Terrorist Plots, Hatched by the F.B.I.

New York Times

David K. Shipler

THE United States has been narrowly saved from lethal terrorist plots in recent years — or so it has seemed. A would-be suicide bomber was intercepted on his way to the Capitol; a scheme to bomb synagogues and shoot Stinger missiles at military aircraft was developed by men in Newburgh, N.Y.; and a fanciful idea to fly explosive-laden model planes into the Pentagon and the Capitol was hatched in Massachusetts. 

But all these dramas were facilitated by the F.B.I., whose undercover agents and informers posed as terrorists offering a dummy missile, fake C-4 explosives, a disarmed suicide vest and rudimentary training. Suspects naïvely played their parts until they were arrested. 

When an Oregon college student, Mohamed Osman Mohamud, thought of using a car bomb to attack a festive Christmas-tree lighting ceremony in Portland, the F.B.I. provided a van loaded with six 55-gallon drums of “inert material,” harmless blasting caps, a detonator cord and a gallon of diesel fuel to make the van smell flammable. An undercover F.B.I. agent even did the driving, with Mr. Mohamud in the passenger seat. To trigger the bomb the student punched a number into a cellphone and got no boom, only a bust. 

This is legal, but is it legitimate? Without the F.B.I., would the culprits commit violence on their own? Is cultivating potential terrorists the best use of the manpower designed to find the real ones? Judging by their official answers, the F.B.I. and the Justice Department are sure of themselves — too sure, perhaps. 

The FBI Again Thwarts Its Own Terror Plot

Information Clearing House
Glenn Greenwald

September 29, 2011 "Salon" -- The FBI has received substantial criticism over the past decade -- much of it valid -- but nobody can deny its record of excellence in thwarting its own Terrorist plots. Time and again, the FBI concocts a Terrorist attack, infiltrates Muslim communities in order to find recruits, persuades them to perpetrate the attack, supplies them with the money, weapons and know-how they need to carry it out -- only to heroically jump in at the last moment, arrest the would-be perpetrators whom the FBI converted, and save a grateful nation from the plot manufactured by the FBI.

Last year, the FBI subjected 19-year-old Somali-American Mohamed Osman Mohamud to months of encouragement, support and money and convinced him to detonate a bomb at a crowded Christmas event in Portland, Oregon, only to arrest him at the last moment and then issue a Press Release boasting of its success. In late 2009, the FBI persuaded and enabled Hosam Maher Husein Smadi, a 19-year old Jordanian citizen, to place a fake bomb at a Dallas skyscraper and separately convinced Farooque Ahmed, a 34-year-old naturalized American citizen born in Pakistan, to bomb the Washington Metro. And now, the FBI has yet again saved us all from its own Terrorist plot by arresting 26-year-old American citizen Rezwan Ferdaus after having spent months providing him with the plans and materials to attack the Pentagon, American troops in Iraq, and possibly the Capitol Building using "remote-controlled" model airplanes carrying explosives.

None of these cases entail the FBI's learning of an actual plot and then infiltrating it to stop it. They all involve the FBI's purposely seeking out Muslims (typically young and impressionable ones) whom they think harbor animosity toward the U.S. and who therefore can be induced to launch an attack despite having never taken even a single step toward doing so before the FBI targeted them. Each time the FBI announces it has disrupted its own plot, press coverage is predictably hysterical (new Homegrown Terrorist caught!), fear levels predictably rise, and new security measures are often implemented in response (the FBI's Terror plot aimed at the D.C. Metro, for instance, led to the Metro Police announcing a new policy of random searches of passengers' bags). I have several observations and questions about these matters:

(1) The bulk of this latest FBI plot entailed attacks on military targets: the Pentagon, U.S. troops in Iraq, and possibly military bases. The U.S. is -- as it has continuously announced to the world -- a Nation at War. The Pentagon is the military headquarters for this war, and its troops abroad are the soldiers fighting it. In what conceivable sense can attacks on those purely military and war targets be labeled "Terrorism" or even illegitimate? The U.S. has continuously attacked exactly those kinds of targets in multiple nations around the world; it expressly tried to kill Saddam and Gadaffi in the wars against their countries (it even knowingly blew up an entire suburban apartment building to get Saddam, who wasn't actually there). What possible definition of "Terrorism" excludes those attacks by the U.S. while including this proposed one on the Pentagon and other military targets (or, for that matter, Nidal Hasan's attack on Fort Hood where soldiers deploy to war zones)?

