Reply #11: NY TIMES ARTICLE on the outrageous fake NY subway terror alert: [View All]

[Nothing Without Hope]

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/11/nyregion/11threat.html

Threat Discounted, New York Eases Subway Alert

By WILLIAM K. RASHBAUM
Published: October 11, 2005

(snip)

Law enforcement officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity because the information in the case is classified, said that an American investigation, conducted largely in Iraq, has yielded no evidence that a plot was in motion or being actively contemplated. The outlines of the alleged plot, based on the word of an informant, were that Al Qaeda operatives in Iraq were coordinating with others, some perhaps already in New York, to hide bombs in baby strollers, packages and briefcases and blow them up in subways.

But the officials said that after taking the three men into custody last week in Iraq, they found no fake passports, no travel documents, no viable travel route from Iraq to New York, and no apparent contact or telephone calls from those in Iraq to people in New York. In addition, the officials said that two of the men detained in Iraq had been given polygraph tests that indicated they were not part of any plot.

At a minimum, then, the case of the subway bomb plot appears to be the latest addition to the country's post-9/11 struggle to meet the sometimes conflicting demands of gathering good intelligence, preventing harm and informing and reassuring the public along the way. It is an effort that has regularly proved awkward and even contradictory, as federal and local agencies make their own assessments and meet their own specific obligations.

The F.B.I.'s chief spokesman, John Miller, an assistant director, said yesterday that the agency supported the city's actions. "Since 9/11, one of the toughest balances has been to pass on all threat information quickly while understanding you have to vet it later, especially when you have to give it to a local government that could be affected," he said in a telephone interview from Washington. "We've also encouraged local governments to take whatever steps they think are prudent until the information is vetted. In this case, everybody did what they were supposed to do."

(snip)

I'm curious about that "at a minimum." Are they skirting around the issue of deliberate terror-mangering for political gain?