Terror Networks Are Nations Biggest Threat – Obama

President Obama today told Chinese students that he believes terror networks such as al Qaeda are the greatest threat to the United States. Obama said that although the terror groups are small in number they present a great danger because they have no conscience. He explained to the students that although they may be small in number, armed with nuclear or biological weapons, just a few individuals could still kill hundreds of thousands of people.

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Al Qaeda Calls For Home-made Bomb Attacks in West

The leader of al Qaeda’s wing in the Arabian Peninsula called on militants to attack airports and trains in the West and said they could easily make bombs from household materials, the group’s Internet magazine said.

The Islamist group has been trying to secure small victories to maintain its feared image after its leaders’ threats to carry out large-scale attacks on Western targets have been discounted as words without deeds, analysts say.

Abu Basir Nasser al-Wahayshi, in an article in the e-magazine Sada al-Malahem, also urged militants to assault secular media figures and columnists who promote the policies of rulers in the world’s top oil exporting region.

“You do not need to exert great effort or spend a lot of money to make 10 grams of explosives, more or less. Do not spend a long time searching for materials as they already exist in your mother’s kitchen,” Wahayshi wrote in the article, posted on an Islamist website on Sunday.

“Make them (bombs) in the shape of a bomb you hurl, or detonate through a timer or a remote detonater or a martyrdom-seeker belt or any electrical appliance.”

Wahayshi said bombers should attack countries involved in wars in Muslim countries as well as government figures and security bodies in the Middle East.

via Al Qaeda calls for home-made bomb attacks in West | Reuters.

Modern Warfare 2 Terrorism Footage Stirs Controversy

Terrorism footage from a leaked version of the new Call of Duty – Modern Warfare 2 video game has apparently stirred a great deal of controversey overseas.

“Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2″ community manager Robert Bowling wasn’t kidding when he said this week might be a good time for players to look away from the Internet if they want “a spoiler free and pure ‘Modern Warfare 2′ experience.” A leaked video involving what are ostensibly terrorist operations from the game has stirred up plenty of controversy, and voices in Australia, a worldwide leader in game censorship, are on the front lines.

“Expecting game designers to be responsible by not glorifying terrorism will always lead to disappointment,” South Australian Attorney-General Michael Atkinson said, according to The Age.

In rundown over on GamePolitics.com, several Australian sources issue grievances with the game for allowing players to presumably act as terrorists in “Modern Warfare 2,” at least one of whom expects video game content to be evaluated as a “leisure activity” instead of an entertainment medium or artform on par with films or novels.

“The consequences of terrorism are just abhorrent in our community and yet here we are with a product that’s meant to be passed off as a leisure time activity, actually promoting what most world leaders speak out publicly against,” Australian Council on Children and the Media president Jane Roberts told the Australian publication.

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Tom Hoggins provides analysis of the controversial new Call Of Duty – Modern Warfare 2 game at The Telegraph.

As soon as the controversial footage of Modern Warfare 2 made it into the public eye this week, there was no doubt a sharp intake of breath from the gaming population the world over. Played from the first-person, the player apparently takes control of a terrorist gunning down innocent civilians in an indiscriminate attack on a public airport.. As he emerges from an airport elevator with his squad, the terrorists open fire on a group of travellers gathered in the baggage reclaim area.

As the footage continues, the player joins in the attack, turning his machine gun on civilians attempting to pull other injured people away from the carnage and even propelling grenades across the airport concourse.

Let’s not beat around the bush here, I’ve seen the footage and even as a lifetime gamer – supposedly ‘desensitised’ to this kind of thing – I was shocked. It was harrowing, terrifying, despicable and made me feel intensely uncomfortable just watching it. It echoes the recent Mumbai killings all too obviously.

So, here’s the big question; has this scene done its job in the way it was intended? While it will cause intense controversy and reignite the debate over video game violence, it could also be a watershed moment for video game storytelling.

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Small Scale Terrorism Plots Pose New Threat

For some time now intelligence experts have warned of a disturbing trend towards homegrown terrorism. Coupled with an additional trend towards smaller scale plots and terror cells comprised of only 1 or more people, authorities are concerned.

After disrupting two recent terrorism plots, American intelligence officials are increasingly concerned that extremist groups in Pakistan linked to Al Qaeda are planning smaller operations in the United States that are harder to detect but more likely to succeed than the spectacular attacks they once emphasized, senior counterterrorism officials say.

The two cases — one involving two Chicago men accused this week of planning an attack on a Danish newspaper that published cartoons of the prophet Mohammad, the other a 24-year-old Denver shuttle bus driver indicted in a plot to use improvised explosives — are among the most serious in years, the officials said.