(2) With regard to the targeted building that is not purely a military target -- the Capitol Building -- is that a legitimate war target under the radically broad standards the U.S. and its allies have promulgated for themselves? The American "shock and awe" assault on Baghdad destroyed "several government buildings and palaces built by Saddam Hussein"; on just the third day of that war, "U.S. bombs turn[ed] key government buildings in Baghdad into rubble." In Libya, NATO repeatedly bombed non-military government buildings. In Gaza, Israeli war planes targeted a police station filled with police recruits on the stated theory that a valid target "ranges from the strictly military institutions and includes the political institutions that provide the logistical funding and human resources" to Hamas.

Obviously, there is a wide range of views regarding the justifiability of each war, but isn't the U.S. Congress -- which funds, oversees, and regulates America's wars -- a legitimate war target under the (inadvisedly) broad definitions the U.S. and its allies have imposed when attacking others? If the political leaders and even functionaries of other countries with which the U.S. is at war are legitimate targets, then doesn't that necessarily mean that Pentagon officials and, arguably, those in the Congress are as well?

(3) The irony that this plot featured "remote-controlled aircraft filled with plastic explosives" is too glaring to merit comment; the only question worth asking is whether the U.S. Government can sue Ferdaus for infringing its drone patents. Glaring though that irony is, there is no shortage of expressions of disgust today, pondering what kind of dasterdly Terrorist monster does it take to want to attack buildings with remote-controlled mini-aircraft.

(4) Wouldn't the FBI's resources be better spent on detecting and breaking up actual Terrorist plots -- if there are any -- rather than manufacturing ones so that they can stop those? Harboring hatred for the U.S. and wanting to harm it (or any country) is not actually a crime; at most, it's a Thought Crime. It doesn't become a crime until steps are taken to attempt to transform that desire into reality. There are millions and millions of people who at some point harbor a desire to impose violent harm on others who never do so: perhaps that's true of a majority of human beings. Many of them will never act in the absence of the type of highly sophisticated, expert push of which the FBI is uniquely capable. Is manufacturing criminals -- as opposed to finding and stopping actual criminals -- really a prudent law enforcement activity?

(5) Does the FBI devote any comparable resources to infiltrating non-Muslim communities in order to persuade and induce those extremists to become Terrorists so that they can arrest them? Are they out in the anti-abortion world, or the world of radical Christianity, or right-wing anti-government radicals, trying to recruit them into manufactured Terrorist plots?

(6) As usual, most media coverage of the FBI's plots is as uncritical as it is sensationalistic. The first paragraph of The New York Times article on this story described the plot as one "to blow up the Pentagon and the United States Capitol." But the FBI's charging Affidavit (reproduced below) makes clear that Ferdaus' plan was to send a single model airplane (at most 1/10 the size of an actual U.S. jet) to the Capitol and two of them to the Pentagon, each packed with "5 pounds" of explosives (para. 70); the Capitol was to be attacked at its dome for "psychological effect" (para 34). The U.S. routinely drops 500-pound or 1,000-pound bombs from actual fighter jets; this plot -- even if it were carried out by someone other than a hapless loner with no experience and it worked perfectly -- could not remotely "blow up" the Pentagon or the Capitol.


(7) As is now found in almost every case of would-be Terrorist plots against the U.S. -- especially "homegrown Terrorists" -- the motive is unbridled fury over (and a desire to avenge) contintuous U.S violence against Muslim civilians. Infused throughout the charging Affidavit here are such references to Ferdaus' motives, including his happiness over the prospect of killing U.S. troops in Iraq; his proclamation that he's "interested in traveling to Afghanistan" to aid insurgents; his statement that "he wanted to 'decapitate' the U.S. government's 'military center' and to severely disrupt . . . the head and heart of the snake" (para 12) and to "essentially decapitate the entire empire" (para 34) (compare that language to how the U.S. described what it tried to do in Baghdad). Using drones to decapitate the leadership and government infrastructure of a nation at war; I wonder where he got that idea.

