Plot to blow up 10 US airplanes over Atlantic - credible threat, or rumour-mongering?

Great Debates
221

[QUOTE=David Simmons]
Two things. Martyr videos are easy to make whether or not you actually intend to be a martyr. Even if you do intend to be a martyr that doesn’t guarantee your plan is a good one or that your method of carrying it out will be effective.
[/QUOTE]

I think I would happily remove a ‘putative martyr’ and make him watch his own video until he came up with something interesting.

[QUOTE=David Simmons]
The history is that explosive incidents have been with conventional explosives. The agent in the 9/11 attacks was ordinary jet engine fuel.
[/QUOTE]

Actually it was box cutters - if you are talking about inorganics

[QUOTE=David Simmons]
As the article noted, a large economic constituency has developed (one might say with explosive speed) that pushes sniffers, x-ray machines and all the other paraphernalia associated with the security business.
[/QUOTE]

And oddly, I don’t trust them, I would go for a well trained interrogator any time.

Once one said to me ‘you have probably been through this more times than I have’

I do not disagree with screening, but I reckon we in the UK should have tooled up for it years ago. And it should be nothing to do with BAA

222

A few days ago, there was a story that said that the suspected ringleader was probably tortured for information in Pakistan.

If so, that leads to one of two conclusions:

  1. If the terror “plot” was not a real threat, then it may have been a largely fabricated story as the result of torture, demonstrating again the dubious benefit of torturing terror suspects for information

  2. If the terror “plot” was, indeed, a real threat, then it can be argued that torturing terror suspects actually saves lives, and this case will bolster the argument of those that are in favor of it.