Wolf! Wolf!

Since the "terror alert" that caused such severe disruption to UK airports, and airports overseas [1], Big Bampot (aka John Reid) has been issuing apocalyptic pronouncements about how "four major plots" had been thwarted [2], the head of the Metropolitan Police warned darkly of possible loss of life on an "unimaginable" scale that would dwarf 9/11, and unattributable "intelligence sources" have been briefing the media non-stop since the airport shutdown with all sorts of (dis)information designed to a) scare the living bejaysus out of us all, and b) pat themselves on the back for having saved the UK from a "major terrorist attack" (and bolster their case for even more funding) .

Look behind the lurid headlines and Spectacle, and coolly evaluate what evidence has been released to the public, and the "plot" becomes more Walter Mitty than Bin Laden. The cops have had their "suspects" in the nick for over 3 days now, and have torn their houses apart, but if they have found any 'bomb-making equipment' they've not said a peep up to now, which seems a little strange as had they even found a suspicious jam jar you'd have thought they'd have been trumpeting their success loud, far and wide. Instead, the 'mood music' coming out of the State is that there was indeed a 'plot' which might have led to a terrorist attack but no actual kit has yet been found. Which sounds to this humble know-nothing who doesn't "get it" about draconian State authoritarianism - sorry, "anti-terror legislation" needed to protect our "cherished freedoms" ^[TM] - as if the cops and the spook and the politicians and the compliant media are already scaling down expectations as to what might come out of their "investigation".

With fresh memories of:

• the Forest Gate fiasco, where a guy was shot at 4am by cops in his own house, and where he and his brother were interrogated without charge for 2 solid weeks, and their house taken apart brick by brick, without the cops being able to pin a thing on them [3]
• of the public execution of Jean Charles de Menezes on the Tube, and the subseqent lying and spinning by the cops to blacken his name, lies and spin that would still be the accepted 'truth' were it not for a very brave whistleblower in the Independent Police Complaints Commission [4]
• of the various other "terror plots" that have been shown to be so much hot air and fantasising (such as the "ricin plot" that the barking Press got so hot under the collar about)

it would be a very gullible and/or innocent person who takes the State at its word in anything to do with terrorism. The State and its agents lie as a matter of course - "State security" trumps everything, including any form of morality and honesty. When the stakes are as high as they are now, when the State is on the verge of achieving complete surveillance over the UK population - a perfect condition every State aspires to but only the UK and US States have approached realising (a bit like what the State of Grace is for Catholics, or Communism is for Marxists) - then anything goes. A few lies and 'terror alerts' are small potatoes - this is Big League stuff, and if the State loses now it'll never get another chance to impose total control for decades at least.

A letter in Saturday's Independent put this far better, and far more succinctly, than I can, and it's worth quoting in full in case the link to it on the Indie site 'goes off':

Sir: The media circus created by the decision to close UK airports on Thursday is typical of the hype and spin members of the public have come to expect from our government, the police and the media.

Details are very sketchy at present. However, we know that, according to the police, at its worst a number of people had discussed the possibility of using chemicals to blow up planes at an unidentified time in the future. If they had obtained the correct equipment police believe that such discussions could possibly have led to the creation of bombs months in the future, but they are not sure. That is it: the rest is just hype and spin. For example, the US government has boldly stated that a "dry run" might have taken place in two days' time. They say this with no evidence whatsoever whilst also admitting that this allegation may be untrue.

No chemical or bomb making equipment has been found nor do we have any details of any alleged "plot" to bomb. It would appear that there was no plot to bomb any aeroplane at all on Thursday. If that is so what was the point of Thursday's circus ?

If this is the worst-case scenario, as painted by the police themselves, then they are not heroes who bravely foiled or prevented an act of terrorism. Rather they created a media circus to assist the ailing credibility of themselves and their political master John Reid, the Home Secretary. Only a few hours before all of this furore the Home Secretary had been desperately twisting the arms of MPs to get support for the Government's anti-terrorism Bill. "They just don't get it," he said. With the new media frenzy he may well get his way. [my emphasis]

We have been told that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, that Jean Charles de Menezes wore a puffa jacket in the summer time as he jumped over a barrier and ignored police warnings to "halt", and that a house in Forest Gate was a bomb factory. All of these were completely untrue. Some were even deliberate lies.

Is it too much to expect that we get some balanced (even cynical) reporting rather than over-excitable, sensationalist "terrorism porn" the Government and police require from a compliant media to push through their political agenda?

DAMIAN MCCARTHY

TEMPLE, LONDON EC4
(Letters, The Independent, 12/8/06)

To their credit, the readers of the Indie seem to be most sceptical about the rush to a Security State, a stance reflected by the Indie's robust editorial line against yet more "anti-terror" laws [5]. What we all need is a good dose of this scepticism, to question the cops and the spooks and the politicians who're herding us with cattle prods into our Big Brother pens, before we're locked in for good. When the next "terror alert" comes along, instead of taking the State's word for it, as so much of the compliant and complicit print and broadcast media has done, we should demand habeas corpus - produce the evidence. And in the current "alert", hard evidence of a serious plot to blow up aircraft has been glaringly absent.

What's the betting that, when the people who've been picked up for this plot (those that don't get quietly released without charges in the meantime) go to trial for conspiracy, they turn out to be Islamic Walter Mittys with big mouths and big ideas but no practical expertise or experience in bomb-making. I'm starting the book at 3-1 on...

[1] US Homeland Security directs Irish airlines to comply with new anti-terror law, Indymedia Ireland, 10/8/06. According to the report, "At 10am this Morning U.S Homeland Security ordered Irish Airline: Aer Lingus to comply with anti-terrorist laws, disallowing liquids on transatlantic flights. The Irish Airport Authority complied"

[2] Reid tell of '4 terror plots', BBC News online, 13/8/06

[3] Recently the cops have alleged that there was kiddy porn on a computer in the house, which sure sounds like a desperate attempt to get something on them to blacken their names and knock down any compensation settlement.

[4] I was the Jean Charles de Menezes whistleblower, Guardian, 22/7/06

[5] Not to mention its other robust pro-immigration, anti-racist, and anti-war lines. For all that the paper is reportedly struggling, it deserves great credit for its honourable and consistent stances for freedom and anti-racism.