, just because it sounds like state sponsored mil/intel

and just because a state sponsored mil/intel group would have far better means and far greater opportunity and just because not one of last 350 terrorist attacks against Israel (since 9/2000) has been so tightly coordinated OR so horrendously fatal doesn't mean that state sponsored mil/intel had anything to do with this. Because we all know that's just crazy talk. It doesn't matter whom the evidence points to because anybody who isn't a nutjob conspiracy kook already knows who the real culprits here are: guys in caves on dialysis machines who hate us for our freedoms, of course.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Terrorism/victims.html

The webpage linked above lists over 350 separate fatal incidents resulting in well over 1000 Israeli fatalities since September, 2000.

I haven't yet located a single incident out of these 350+ in which more than 30 Israelis died. Nor have I found a single example of a well-coordinated, multiple-attack terrorist strike (defined as three or more separate fatal acts of terrorism executed within a span of three hours). Perhaps someone more knowledgeable than I could direct me to these entries?

Now, it seems to me that the more sophisticated and spectacular an act of terrorism is -- the more, shall we say, made-for-TV -- the greater chance that this dramatically successful act of terrorism was state sponsored to achieve some political end. This is purely a function of the far greater MEANS and OPPORTUNITY of state sponsored mil/intel organizations when compared with those of the typical Jihadist terrorists they are tasked with foiling. Surely, we would all agree that this exact pattern (of highly dramatic and potent terrorist acts correlating with covert state sponsored activities) is quite typical in the historical records of many perhaps less "politically enlightened" regions -- such as Indonesia, South Africa and Latin America, for example.

Unlike Israel (which deals with far more numerous but typically far less potent Jihadist attacks), the USA & Great Britain appear to deal almost exclusively with spectacularly successful, well-coordinated, highly sophisticated MADE-FOR-TV Goldfinger/Dr. No-type terrorists.

The Jihadist terrorists attacking Israel don't typically choose highly symbolic strike dates (like 9/11 or 7.7 -- with years of inactivity between) to launch singular and discrete but highly memorable, extremely fatal and very well-coordinated multi-strikes. In contrast, real terrorist organizations almost invariably attempt to highlight the desperate straits of their causes by aggressively claiming full responsibility for their violent acts using previously known and recognized channels and spokesmen. Furthermore, these real Jihadist terrorist organizations do not put a premium on huge and horrifically fatal MADE-FOR-TV terror muscle-flexing but instead foster a continual atmosphere of perilousness by striking whenever, wherever and however they can.

Maybe I'm far too cynical, but I've started to suspect that the term "al Qaeda" has now come to simply signify any anonymous act of terror that might otherwise appear sophisticated enough to implicate state-sponsored mil/intel. I realize that this is a generalization at best, but please understand the context in which I'm daring to utter such blasphemous thoughtcrime. Our entire corporate media apparatus and political hierarchy have already convicted Islamic fundamentalists of today's crimes with nary a shred of backing evidence. In contrast, I'm not trying to convince anyone to jump to any hasty conclusions -- just to duly consider all logically probable alternatives.

[daleo]

16. You make a lot of interesting points.

Every one of those points is thought provoking. As is the fact that something as fundamental as the timeline of this bombing was changed after a couple of days, as if the facts were being fixed to a developing policy. Given that this very thing is now admitted in the Downing Street Minutes, it makes perfect sense to keep an open mind.

[stickdog]

25. Yes. I don't know who did it. But I know enough not to unquestioningly buy

everything they're selling.

[jazzjunkysue]

6. The cell called the secret service...

:tinfoilhat:

[Solly Mack]

7. Ah..so Britain is harboring terrorists?

Much like America was harboring her own terrorists...

Guess it's time to go bomb some country that isn't harboring the terrorists

I'm just saying...by the comments presented by Bush...if you're going to invade countries that harbor terrorists, better invade America and the UK it seems.

Now, if both America and Britain can't be held responsible for the terrorists living within it's borders...why did we invade and kill the people of Afghanistan?

[aion]

8. We invaded Afghanistan because...

...the Taliban refused to hand over Osama without having first received proof of his complicity in the attacks. When presented with this demand, BushCo stated that we had such proof, but we needed to protect 'sources and methods.'

[Solly Mack]

9. one terrorists group refuses to hand over another terrorists group

so America murders innocent people.... mind you, one of the terrorists groups, the Taliban, we gave millions of dollars to just before September 11th.



what a country!

