Fade to Black: Another Terror Plot Unravels
By Chris Floyd
From the Daily Mail: Rashid
Rauf, whose detention in Pakistan was the trigger for the
arrest of 23 suspects in Britain, has been accused of taking
orders from Al Qaeda’s ‘No3’ in Afghanistan and sending
money back to the UK to allow the alleged bombers to buy
plane tickets. But after two weeks of interrogation, an
inch-by-inch search of his house and analysis of his home
computer, officials are now saying that his extradition is
‘a way down the track’ if it happens at all.
It comes amid wider suspicions that the plot may not have
been as serious, or as far advanced, as the authorities
initially claimed. Analysts suspect Pakistani authorities
exaggerated Rauf’s role to appear ‘tough on terrorism’ and
impress Britain and America.
A spokesman for Pakistan’s Interior Ministry last night
admitted that ‘extradition at this time is not under
consideration’.
Wow, who would have
thought it? You mean there might be less than meets the eye
about the
Great London Bomb Plot, when George W. Bush single handedly
foiled the imminent death of thousands of people by using his
super-president powers of warrantless wiretapping? (That
is how the story is
being pitched by Bush minions like the cadaverous Michael
Chertoff and the chubby-cheeked enabler of torture Al Gonzales,
right?)
But if even the CIA's
old running buddies in the Pakistan secret services can't wring
enough plausible evidence out of Rauf with their renowned
methods of information extraction, could it be that the whole
great googily-moogily is about to unravel? Wise man William Blum
has this take:
"Our government has kept us
in a perpetual state of fear -- kept us in a continuous
stampede of patriotic fervor -- with the cry of grave
national emergency. Always there has been some terrible evil
at home or some monstrous foreign power that was going to
gobble us up if we did not blindly rally behind it by
furnishing the exorbitant funds demanded. Yet, in
retrospect, these disasters seem never to have happened,
seem never to have been quite real." -- General
Douglas MacArthur, 1957.
....From what is typical in terrorist
scares, it is likely that the individuals arrested in the UK August
10 are guilty of what George Orwell, in 1984, called "thoughtcrimes".
That is to say, they haven't actually DONE anything. At most,
they've THOUGHT about doing something the government would label
"terrorism". Perhaps not even very serious thoughts, perhaps just
venting their anger at the exceptionally violent role played by the
UK and the US in the Mideast and thinking out loud how nice it would
be to throw some of that violence back in the face of Blair and
Bush. And then, the fatal moment for them that ruins their lives
forever ... their angry words are heard by the wrong person, who
reports them to the authorities. (In the Manhattan flood case the
formidable, dangerous "terrorists" made mention on an Internet chat
room about blowing something up.)
Soon a government
agent provocateur appears, infiltrates the group, and then
actually encourages the individuals to think and talk
further about terrorist acts, to develop real plans instead
of youthful fantasizing, and even provides the individuals
with some of the actual means for carrying out these
terrorist acts, like explosive material and technical
know-how, money and transportation, whatever is needed to
advance the plot. It's known as "entrapment", and it's
supposed to be illegal, it's supposed to be a powerful
defense for the accused, but the authorities get away with
it all the time; and the accused get put away for very long
stretches. And because of the role played by the agent
provocateur, we may never know whether any of the accused,
on their own, would have gone much further, if at all, like
actually making a bomb, or, in the present case, even making
transatlantic flight reservations since many of the accused
reportedly did not even have passports. Government
infiltrating and monitoring is one thing; encouragement,
pushing the plot forward, and scaring the public to make
political capital from it is quite something else.
For more on the Bush
Gang's penchant for manufacturing terror for fun and profit,
see:
Into the Dark: The Pentagon Plan to Foment Terrorism
Darkness Visible: The Pentagon Plan to Foment Terrorism is Now
Operative
The original Daily Mail story came to us via Kurt Nimmo,
who adds
this telling gloss:
How fortuitous, especially for
the neocons and Bush’s Ministry of Homeland Security, busily
working to trounce the Constitution and turn America into a
snoop and police state.
“Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff called on
state legislators Thursday to embrace new federal driver’s
license requirements to strengthen security,” reports the
Associated Press. “Starting three years from now, if you
live or work in the United States, you’ll need a federally
approved ID card to travel on an airplane, open a bank
account, collect Social Security payments, or take advantage
of nearly any government service. Practically speaking, your
driver’s license likely will have to be reissued to meet
federal standards,” explained CNet News in March. In
addition to name, birth date, sex, ID number, a digital
photograph, and address, “Homeland Security is permitted to
add additional requirements—such as a fingerprint or retinal
scan—on top of those.” In short, without this new card,
slotted to go online by 2008, you will be unable to function
in society.
Yeah, but with all
the extra security keeping us so safe, they'll probably let you
take your Metamucil on a plane. That's enough freedom for
anybody, right?
Chris Floyd is an American journalist. He is the author of the
book, Empire Burlesque: The Secret History of the Bush Regime. He
has been a writer and editor for more than 20 years, working in the
United States, Great Britain and Russia for various newspapers,
magazines, the U.S. government and Oxford University. Visit his
website www.chris-floyd.com
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