In both, the officials said, the main defendants are long-term residents of the United States with substantial community ties who traveled to Pakistan’s tribal areas, where they apparently trained with extremist groups affiliated with Al Qaeda. The officials, from American military, law enforcement and intelligence agencies, spoke on the condition that they not be identified because they were not authorized to discuss the cases.

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Militants Pose A Serious Threat To Pakistans Future

An analysis in Sunday’s UK telegraph describes Pakistan’s government and army as being in a state of denial about the extent of the Taliban’s threat, despite nearly a dozen suicide attacks in as many days.

Pakistan’s militants are intent on nothing less than toppling the government, assassinating the ruling establishment, imposing an Islamic state and getting hold of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons.

The attacks in advance of the army’s ground offensive in South Waziristan were widespread, taking place in three of the country’s four provinces and involving not just Taliban tribesmen from the Pashtun ethnic group, but extremist Punjabi factions who were until recently trained by the Interservices Intelligence (ISI) to fight India in Kashmir.

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Suicide Bomber Type Vest Found In Mt. Washington – Pittsburgh

Workers cleaning out a house in Mt. Washington called police when they found a device with what looked like pipe bombs with wires and nails attached.

“It looked exactly like somebody would wear in a suicide bomber-type of scene or suicide bomber- type of incident,” said Sheldon Williams, of the Pittsburgh police bomb squad.

The device was found outside 559 Southern Avenue late Thursday morning while workers from Pittsburgh Iron and Scrap Metal were picking up scrap metal. While loading materials into their truck, they noticed a device and called authorities.

The bomb squad arrived and, using the squad’s robot, police were able to get a closer look at the device.

“It had a vest,” he said. “The pipe bombs were in a series, meaning they were all linked together.”

“There was a wire coming out of it with a plunger on the end of it,” Williams said.

The bomb squad detonated one of the pipe bombs at the scene. The other three pipe bombs in the vest could not be opened and were taken to a private destination for further testing and detonation.

“It could totally be a hoax device,” said Williams. “But we would not make that determination upon arrival.”

Part of the investigation will include locating the previous tenants that neighbors said kept to themselves.

via ‘Source

Spy Agencies Believe North Korea Has Nuke Warheads

Intelligence agencies have information that North Korea has assembled several nuclear warheads for its medium-range Rodong missiles capable of targeting Japan, an analyst said Tuesday.

Daniel Pinkston, senior analyst with the Brussels-based International Crisis Group, said the agencies believe that probably five to eight warheads have been assembled.

“Intelligence agencies believe the North Koreans have assembled nuclear warheads for Rodong missiles, which are stored at underground facilities near the Rodong missile bases,” Pinkston told AFP.

“It might be right, it might be wrong — but if others believe it is true, it has implications for the psychological aspects of deterrence,” he said, describing the assessment as “quite significant.”

Pinkston declined to identify his sources and said they had not shared their own sources with him.

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EMP Threat – A Single Nuke Could Destroy America

A sword of Damocles hangs over our heads. It is a real threat that has been all but ignored.

On Feb. 3, Iran launched a “communications satellite” into orbit. At this very moment, North Korea is threatening to do the same. The ability to launch an alleged communications satellite belies a far more frightening truth. A rocket that can carry a satellite into orbit also can drop a nuclear warhead over any location on the planet in less than 45 minutes.

Far too many timid or uninformed sources maintain that a single launch of a missile poses no true threat to the United States, given our retaliatory power.

A reality check is in order and must be discussed in response to such an absurd claim: In fact, one small nuclear weapon, delivered by an ICBM can destroy the United States by maximizing the effect of the resultant electromagnetic pulse upon detonation.

An electromagnetic pulse EMP is a byproduct of detonating an atomic bomb above the Earth’s atmosphere. When a nuclear weapon is detonated in space, the gamma rays emitted trigger a massive electrical disturbance in the upper atmosphere. Moving at the speed of light, this overload will short out all electrical equipment, power grids and delicate electronics on the Earth’s surface. In fact, it would take only one to three weapons exploding above the continental United States to wipe out our entire grid and transportation network. It might take years to recover from, if ever.

This is not science fiction. If you doubt this, spend a short amount of time skimming the Report of the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse Attack from April 2008. You will come away sobered.

Even as the new administration plans to spend trillions on economic bailouts, it has announced plans to reduce funding and downgrade efforts for missile defense. Furthermore, the United States’ reluctance to invest in a modern and credible traditional nuclear deterrent is a serious concern. What good will a bailout be if there is no longer a nation to bail out?

Fifty years ago, it was not Sputnik itself that sent a dire chill of warning around the world; it was the capability of the rocket that launched Sputnik. The rocket that lofted Sputnik into orbit also could have served as an ICBM.