At least according to the FBI, this is how Feradus replied when expressly asked why he wanted to attack the U.S.:

Cause that would be a huge scare . . . the point is you want to scare them so they know not to mess with you . . . They have . . . . have killed from us, our innocents, our men, women and children, they are all enemies (para 19).

If the FBI's allegations are accurate, then it's clear Ferdaus has become hardened in his hatred; he talks about a willingness to kill American civilians because they have become part of the enemy, and claims that he fantasized about such attacks before the FBI informant spoke to him.

But whatever else is true, it's simply unrealistic in the extreme to expect to run around for a full decade screaming WE ARE AT WAR!! -- and dropping bombs and attacking with drones and shooting up families in multiple Muslim countries (and occupying, interfering in and killing large numbers before that) -- and not produce many Rezwan Ferdauses. In fact, the only surprising thing is that these seem to be so few of them actually willing and able to attack back that -- in order to justify this Endless War on civil liberties (and Terror) -- the FBI has to search for ones they can recruit, convert, convince, fund, and direct to carry out plots.

Complaint Affidavit

US Media Gloss Over American Role in Egyptian Repression

Common Dreams

The Delicate Tightrope of Supporting a Dictator

by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR)

The 'Roundtable' panel on ABC's 'This Week'
is a prime example of where to find tepid and
sloppy coverage of how US foreign policy
has supported the Mubarak regime over the
decades. It does not, in fact, take an
"Egyptian perspective" to appreciate how
crucial U.S. support has been to the Mubarak
dictatorship. One only needs to look at the
history of the past three decades--a history
U.S. media would prefer that we overlook,
or treat as part of a delicate "balancing act."

But since U.S. corporate media are accustomed to viewing international affairs through the lens of U.S. elite interests, much of the current coverage elides Washington's role, or presents it as a "tightrope" balancing act for the Obama administration. As one New York Times story (1/26/11) put it, "The administration has tried to balance its ties to Mr. Mubarak with expressions of concern about rigged elections and jailed dissidents in his country." USA Today (2/1/11) announced: "The upheaval in Egypt has put the United States in a delicate diplomatic situation: pressing for a more democratic Egypt, but wary that too much change could threaten the stability that Egypt helps bring to the Middle East."

On the PBS NewsHour, Margaret Warner (1/31/11) said, "The chaos in Egypt posed a delicate diplomatic challenge for the United States: appealing for democracy without alienating an ally." Or as NBC Nightly News anchor Kate Snow (1/29/11) asked: "Is it a bit of a tightrope that the U.S. has to walk here, though, in terms of wanting to promote democracy on the one hand, but being a longtime ally of the Mubarak administration?"

An L.A. Times editorial (1/28/11) implausibly argued that the U.S. record of support for Mubarak would assist efforts to promote democracy: "As an ally and benefactor, the United States has helped prop up the 82-year-old strongman since he took power 30 years ago, and today it is in a unique position to impress upon him the importance of democracy."

Some of the recently released WikiLeaks cables on Egypt provided another window into media thinking on the issue. The January 28 New York Times story was headlined, "Cables Show Delicate U.S. Dealings With Egypt's Leaders." The same day, the London Guardian had a very different headline: "WikiLeaks Cables Show Close U.S. Relationship With Egyptian President." The Times account buried some of the more damning details, which make clear that U.S. officials are keenly aware of the prevalence of torture and brutality under Mubarak (FAIR Blog, 1/28/11).

ABC's Christiane Amanpour offered what amounted to a rationalization of U.S. support for Egypt, explaining (1/26/11) that

the implications are really big because this is very fundamental. Egypt receives the most American aid, more than $1 billion a year. It has the same goals as the United States against radicalization and terrorism, pro the Israeli peace process. But the United States, many people are saying, needs to get ahead of the curve, because otherwise it might be left behind as the people demonstrate their will.

