Possible Terrorist Strike Against Europe - All Fearmongering

[Sionnach Glic]

Bin Laden 'personally approved' attacks on Europe
Intelligence experts have launched investigations into reports that Osama bin Laden personally approved Mumbai-style attacks on Britain, France and Germany.

by Duncan Gardham and Robert Crilly in Islamabad
Published: 8:11PM BST 01 Oct 2010

Western intelligence agencies believe that a plot of the size proposed, originating in Pakistan, would need to have the go-ahead from the al-Qaeda chief.

Agents have made the assumption that bin Laden used couriers to send a message to al-Qaeda followers telling them he would like to see a Mumbai-style attack on the three European targets.

A US official told The Daily Telegraph: "Senior al-Qaeda terrorists have been involved in many recent attack-planning efforts. It wouldn't be surprising in the least if bin Laden were involved in some of that."

If true, it would mean the al-Qaeda chief was once again taking an operational role despite the risks to his life. The reports emerged as an 11-minute audio tape from bin Laden was put on the internet yesterday called "Reflections on the Method of Relief Work".

The ambush plots were disrupted by drone attacks in Pakistan in recent days, according to security sources, which killed a number of Britons.

A second US counter-terrorism source said the threat was "credible, but not specific".

Western intelligence agencies have failed to get a fix on bin Laden since he walked into Pakistan as the US attacked his hideout in the mountains of Tora Bora, Afghanistan, in December, 2001.

Leon Panetta, the head of the CIA, said in June that it was "the early 2000s" when they had "the last precise information about where he might be located".

President Barack Obama said last month that pressure on the al-Qaeda leadership meant that "they have been holed up in ways that have made it harder for them to operate".

Bin Laden's message concentrated on global warming and the floods in Pakistan rather than terrorist attacks. "The number of victims caused by climate change is very big ... bigger than the victims of wars," he said in his first public comments since a message emerged on March 25.

"If governments spent only one per cent of what is spent on armies, they would change the face of the world for poor people."

Over recent years, bin Laden has issued audio tapes but no videos, after it emerged that the CIA was trying to identify where he was hiding by looking at the vegetation in videos he had released. In more than 30 audio and video tapes, he has warned European countries and the US about attacks and praised previous ones, although he has never talked of a preferred method.

In his latest tape, bin Laden called for "serious and prompt action to provide relief" in Pakistan including tents, food and medicine but added that "disasters are much bigger than what is being offered".

He also talked of creating development projects in impoverished regions and working on farming projects to guarantee food security.

The audio tape was posted on Islamic militant websites where it was accompanied by a photograph of a smiling bin Laden superimposed over a picture of a man distributing aid.

The Telegraph.

[Mikey]

"Personally approved?" Is there a magnitude of a terrorist attack that, under which, it just gets rubber-stamped by bin-Laden's appointment secretary?

[SolkaTruesilver]

"Personally approved?" Is there a magnitude of a terrorist attack that, under which, it just gets rubber-stamped by bin-Laden's appointment secretary?

There are memo mass-produced with "Approved by Bin Laden" that fan terrorist organisations buy to help finance main Al-Qaeda. It doubles as giving credence to these amateur attacks.

[Sionnach Glic]

Turns out this was based on absolutely nothing. Good work, guys.

[Foxfyre]

Turns out this was based on absolutely nothing. Good work, guys.

Are you surprised, it is the Intel communitity we are talking about here.

[Mikey]

Ha! You should see the warning on the local news this morning about the possibility of getting hit by a falling satellite.