Unexplained, conflicting US global terror warnings now extend to American homeland
Unexplained, conflicting US global terror warnings now extend to American homeland.
Saturday night Aug. 3, the global warnings issued last week by the US State Department and Interpol against terrorist attacks covering almost the entire Muslim world, suddenly reached the American homeland. Sunday morning, Aug. 4, as US missions closed in 22 countries, including Egypt and Israel, the New York Police Department went on high alert. Security was beefed up in high-profile areas outside houses of worship and transportation hubs, although Police Commissioner Ray Kelly complained that “a lack of specific information was cause for concern.”
Friday, Aug. 2 the State Department issued a worldwide travel alert warning to Americans overseas of potential al Qaeda attacks in the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia.
Saturday night, National Security Adviser Susan Rice convened security officials on the situation. The White House stated: “Given the nature of the potential threat through the week, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and counter-terrorism Lisa Monaco has held regular meetings with relevant members of the inter-agency to ensure the US government is taking those appropriate steps.”
Nothing in this statement specified the nature of the “potential threat.”
Sunday, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey told the ABC that the threat was “more specific than previous ones” and “the intent is to attack Western, not just US interests.” He reported that the diplomatic facilities closed “range from Mauritania in northwest Africa to Afghanistan.”
Western and Middle East terrorism and intelligence experts say that in additional to the lack of information, at least six elements don’t add up in the various global warnings released since Thursday Aug. 1:
1. Thursday, US President Barack Obama ordered that “all appropriate steps” be taken to protect Americans in response to a threat of an al-Qaeda attack. What does this mean? The experts comment that even if all US agencies were pressed into service worldwide, there is no way they could protect all Americans in the vast area marked out in the warnings.
2. If the threat is specific why does the warning extend to so many countries? Al Qaeda is not even active in all them. If the danger is so immediate, why haven’t any governments in North Africa and as far east as Bangladesh declared their own terror alerts?
3. US officials reported that some of the intelligence came from terrorist communications intercepted by the National Security Agency over the past days. This too raises questions, considering that al Qaeda leaders are wont to avoid electronic media and satellite phones for their communications on operations, preferring couriers who are not susceptible to electronic interception or eavesdropping. The Internet serves them for propaganda and planting red herrings.
4. In the past week, US drones conducted three attacks against al Qaeda targets in Yemen, where the organization is defined by US officials as al Qaeda’s most dangerous affiliate and capable of attacking the US embassy in Sanaa.
The last drone attack Aug. 1 killed five low-profile al Qaeda operatives, who were driving in a vehicle in the Qatan Valley of Hadramouth province (Osama bin Laden’s place of birth).
All 12 US drone attacks in Yemen of the last eight months targeted Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). Although its deputy chief Said al Shiri, a former inmate of the Guantanamo Bay facility, was eliminated, AQAP’s entire high command has remained intact and fully functional. In other words, US intelligence counter-terror agencies have not discovered their whereabouts.
5. Neither have they run down the location of al Qaeda’s top leader Ayman al-Zawahiri. Tuesday, he released a communiqué accusing US agents of engineering the coup which deposed the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood president by penetrating the Egyptian army. He called for more attacks on America.
6. Saturday, the international police agency, Interpol, published a global security alert following “the escape of hundreds of terrorists and other criminals” in the past month, including jailbreaks in Iraq, Libya and Pakistan. Interpol feared that the escapees would team up with al Qaeda to hit Western targets. Yet none of its 190 member states have declared terror alerts on this score either.
7. Finally, the sweeping warnnings from the Obama administration dramatically refute its own oft-heard claims that al Qaeda is no longer a force to be reckoned with, because it has lost its compact central command and control of its component branches, which have split up into regional franchises operating autonomously. Al Qaeda, they have been saying, is no longer capable of large-scale terrorist attacks on a global scale.
WarSclerotic 
August 4, 2013 at 3:05 PM
Reblogged this on BPI reblog and commented:
Unexplained, conflicting US global terror warnings now extend to American homeland
August 4, 2013 at 3:43 PM
Reblogged this on servehiminthewaiting.
August 4, 2013 at 3:58 PM
Oho…Debka is writing like us here and – this is more important – after us. We’ll not develop this commentary beyond of what it is because it reflects the same conception people brought here in the last 12-24 hours : The embassy hysteria were not suppose to happen, it was a huge mistake, this is not the way to deal with terrorists. Fleeing is not an option. Ask Israel.
August 4, 2013 at 4:22 PM
Interesting reading
http://www.homelandsecurityus.com/archives/9086
August 4, 2013 at 5:15 PM
Joop, I read the article and thank you for research. However, its observations are highly speculative – to say the least – and even that was not enough to say ”we totally disagreed with the author”.
Where really this article is clashing into the wall is when is asserting that Obama is a part of a big intervention in the region, which in turn will lead to a global war. Our conception is totally different and this is Obama is fleeing the region, the American troops will go home, and sir, this i s the reason that a global war will spark in the end. Anyhow, it was instructive to read it. Thanks.
August 4, 2013 at 5:42 PM
Luis, i would be very happy if i was as sure as you, but i,am not.
If obama is fleeing the region , why would we have a global war ?
For a war you need at least 2 opponents.
August 4, 2013 at 6:46 PM
It takes 2 sides to end a war but only 1 side to keep it going. A war is being waged against the West whether we admit it or not.
History has shown appeasement to be a disaster time after time.
