What will happen on the home front?

A member of my extended family, known for his tendency to be an exaggerating smart-ass, works as a cop. I like cops fine. I just don’t have a lot of respect for this particular alarmist.

He says that the police are meeting to make plans about what to do in case of terrorist up-risings within the United States while we are at war in Iraq. He says that too many of our National Guard are being shipped out and that the local police will be federalized.

I understand that police are having meetings to discuss contingency plans, but I think he is imagining a lot.

He believes that sleeper cells of terrorists all over the country will be attacking American citizens. He also suggests that immigrants from many Middle Eastern countires will “rise up” to take control.

Does such a scenario seem as out of reach to you as it does to me?

I don’t mind if this thread expands to include a discussion of what we can expect to happen here.

Well, there will be some violent protest. Quite possibly, attacks under the pretext of protest. As far as organized huge scale attack, they just might be incited to prepone the already planned attack due to the war.

The major concern I would have is the fairly large overlap between policemen and other emergency workers, and the National Guard. A lot of people in the first half are also members of the second half.

While I wouldn’t rule out the possibility of another terrorist attack on the US during a war on Iraq (heck, I’d say it’s even more likely), I think that the idea of immigrants mounting an armed resistance is beyond ridiculous. That kind of talk is not only dumb, but dangerous. It’s wild assertions like that which get Arab-Americans beaten up and their businesses attacked. The fact that it’s coming from a cop is even more worrying…