MetaFilter posts tagged with terror

Federal prosecutors to investigate abusive interrogation cases

grobstein — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:57:07 -0800

Big Newsfilter: US Attorney General Holder appoints a prosecutor to investigate abusive CIA interrogations in the War on Terror. Obama was reluctant to investigate Bush admin wrongdoing, and he still insists "he thinks that we should be looking forward, not backward" (per his deputy press secretary). But Holder managed to get the go-ahead. Previously.

Threat Level Elevated

saulgoodman — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 11:36:19 -0800

US News reports that in a new tell-all book, Tom Ridge admits manipulating terror threat levels for political motives. In the forthcoming book, Ridge reportedly acknowledges for the first time that he was pushed to raise the security alert on the eve of President Bush's re-election, something he "saw as politically motivated and worth resigning over." But as The Atlantic points out, Ridge apparently gave in to the White House demands anyway, resigning only after the election. Huffington Post also provides additional discussion on this developing story.

A Scout respects those with ideas and customs other than his own.

bitmage — Fri, 15 May 2009 09:54:51 -0800

"Be Prepared" A Scout understands there is strength in being gentle. He treats others as he wants to be treated. He does not hurt or kill harmless things without reason.

United States surrenders, terror, drugs win.

TheOnlyCoolTim — Thu, 14 May 2009 11:10:21 -0800

Without much fanfare, the Global War on Terror has ended. The new name for these military interventions is the Overseas Contingency Operation. Press Q&A. Some Republican representatives discuss. (SPOILER: They are not pleased.) Military blogs discuss. Similarly, the War on Drugs also looks to be on the way out, though no new name for the project has been announced at this time.

Has There Ever Been a Good Air Force One Photo Op?

stagewhisper — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 18:09:05 -0800

A Presidential Boeing 747 along with two fighter planes continuously circled jarringly close to the tops of buildings in Lower Manhattan and Jersey City this morning. From the ground it looked as though a plane had been hijacked again, and the Air Force was attempting to force it down. Panic ensued. Another terrorist attack? No, just a top secret photo op. The White House apologizes .

ICRC Report on the Treatment of Fourteen "High Value Detainees" in CIA Custody

y2karl — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 10:32:36 -0800

From the International Committee of the Red Cross ICRC Report on the Treatment of Fourteen "High Value Detainees" in CIA Custody - This is the report in its entirety. [pdf]

From Mark Danner: US Torture: Voices from the Black Sites and The Red Cross Torture Report: What It Means

...It is the most damning and credible indictment of the American government to appear in years - more damning because it was prepared in the usual secrecy and not intended as a public document; more damning because it comes not from Jane Mayer or Mark Danner or Dana Priest or this blog, but from the most credible and respected human rights watchdog in the world: the International Committee for the Red Cross. It is broad, meticulous evidence of pre-meditated, illegal, and immoral war crimes that were then subject to cover-up and lies at the highest levels. It makes Nixon's crimes look petty. You no longer have any excuse to look away or move on. Either America deals with this or it does not. It is a test of character and integrity for the country and for the political elite. It is a test for the new president.
Andrew Sullivan, among many others...

Voices from the Black Sites

shoesfullofdust — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 16:38:59 -0800

Interrogation techniques used by the CIA on al-Qaeda suspects "constituted torture", according to a report by the International Red Cross.

Phony Guantanamo Recidivism Numbers?

445supermag — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 12:45:22 -0800

"The Department of Defense claimed in a dramatic press briefing on January 13 that “61 in all former Guantanamo detainees are confirmed or suspected of returning to the fight” of terrorism." ...troubling is the Defense Department’s listing of the released Uighurs, who were completely exonerated by an internal military hearing. They’ve done nothing wrong. However, one of them wrote an op-ed column for the New York Times proclaiming that “I was locked up and mistreated for being in the wrong place at the wrong time during America's war in Afghanistan.” He also said in the same editorial: “The United States [is] a country I deeply admire.” That’s “suspected of going back into the battlefield”? Only if you are delusional. Some more here: In his dissent in Boumedienne (pdf), Justice Scalia wrote: "At least 30 of those prisoners hitherto released from Guantanamo Bay have returned to the battlefield." ...The Tipton Three were three British citizens who were captured in Afghanistan, and suspected of being members of al Qaeda, in part because they were thought, wrongly, to be in a videotape of a rally featuring bin Laden. After British intelligence cleared them of that charge (one of the three had in fact been working at a Curry's electronics store in Birmingham when the rally was taking place in Afghanistan), they were released. And after that, they participated in the movie The Road To Guantanamo. Apparently, this counts as "returning to the battlefield".

Not Safe For Kids

chuckdarwin — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 15:20:59 -0800

The Junior Christian Science Bible Lesson Show is easily the most terrifying "children's show" ever broadcast. David Nkrumah Liebe Unger Hart is pretty mysterious.

Bunk up, it's booming.

gman — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 17:21:17 -0800

Bunkers have a wide variety of uses in today's world. They're not all used by those fearful of a terrorist attack. They are also used to protect from natural disasters and to hide grow-ops. George's got one. Tom too. You can build you own, or have someone do it for you. The Ark Two Shelter is located just outside of Toronto. Tours of bunkers are also available. Be prepared. Previously.

