If you were in possession of timers, weedkiller, firelighters and tennis balls in connection with the commission, preparation or instigation of an act of terrorism, and travelling on the train, would you really take time out to be abusive to a railway servant, resulting in your arrest and discovery ? It makes you wonder if someone knew about him all along.
He is accused on five counts of recording or possessing information or documents likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism. The documents allegedly include notebooks, a folder containing drawings and handwritten notes, the WAFFEN SS UK Members Handbook, and a book entitled Counter Bomb.
The Waffen SS UK Members Handbook ? I'm not sure the Waffen SS was a membership organisation, let alone one with a British branch. I thought you had to be invited.
I wonder what he was doing in Suffolk ? Perhaps, as a loyal member of the Waffen SS (isn't that treasonable ?) he was planning an attack on the birthplace of British radar at Bawdsey, where the Post Óffice carried out the pioneering work in the 30s. Someone ought to tell him he's a bit late.
8 comments:
"He also faces four charges of possessing an article in circumstances which give rise to a reasonable suspicion that his possession was for a purpose connected with the commission, preparation or instigation of an act of terrorism."
That's a pretty Orwellian charge, isn't it? In other words, something completely innocuous and carried by anyone, but that will now be used as further 'evidence' against him....
I'm not carrying a torch - or even a firelighter - for the guy. It just struck me as odd that someone supposedly 'on a mission' would call attention to himself like that. He's either an idiot or was already being watched. Either explanation is possible.
I understand what you say - but if I'm found outside a building at 3am with matches, rags and a gallon of petrol in my hand, I think it's not unreasonable to think I'm up to no good. Lots of innocuous things can be significant in the right context. We must be fair.
It just struck me as odd that someone supposedly 'on a mission' would call attention to himself like that.
It's quite possible I suppose. Commiting a terror attack is about getting publicity for a cause, so the would-be terrorist isn't going to be too discreet if they're a bit of a nutter.
Having said that, most of the supposed 'terrorist' cases you hear about these days seem to be based on pretty flimsy evidence. I can't decide whether it's some sort of deliberate plan, or just plain CYA, with no one willing to take any responsibility for dropping the case whenever the 'terrorist' charge gets mentioned.
There is something to be said for all three of the above opinions, so I won't be much help in clarifying matters. So ...
1) to juliam: it's not that long ago since kid's 'how-it's-made' books included, along with cross-sections of car and plane engines, simple instructions for making a nuclear bomb. Forsyth or some novelist showed you how to bomb a safe silently, AND to smuggle the neccessary components for a nuclear device past customs and put them together in the kitchen: I learned to make French Government gunpowder (years ago) from an article on spirit proof regulations in "Good Housekeeping" or "Homes and Gardens" in about 1958.(They missed out the corning process. but I've taken that on boeard since.)I THINK I remember how to make a solenoid gun that fires needles: you need a loo roll, a coil a bettery and...ah, that's telling! Somewhere I've got the Certificate 'A' Parts One and Two handbooks that I was issued a few years later in the CCF: if I just wrote down a few of the things I remember and had a bag of charcoal and some sulphur I'm sure I could be sent down.
A book like "The Turner Diaries" could well be used to instigate, prepare, or commit an act of terrorism: the directions for all three are pretty clear. I used to lend a copy to friends on the Left: they professed to be horrified, but were fascinated and read on to the end. We could have all have been banged up for having the book: the methods apparently work, and the book clearly anticipates the Oklahoma bombing. Can you be found guilty of giving rise to a "reasonable suspicion?" That's what they need to arrest you, but is that all they need for a verdict? [Does anyone remember the matter of "The Anarchists' Cookbook" (I think it was called) which had bomb recipes in it? The book was held by Cheltenham Tory types to represent a genuine Carlos-the-Jackal or Baader-Meinhof type threat: others, like the Brixton anarchists possibly its originators, branded it as a state-sponsored hoax, saying that each recipe, though plausible, had a fatal flaw, so the would-be bomber would blow himself up, saving the police trouble! (Actually the Brixton anarchists DID blow themselves up, when they tried surreptitiously piping next door's gas supplies into their premises!)
2) to laban. History shows lots of examples of folk who had dangerous goods supplied to them by members of government agencies, who then collared the recipients. Examples could start with the Gunpowder Plot where the state, having identified a couple of Catholic hotheads, apparently sold them cheap gunpowder and found them a cellar to store it in. James I and others at the time knew this, and the early anniversaries of the Plot were referred to as "Cecil's Holiday" after its State Controller, agent provocateur par excellence. Examples can easily be multiplied: members of the Cabinet were in the 19th. century heavily implicated in a supposed Fenian plot to blow up Queen victoria, the exposure of which would have scotched plans for Irish Home Rule.
3) for Moriarty. Again, yes -if you really believe your cause is just, it might be the ONLY way to get to make that great speech in court, sway the jury, and get the mob out on the street. But again, what about the great RICIN plot of a few years back? On Mr. Blair's instructions I bought a tanker-load of bottled water, kept my hands off escalator handrails on the tube, and used a finger-stall to push lift buttons.
But the ricin proved to be as illusory as the WMD...
And I suppose there's always the chance that something on the lines of the following could take place: "We'll come round after dark and make your bedroom look right. Tell the blokes in the pub you belong to Column 88. Don't worry, the stuff we'll plant can't go off. Here's what'll be said in court, with the list of people you're supposed to have met. You'll get six years, but you'll only only be inside for a week or so, and then you'll be quietly sprung ...Sorry, we can't pay more than that, but we CAN forget about the genuine stuff: are you up for it?"
Well the state has to show equivalence to the thousands of jihadis in "their" enclaves(Telgraph report of a day or so ago). And Zanu has to work with what it's got - but I would thought a tennis ball would have made a remarkably unpromising grenade casing, couldn't it even be a cricket ball? they must be asking, plaintively.
It will be fascinating to learn the "Waffen SS" UK's order of battle. If it isn't of Panzer Corps stregth I will be desperately disappointed - I would hope there would be Tiger tanks, 88mm guns, half tracks for the Panzer Grenadiers, Spandaus, Nebelwurfer and Panzerfausts.
But I must face the probability of disillusionment.
This is like the "BNP bomber" up in Pendle, fearsomely equipped with thunderflashes -and a "rocket launcher" - ie an empty tube. The "rocket launcher" made a brief appearance in the Press, never to be heard of again - funny that.
Meanwhile the real threat grows larger, day to day - the import and fast breeding of singularly unpromising human "capital"
"Somalis living in Britain are channeling cash to al Qaeda-linked Islamist groups committing human rights atrocities in their war-torn homeland, a community leader has claimed."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3407535/Somali-Taliban-behind-stoning-of-13-year-old-girl-gets-funding-from-Britain.html
Sarge! Come on, start your own blog.
And of course, I should have added that a box of matches can be used for a terrorist offence, or a torch battery.
And what happened to the BNP bloke in Pendle?
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