Yet for all its rhetoric, the Soviet Union was essentially a rational power that recognized the threat of mutual destruction and thus never stepped to the edge.

The world is different today. Intercontinental range missiles tipped with nuclear weapons in the hands of leaders driven by fanaticism, leaders that support global terrorism, leaders that have made repeated threats that they will seek our annihilation . . . can now at last achieve that dream in a matter of minutes.

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Terrorists Attack Police Academy in Lahore Pakistan

Unidentified gunmen armed with assault rifles and grenades made a violent attack on a police training school in eastern Pakistan city of Lahore on Monday, leaving the city overshadowed with terrorism threats.

The intense fighting between Pakistan military and police and the gunmen started from 7:30 a.m. local time in the second largest city in Pakistan and lasted about eight hours.

Advisor on Prime Minister’s Interior Rehman Malik confirmed that four terrorists have been killed and the others have been arrested, but he did not give exact figure of the gunmen as well as the figure of casualties in the attack.

There is still conflicting reports on the casualties. Earlier reports said at least 25 people were killed and 90 others injured when the masked gunmen attacked the police.

A group of armed men huddled next to a minaret on a mosque rooftop leapt to their feet and shouted “Allahu Akbar”. For once it was Pakistani security forces celebrating rather than militants. Across a main road in the water-buffalo market town of Manawan, outside Lahore, police commandos fired triumphal “aerial” rounds. They had recaptured a police-training centre which militants had stormed eight hours earlier on Monday March 30th.

Lax security at the ramshackle academy allowed a dozen militants to rampage among 800 or more mostly unarmed police recruits. “The operation is over,” said the interior minister, Rehman Malik. He said that if security forces had not been on high alert, the toll would have been higher. “The attack was to dishearten, to demoralise the civilian security services,” said a local administrator. Terrorist attacks in Pakistan have become such frequent occurrences that people have grown used to asking when and where the next assault would come.

Cadets said that the militants burst onto the parade ground at 7.30am through the main gate and from the rear, spraying rounds from Kalashnikovs and hurling grenades. The terrorists’ faces were obscured by black cloth. Several were reported to have donned police uniforms. Policemen jumped from second-floor windows and stampeded over walls to escape. An armoured personnel carrier advanced then beat a retreat. A lull in the firefight ensued.

Just before 4pm commandos fought back, launching an assault amid intense gunfire. Spectators watching from the bazaar scuttled for cover during several minutes of crackle and blasts. It was a rare success and a joint operation by the army, paramilitary rangers and Punjab’s “elite” police squad. Even the smart, cravat-wearing highway police played a role.

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Gunmen Made Stand in Pakistan Barracks’ Top Floor

Blood-soaked bedding was strewn with blackened body parts in a police barracks in the Pakistani city of Lahore on Monday after the last of the gunmen who stormed the building blew themselves up.

The attackers, armed with grenades and rifles, launched an assault on the police training center during a morning drill session, shooting down recruits on their dusty parade ground.

They held off police and soldiers for about eight hours before the last three gunmen made a stand on the top floor of the three-storey building. They blew themselves up as security forces launched a final assault, police said.

At least eight recruits were killed and 89 wounded. Four gunmen were killed and three were captured, the government said. Rehman Malik, the Interior Ministry head, said the Pakistani Taliban were suspected of carrying out the attack.

“I can’t tell you what I saw and what kind of terror I went through,” 19-year-old recruit Zahid Usman told his mother by mobile phone shortly after the violence ended.

“They were not human beings. They were not Muslims, they were evil,” a sobbing Usman said.

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Fighters Loyal to Pakistani Taliban Leader Baitullah Mehsud Suspected

Fighters loyal to Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud were suspected of carrying out an attack on a police academy in Lahore on Monday, Interior Ministry head Rehman Malik said.

The militants killed eight cadets before being overwhelmed by a commando assault. Four militants died during the assault, while three suspects have been captured, officials said.

Malik told a news conference that one of the suspects was an Afghan.

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Overseas Contingency Operation Is The New Global War on Terror

The end of the Global War on Terror, or at least the use of that phrase, has been codified at the Pentagon. Reports that the phrase was being retired have been circulating for some time amongst senior administration officials, and this morning speechwriters and other staff were notified via this e-mail to use “Overseas Contingency Operation” instead.

“Recently, in a LtGen [John] Bergman, USMC, statement for the 25 March [congressional] hearing, OMB required that the following change be made before going to the Hill,” Dave Riedel, of the Office of Security Review, wrote in an e-mail. Read more

UK – Terrorists Could Launch Dirty Bomb Attack

It is becoming “more realistic” that terrorists could get hold of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons to attack the United Kingdom, the British Home Office said today. The warning was included in an updated counter-terrorism strategy designed to tackle what Home Office officials called an evolving terrorist threat.