August 4, 2013 at 7:35 PM
Look no further than Syria, if you want to understand where we stand today. ”In the beginning” there were the mass protests and the Assad army. After that, there were the people, the FSA and the Assad Army. In that very moment, when Assad started to kill his own people, the west lead by America should intervene. And a precedent already was there, the UN security council resolution regarding Khadafi’ Libya. But, the West forces and the Americans stood idle, because the Russians, much more fast than those dilettantes already enter the scene. Now, the equation was more complex. There were Assad army, Russian presence, the local people and FSA – Free Syria Army. The fear from the Russians now kept the western forces away from a direct intervention. After that, the ”death tourists” started to pour into Syria, transforming this embattled country into an Al Qaeda heaven and training ground. And, when everybody started to think that Assad’ days in power are numbered, it was Iran – a regional military power – which enter the Syrian arena. Now, the west was in a very difficult position and were supplying the rebels with ”non lethal” weapons while trying to run some political solutions which proved to be ridicule. Still Assad was in deep problems when Iran ordered its Lebanon surrogate, Hezbollah, to enter in Syria. And we had also the red lines story, yes chemical weapons, no chemical weapons…
Today, in Syria, we have roughly the following situation:
Iran, Hezbollah, Russia and Assad governmental forces against
The Sunni Syrian population, Al Qaeda fighters, Al Qaeda sunni surrogates forces, the Free Syrian Army units;
Israel staying idle – for the time being – only sometimes ”stinging” accordingly with its security needs; Britain forces are idle; USA forces are not in a ”ready” situation. A single serious event can spark a circus so big that actual situation will seem like a skirmish, in comparison with what we’ll get if , for example, Israel will enter in the conflict, against the Iranians.
In all this interesting but sad story, America is nowhere to be seen.
August 4, 2013 at 6:58 PM
Oke i tried to explain it a bit in parts in other comments.
Over again.
Saudi is for years trying to get the USA so far to attack Iran, USA is refusing it .
Next , Israel can not survive whit a nuclear Iran.
Next, how can Saudi force the USA to take action, simple to make a deal whit Russia and Israel, trough Egypt.
Next , USA do nothing , Israel will, and the USA is losing influence in the middle east, What means that Russia trow Iran and Syria under the bus,party in Saudi and Israel and Russia has a stronger foot hold.
.
The USA has to do something, otherwise they are loosing there influence , and i see that as a NO option for the USA.
So for all party,s it will be the best option that the USA come into action !( except for Russia, but will they go to a war whit the west for it ?? )
So this is very fast my simple opinion.
August 4, 2013 at 7:19 PM
Canada closes embassy
Tightens security in Bangladesh following U.S. terror warning
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/breakingnews/canada-closes-embassy-218259731.html
August 4, 2013 at 7:21 PM
BREAKING NEWS – Canada suspends diplomatic ties with Iran
August 4, 2013 at 7:43 PM
Saudi airspace closed to Sudanese president’s flight to Tehran
DEBKAfile August 4, 2013, 4:59 PM (GMT+02:00)
Saudi Arabia denied permission for a plane carrying Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir to travel through its air pace on Sunday for the swearing-in of the new Iranian president, Hasan Rouhani in Tehran.
The aircraft had to turn back. DEBKAfile: Riyadh is furious with Bashir for granting the Iranian navy Red Sea bases for is warships including submarines opposite Saudi shores.
http://www.debka.com/newsupdatepopup/5230/
August 4, 2013 at 7:52 PM
Dutch embassy in Yemen closed.
August 4, 2013 at 8:22 PM
The opening of a new front line in Syria was just confirmed on Al Jazeera news ; the rebel forces are attacking the strategic Mediterranean port of Latakia, which is an Assad stronghold (Alawite population). This move, if will succeed, will cut off Assad from the city he wanted as a capital of a future alawite state.
August 4, 2013 at 8:30 PM
He will put everything on everything to hold that city.
August 4, 2013 at 9:56 PM
For the time being, its like a surprise attack behind his lines; the Hezbollah forces aren’t in that region and the Assad forces are not deployed there in formations to sustain this attack. It looks like a rebel diversion attack for release the pressure on themselves, but it can be the best rebels maneuver until now, in this war.
August 4, 2013 at 8:30 PM
All this sound like a theater play.
The US oligarchy is losing Egypt. They try to react with the help of Al-Qaeda.
Al-Qaeda says that what is happening in Egypt is caused by an alliance between the USA, the Egyptian army and the Christian Copts. At the same time the USA are accusing Al-Qaeda of plotting to attack U.S. embassies. It really sounds like a deal between Al-Qaeda and the USA to convince Egyptians to attack the generals and the Copts, and seize power with the help of Al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood.
The U.S. strategy of pushing radical Islam and terrorism all over the region to ultimately attack Russia and China is failing pathetically. And Saudi Arabia is starting an alliance with Russia and Egypt ! That is the cherry on the cake !
August 4, 2013 at 9:55 PM
Surely there was a threat. Just as surely there is a threat somewhere on a daily basis. NYC Police Commissioner Kelly (probably the finest police commissioner in living memory and possibly next head of homeland security) complained of vagueness in the information about the threat which is very unusual. Call me a nutcase, but I believe that the American republic may not survive the next three years of Obama. This event is just practice for the big event to come which will cancel the Constitution and the next presidential election. Remember he is a huge narcissus, and no matter how many people get hurt or die in the process, he believes that he is doing us a favor by staying in power. What would the poor people do without him? There is a reason for the huge amounts of hollow points bullets, armored vehicles, and new swat teams for every federal agency. One thing though, Obama truly does not understand the American people.
August 4, 2013 at 10:14 PM
A really heavy day passed today on all of us. May the night be much more easy. Good night to all.