Marc Perkel Rantz

Ashcroft issues fake terror warning.

John Ashcroft's terror warning this last week was fake and no more than a political stunt to attempt to distract attention away from the administrations incompetence. Interestingly enough - it only highlighted the incompetence.

According to MSNBC Ashcroft's sources were know to not be credible. It came from a group that claims responsibility for everything.

John Ashcroft is putting Americans at risk issuing these fake warnings because once people know he's doing that then people are likely to ignore a real warning. John Ashcroft's actions serve the goals of our enemies and not Americans.

-----------

Terror threat source called into question
Ashcroft cites al-Qaida plan, but how credible is the information?
By Lisa Myers
Senior investigative correspondent
NBC News
Updated: 6:57 p.m. ET May 28, 2004

WASHINGTON - Earlier this week Attorney General John Ashcroft warned of an attack planned on America for sometime in the coming months. That may happen, but NBC News has learned one of Ashcroft’s sources is highly suspect.

In warning Americans to brace for a possible attack, Ashcroft cited what he called “credible intelligence from multiple sources,” saying that “just after New Year's, al-Qaida announced openly that preparations for an attack on the United States were 70 percent complete.… After the March 11 attack in Madrid, Spain, an al-Qaida spokesman announced that 90 percent of the arrangements for an attack in the United States were complete.”

But terrorism experts tell NBC News there's no evidence a credible al-Qaida spokesman ever said that, and the claims actually were made by a largely discredited group, Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigades, known for putting propaganda on the Internet.

“This particular group is not really taken seriously by Western intelligence,” said terrorism expert M.J. Gohel of the Asia-Pacific Foundation, an international policy assessment group. “It does not appear to have any real field operational capability. But it is certainly part of the global jihad movement — part of its propaganda wing, if you like. It likes to weave a web of lies; it likes to put out disinformation so that the truth is deeply buried. So it is a dangerous group in that sense, but it is not taken seriously in terms of its operational capability.”

The group has claimed responsibility for the power blackout in the Northeast last year, a power outage in London and the Madrid bombing. None of the claims was found to be credible.

Posted by marc at May 29, 2004 08:35 AM | TrackBack