43 million additional dollars to the Taliban from America
http://www.robertscheer.com/1_natcolumn/01_columns/taliban.htm#poppy

[stickdog]

14. Note that the Brits made the "case" that OBL was behind 9/11.

http://ics.leeds.ac.uk/papers/vp01.cfm?outfit=pmt&requesttimeout=500&folder=10&paper=887

Here's how the report begins:

This document does not purport to provide a prosecutable case against Usama Bin Laden in a court of law. Intelligence often cannot be used evidentially, due both to the strict rules of admissibility and to the need to protect the safety of sources. But on the basis of all the information available HMG is confident of its conclusions as expressed in this document.

I ask you, what evidence could possibly be more compelling and convincing than "trust us, we know but we can't tell you how or why we know"?

[stickdog]

11. Wow! It almost sounds like state sponsored mil/intel, huh?

But, of course, that's crazy talk because we all know it must be the fault of a few guys hiding in a secret cave in the middle of nowhere.

Probably al Qaeda's number three guy, is what I'm thinking. Those al Qaeda number three guys are like a regular plague of locusts, I tell you ...

[are_we_united_yet]

13. *snort*

(wiping coffee off monitor and keyboard)
:rofl:

[Rich Hunt]

15. well, by jesus...

Let's go find another country to bomb the fick out of, then.

[fedsron2us]

17. Terrorist gang 'used military explosives'

London bombs

A single bombmaker using high-grade military explosives is believed to be responsible for building the four devices that killed more than 50 people last week, The Times can reveal.

Similar components from the explosive devices have been found at all four murder sites, leading detectives to believe that each of the 10lb rucksack bombs was the work of one man. They also believe that the materials used were not home made but sophisticated military explosives, possibly smuggled into Britain from the Balkans.

“The nature of the explosives appears to be military, which is very worrying,” said Superintendent Christophe Chaboud, the chief of the French anti-terrorist police, who was in London to help Scotland Yard.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,22989-1690391,00.html

[psychopomp]

18. Things that make you say, "hmmm..."

[reBel_gyrl]

19. Know what else makes me say "Hmmm"?

A little off topic, but I heard the Giuliani was in London the day of the attacks. The then mayor of New York was there for Sept. 11, then in London the day they were attacked... strange coincidence.

What does it mean, that the explosives were military? Whose military, is that stuff standard for all military personel of all countries?

[More Than A Feeling]

20. Could this be part of the 350 tons of explosives

that disappeared in Iraq a while back?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3950493.stm

[wakeme2008]

24. Right

if you listen to Richard Clark on Crooks and Liars site, ppl in Europe are sending terrorist to Iraq to be trained. And with all that extra explosives, a little is being shipped back to Europe..

thank you George Bush...

[applegrove]

21. This is exactly why there should be strict arms embargoes all around

the world. It will come back and bite you. Now a good question will be where exactly did the stuff come from - meaning - who invented it? If it was the USA then we know military sales around the world are a bad thing. Military development should not be an "industry" per se - but an arm of government. If the only technology of yours people see is blowing up (in the case of some rare military intervention)- and not for sale - they will not be able to copy it and make it common.

Unfortunately we face the same issue with Nuclear weapons now.

[proiowadem]

22. Don't forget.....

MILITARY GRAD ANTHRAX. WTC building 7. Just things to keep in mind.

[fedsron2us]

23. The Madrid bombs were made from Goma-2

which is an industrial explosive which could have been bought on the black market in Spain and Portugal.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goma-2

In this respect at least it appears the London bombings are different.

[Rene]

27. I don't believe for a moment that was a Islamic/elQueda terrorist attack.

That 1000 person 'emergency drill' in the exact same area at the exact same time as the blasts is just too wierd of a coincidence. AND the use of military-type explosives. I'd say that was an inside job by one person related to security OR the Mossad, taking advantage of the timing.
I ask myself - who would benefit from setting Christians against Muslims and vice versa.

I think if they find/identify any of the remains of the guy 'fiddling with the bag' on the bus.....they learn who the one man is who set off a l l the devices by cellphone...and tripped one in his bag 'accidentally'. Once they identify him and find where he lived, I think they'll find all the proof needed.

That's my opinion. No Islamic terrorists were involved.
What's the detailed story on the alneda.com web site connected to Maryland and Houston, Tx people and addresses?

[UpInArms]

26. kick

:kick:

for the late night readers