Some outlets saw a distinct shift in the Obama administration's position--well ahead of any evidence to that effect. The Washington Post published a January 27 piece headlined "As Arabs Protest, U.S. Speaks Up," which declared that the White House was "openly supporting the anti-government demonstrations shaking the Arab Middle East," adding that the administration had "thrown U.S. support clearly behind the protesters, speaking daily in favor of free speech and assembly even when the protests target longtime U.S. allies such as Egypt."

The Post's evidence, however, was thin: a quote from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stating that the Mubarak government should "respond to the legitimate needs and interests of the Egyptian people." The strongest support for the notion that the U.S. was backing the street protests came from an anonymous administration official--hardly an indication of "speak[ing] up" in "open support."

Another Post article tried to make the case again on January 31:

The Obama administration firmly aligned itself on Sunday with the protest movement that has overtaken Egypt, calling for an "orderly transition" to a more representative government amid rising U.S. concern that the demonstrations are turning violent and that unrest could spread across the Arab world.

Several paragraphs later, though, the Post added that the "shift in message had no visible effect in Cairo and other Egyptian cities," and reported that prominent activist Mohamed ElBaradei's assessment was that the rhetoric "had landed 'like lead" in the Egyptian capital."

It would seem that Egyptians have a clearer view of U.S. policy than many pundits and mainstream journalists. That point was driven home when NBC reporter Richard Engel, to his credit, brandished a tear gas canister that had been fired at protesters (1/28/11):

These were the tear gas canisters that were fired by all those riot police today. And if you look at them closely, they say clearly in English, "Made in the USA." Egyptians have been picking them up, they've been looking them over.

But then, as if this straightforward illustration of the U.S. role in Egyptian repression was too revealing, Engel qualified his observation: "And from an Egyptian perspective, it does seem like Mubarak and the United States are working together. So the U.S. is walking a fine line here."

It does not, in fact, take an "Egyptian perspective" to appreciate how crucial U.S. support has been to the Mubarak dictatorship. One only needs to look at the history of the past three decades--a history U.S. media would prefer that we overlook, or treat as part of a delicate "balancing act."

FBI Creates Another “Terrorist” Teen: Meet Mohamed Osman Mohamud

American Everyman

FBI Given Credit for Stopping Bombing Attempt, that They Created

by Scott Creighton

So let me get this straight; they came across emails, supposedly in “code”, that stated “a Somali-born teenager“, Mohamed Osman Mohamud, wanted to go to Pakistan to help fight.

So of course, the FBI anti-terrorism task force, sends over an undercover agent who pumps the CHILD up with jihad talks, gives him a “test bomb” to set off in the woods, then has more agents make this CHILD a van bomb (starting to sound like the first WTC attack?), and a van, and DRIVES THE THING TO THE LOCATION WITH THE CHILD, then gets the kid to dial a number on a cell phone.

Had they left the kid alone, he would be in Pakistan at this point and probably killed by a CIA death squad.

The bomb was a dud supplied by the agents and the public was never in danger, authorities said.

Authorities allowed the plot to proceed in order to build up enough evidence to charge the suspect with attempt. (NO. They CREATED the plot. BIG DIFFERENCE)

Oregonian newspaper that show the sting operation began in June after an undercover agent learned that Mohamud had been in regular e-mail contact with an “unindicted associate” in Pakistan’s northwest…

The two used coded language in which the FBI believes Mohamud discussed traveling to Pakistan to prepare for “violent jihad,” the documents said.

In June an FBI agent contacted Mohamud “under the guise of being affiliated with” the suspected terrorist. But the documents did not say how federal officials first became aware of Mohamud.

An undercover agent met with him a month later in Portland, where they “discussed violent jihad,” according to the court documents.

As a trial run, Mohamud and agents detonated a bomb in Oregon’s backcounry earlier this month.

Friday, an agent and Mohamud drove to downtown Portland in a white van that carried six 55-gallon drums with detonation cords and plastic caps, but all of them were inert, the complaint states.

( http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/27/mohamed-osman-mohamud-portland-car-bomb_n_788695.html )

Remarkably, the article goes on to say that “U.S. authorities have been struggling against a recent spate of terror plans by U.S. citizens or residents.” and then they list each of the recent “terrorist” plans and in each case they mention how the U.S. authorities had created the plans themselves.

Thank god the FBI is there to foil the terrorist attacks that they created.