Lulling them into false sense of security. Scotland Yard will follow them and catch them unawares.
Maybe this incident was a rehearsal?
Let’s meet, explore the area, and see if it’s possible to reach the base’s fence?
They wouldn’t have any guns or explosives. Nothing illegal in the vans.
Sounds like a movie. 
I’m just speculating. Authorities may never know unless the suspects start talking.
This isn’t the plot of Usual Suspects. What are the odds all five gen-z useless idiots clammed up? They fucking talked. I bet more than one cried.
do we know why one of the 5 called the police before the farmer? … what was that about?
Saying Iran was involved is what gets me. Involved in what? What the hell did they do?
Detectives have arrested (but not charged yet) a dual UK Iranian national on suspicion of preparing terrorist acts.
I think the implication is that someone gave these guys disguised vans, a quantity of petrol and a map to the airbase, but didn’t come along on the trip, and that person probably has more direct connections to terrorist orgs than the patsies.
Apparently this sort of thing is common enough. You don’t start by getting the disaffected rubes to start fires at airbases, you start by getting them to graffitti a bus stop, but once they’ve done property damage at your behest it’s a simple enough ratchet…
Do we know they did that, or just that somebody other than the farmer whose property they were on did? I’m not disagreeing w you, I simply don’t know.
I admit to not reading every article, but sorting out what reporting was / is accurate and what was early speculation or confused 4th hand info is always difficult. And that’s before deliberate disinformation gets stirred into the mix.
The graffiti does ring a bell, now that you mention it:
From article:
Footage posted by Palestine Action activists riding on scooters inside the Oxfordshire airbase
Is it an act of terrorism if it involves scooters?
…and Gen-Z-ers wonder why nobody takes them seriously.
It’s been widely reported in the UK and not refuted, yeah. The first call was reportedly over an hour before the one from the farmer, and seems to have been by one of the guys initially arrested.
It sounds like they just were a bunch of muppets. Doing a bit of light crime with their mates, nothing serious, having been given instructions by Bob’s mate who’s gonna pay. Then one realised how deep the pile o shit they were just about to dive in actually was and panicked. Which would square with them being released on bail.
Supposedly Russia tries stuff like that all the time in Ukraine, hiring people to do what they think are minor crimes, but they’re being set up to do much more serious stuff. Get someone to deliver weed a couple of times for cash, then the next parcel they’re asked to leave somewhere is explosives.
I had the same thought.
@Filbert: Thanks for all that. Makes sense.
So two bits of news:
- The man arrested on suspicion of preparation of terrorist acts has also been released on bail, under conditions.
This is a bit of a surprise, in that there was a suggestion that the guy who organised it but didn’t go was the brains of the operation and conceivably a bona fide enemy agent. Again, release on bail suggests they don’t think he’s a die-hard eight-cylinder Tehran trained operative who could disappear into the shadows only to strike again.
UK-Iranian dual national arrested over RAF Fairford investigation bailed - BBC News
- Whatever it was, it worked - the US is removing all its B1 bombers from Europe.
This is genuinely astonishing. At best, for the price of three vans, six idiots and a couple of barrels of petrol, Iran has successfully disrupted American logistics in a fairly major way. At worst, six idiots with three vans and a couple of barrels of petrol have done it all by themselves.
(I don’t know what impact moving the bombers will have on the US’s ability to conduct the war, but I doubt adding c.3000 miles each way to bombing missions makes the job easier.)
US removes all bombers from RAF Fairford back to home stations - BBC News
This map illustrates very well why the US was using a UK base.
Why not increase security at Fairford?
This seems a bit extreme. Unless there’s a lot more substance behind an Iranian threat?
My suspicion (I’ve been wrong ONCE before), is that this is going to turn into another unnecessary political strong-arm tactic by the Trump administration to get an ally to allow more ‘control’ of US presence abroad. A lot like the Greenland fiasco where arguably additional latitude for US base expansion was granted (perhaps only in terms of PR).
There may or may not be a security risk to US assets on that airbase, but it’s an opportunity for Trump to twist NATO’s arm. And we know Trump can’t resist an opportunity for theatrics and change of subject.
There’s a reason the UK was nicknamed ‘the unsinkable aircraft carrier.’
And in 1984 it was called Airstrip One for the same reason.
If I understand correctly, the US is sending bombers from this base to attack targets in Iran. Iran has declared this base to be a legitimate military target.
How would an attack by Iranian agents on this base be “terrorism”? If it’s being used to conduct military strikes on them, wouldn’t a military strike on the base be a legitimate response?
That’s a good question and I think it comes down to how direct the connection is to Iranian political/military institutions, but it will be a very fuzzy line.
If Iran put a bunch of its bigger drones on a ship, sailed it to the Irish Sea and launched them at the airbase then that would very obviously be a military attack.*
If Iran sends in a bunch of special forces soldiers to infiltrate the area, storm the base and damage planes, sabotage critical equipment, blow holes in the runway etc., that’s military action too.
If Iran uses non-state paramilitaries to storm the base and damage planes, sabotage critical equipment, blow holes in the runway etc., that’s somewhere between military action and state-sponsored terrorism.
If Iran encourages and supports a civilian direct action group to do similar, that’s probably not military action, probably state-sponsored terrorism.
If a civilian direct action group is inspired to do similar without direct prompting or support from Iran, but is aware of and in agreement with Iran’s “this base is a legitimate target in our war against the unprovoked aggression of the capitalist imperialist West” stance then I would say probably terrorism but arguably not state-sponsored as such.
Well, Iran may have been willing to risk a drone attack on the American B-1s, B-2s and B-52s, on the base.
Seems pretty risky. Could it trigger a NATO response? It seems at a minimum that Britain would be drawn into the conflict.
It’s kind of a grey area. American bases in Arab countries have been hit and the host country didn’t respond.
I think it was wise to move the bombers. Drone attacks are difficult to stop with conventional methods.
Interesting, and points to a key definitional question: is terrorism defined by the intended targets or by the means or by both?
In my mind, it’s primarily defined by the intended targets. When you target civilians and/or civilian infrastructure in order to create fear in order to influence political change, that’s terrorism. When you target military infrastructure in order to degrade the enemy’s military capacity, that’s war.
But of course that means that Iran attacking a US air base is war, and the US attacking Iranian airbases is war. And when Iran attacks Kuwaiti water plants, or the US attacks Iranian water plants, that’s terrorism.
So I’m not sure my definition is the relevant one in these matters.