Rather than acquiring a nuclear warhead, British officials worry more that terrorists could gather radioactive material to build a so-called “dirty-bomb.” That risk has existed for some time, but it’s increased due to the security situation in several failed states as well as a growing market in radioactive materials.

In an off-camera press briefing this morning for a handful of journalists, British officials said they continue to track a large number of British nationals of Pakistani origin who are traveling to Pakistan for terror training, and to fight in the insurgency, or both. However, they said there are some hopeful signs from Pakistan’s new government.

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Backpack With 7 Pipe Bombs Leads To Evacuations

Santee California - A man who found seven pipe bombs in a backpack turned them in to the Sheriff’s Department substation Monday afternoon, prompting authorities to evacuate nearby businesses as they neutralized the explosive devices.

The man entered the station on Cuyamaca Street, near Buena Vista Avenue, around 2:15 p.m. and left the backpack in the lobby, Lt. Mike Munsey said. The man said he found the bag with the bombs the night before and one of them was leaking.

The sheriff’s bomb-arson unit inspected the backpack and neutralized each bomb individually, Munsey said.

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Report: al Qaeda Recruiting In Uk At Street Level

The al Qaeda terror network is able to “directly recruit British muslims at street level in the UK”, according to a ground-breaking new report by the UK’s premier anti-extremism think-tank.

The research paper produced by the Quilliam Foundation, just published in the US military journal, The Sentinel, says the success of attacks such as 7/7, compared with the failed bombings at Glasgow Airport and London’s West End, is proof of the “direct assistance” from senior al-Qaeda members to British homegrown terrorist, without which “few of these attacks would have ever been viable”.

Author James Brandon also rejects the consensus that al-Qaeda has adopted a strategy of “leaderless jihad”, recruiting and mobilizing followers purely through the internet. While counter-terrorism initiatives introduced since 9/11 have driven the movement underground, Brandon claims the evidence suggests al-Qaeda “continues to operate through a traditional hierarchical structure based on face-to-face contact” and is able to recruit directly in Britain.

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The report compiles evidence based on recent criminal trials to show how most of the major and successful terrorist plots in the post-9/11 era have had direct ties to high level al-Qaeda figures in the Afghanistan and Pakistan border region, calling into question the idea of terrorist self-starters’.

Brandon told the Sunday Herald: “People aren’t radicalised just by watching news about Iraq or Afghanistan or Gaza. It’s a much more complex process than that. And the key thing to understand is that there are actually people out deliberately trying to radicalise other people – people aren’t just self-radicalising. And once you understand that then it’s slightly easier to deal with, because if you can simply tackle the people involved in the radicalisation then the problem to an extent goes away.”

Terror expert David Capitanchik, formerly of Aberdeen university international relations department, said: “Unlike the IRA, which was one organisation and quite easy to infiltrate, it’s difficult to infiltrate al-Qaeda as the groups are very small.”

But professor Alex Schmid, director of St Andrews university’s centre for terrorism studies, criticised Brandon for drawing definitive conclusions from a “nebulous jihadi landscape”. He said: “I have been talking to people with access to classified intelligence and they have given me diametrically opposed accounts regarding the degree of control of core al-Qaeda on plots beyond Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Middle East.”

via Report Claims Alqaeda Can Recruit In Uk At Street Level (from Sunday Herald).

London Police Launch Counter-terrorism PR Campaign

London police launched a new counter-terrorism publicity campaign on Monday, calling on residents of the capital to keep their ears and eyes open for anything suspicious and to report it.

The campaign is not linked to any specific threat, police said, but rather a reminder that attacks have happened in the past and could easily happen again. The slogan is: “Don’t rely on others. If you suspect it, report it.”

“Terrorists can be stopped in their tracks if suspicious activity is passed to the police,” Deputy Assistant Commissioner John McDowall, the head of the Metropolitan Police counter-terrorism command, said in a statement.

“They will not succeed if people report something unusual they have seen while going about their daily lives.

“We want people to look out for the unusual — some activity or behaviour which strikes them as not quite right and out of place in their normal day-to-day lives — and to take responsibility for reporting it.”

London has seen several failed and successful attacks in recent years, most notably the July 7, 2005, suicide bombings on the Underground and the bus network which killed 52 people.

The Metropolitan Police have overall responsibility for counter-terrorism policing and have been at the forefront of gathering evidence in a series of cases against suspected terrorism plotters in recent years.

The campaign calls on London’s 8 million residents to pay particular attention to anyone suspicious who is buying chemicals, logging on to militant websites or carrying out surveillance of prominent buildings.

via London police launch counter-terrorism PR campaign | Top News | Reuters.

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