A moving image of capitalism screaming and exploding

stammer — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 21:00:08 -0800

In the early days of the occupation of Iraq, a "gathering of antagonists to capital and empire" known as the Retort Collective published Afflicted Powers, a contentious analysis of September 11th and its aftermath grounded in the Situationist concepts developed by Guy Debord in The Society of the Spectacle. Two lengthy excerpts can be read online: an introduction to the war as a "struggle for mastery in the realm of the image", and a critique of the "Blood for Oil" argument. Afflicted Powers inspired two significant responses in the New Left Review: Gopal Balakrishnan's "States of War" is particularly interesting for its discussions of Israel and of Retort's proposed link between Salafist terrorism and Leninism (a link which has also been made by George Bush); Julian Stallabrass specifically addressed Retort's concept of the Spectacle in "Spectacle and Terror". AP got a kind review from Michael Hardt (co-author of Empire and Multitude) and a brutally sectarian one from a rival Situationist group, thus proving the vitality of the Situationist International's tradition of splits, expulsions, and fratricidal polemic. The Society of the Spectacle is available in full online -- both the original book and the NSFW movie version. Compare Baudrillard on The Spirit of Terrorism. "Debord and the Postmodern Turn" (pdf) discusses Baudrillard's debt to Situationism. Debord and Situationism on Metafilter: Overview, Debord's Board Game, Bureau of Public Secrets.

he could bear to wait no longer

ZachsMind — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 22:09:05 -0800

Last Year I Killed A Man , by Vaughan Thomas. Published Saturday July 19, 2008 by The Guardian.

The Jihad Will Be Televised

digaman — Mon, 19 May 2008 18:44:42 -0800

NewsFilter: Sen. Joe Lieberman (ID - Conn.) strikes a decisive blow against another Islamic terror front group: YouTube.

The Chain of Command in Coercive Interrogations

digaman — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 07:53:05 -0800

“You could almost see their dicks getting hard as they got new ideas." A Vanity Fair reporter investigates the chain of command that tossed out the Geneva Conventions and instituted coercive interrogation techniques -- some might call them torture or even war crimes -- in Bush's Global War on Terror. UC Berkeley law professor John Yoo's now-obsolete 81-page memo to the Pentagon in 2003 [available as PDFs here and here] was crucial, offering a broad range of legal justifications and deniability for disregarding international law in the name of "self-defense." Others say that Yoo was just making "a clear point about the limits of Congress to intrude on the executive branch in its exercise of duties as Commander in Chief." [previously here and here.]

Mockingbird 2.0?

augustweed — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 13:49:27 -0800

Rehearsing the next terror attack. before 911, the government paid little attention to the role of media and public communications in its national exercises. In 2003, Ogilvy PR was asked by the Department of Homeland Security to develop and manage a full-scale, sophisticated media element in support of TOPOFF 3, its most comprehensive terrorism response exercise ever. The result was a simulated yet eerily realistic news broadcast via the Virtual News Network. The TOPOFF 4 exercise is scheduled to take place October 15-19, 2007.

Who's Soft on Terrorism?

digaman — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 08:02:40 -0800

Who's soft on terrorism? Surely not the Democrats, who are about to enable the National Security Agency to extend its secret domestic wiretapping program after saying otherwise for months. Surely not the Republican White House, determined to rush out a new Osama bin Laden video even if it burns an intelligence connection spying on Al Qaeda that has been carefully cultivated for years.

The Age of Disaster Capitalism

y2karl — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 10:29:22 -0800

The Age of Disaster Capitalism

...Through all its various name changes - the war on terror, the war on radical Islam, the war against Islamofascism, the third world war, the long war, the generational war - the basic shape of the conflict has remained unchanged. It is limited by neither time nor space nor target. From a military perspective, these sprawling and amorphous traits make the war on terror an unwinnable proposition. But from an economic perspective, they make it an unbeatable one: not a flash-in-the-pan war that could potentially be won but a new and permanent fixture in the global economic architecture. That was the business prospectus that the Bush administration put before corporate America after September 11. The revenue stream was a seemingly bottomless supply of tax dollars to be funnelled from the Pentagon ($270bn in 2005 to private contractors, a $137bn increase since Bush took office), US intelligence agencies and the newest arrival, the department of homeland security. Between September 11 2001 and 2006, the Department of Homeland Security handed out $130bn to contractors - money that was not in the private sector before and that is more than the GDP of Chile or the Czech Republic.

Is this what was supposed to happen before the Sept. 21st put options ran out?

umop-apisdn — Sat, 08 Sep 2007 07:20:20 -0800

On Wednesday Sept. 5^th, German police stopped a major terrorist attack. The planned bomb consisted of 730 kilogramms of hydrogen peroxide to be mixed with other chemicals. The explosive power would have been equivalent to 550 kilogramms of TNT. The IHT reports the possible targets were the Ramstein US Air Force Air Base and Frankfurt International Airport. The suspects had been under observation for 10 months, the chemicals had been clandestinely rendered harmless by German authorities. What caused the final arrest? Two things: 1) they had just recieved a call from north Pakistan urgently ordering them to follow through within 14 days. 2) a local village policeman blew the surveillance cover by literally telling them at a routine road stop that they were on a watch-list. German intelligence immediately knew the policeman had blown their cover. How? They had bugged the car [Spiegel, rough translation]. Notable:
Making a bomb out of hydrogen peroxide is school chemistry class knowledge. In combination with acetone and acid it becomes explosive and is commonly referred to as TATP or also, due to its instability, as the Mother of Satan. Hydrogen peroxide is the fluid that the airlines are scared of.

The Germans recieved the decisive tips that lead to observation of the suspects from American authorities. Even during the G-8 June 2007 meetings in Heiligendamm President Bush asked Chancellor Angela Merkel how "Operation Alberich" was proceeding [Spiegel, rough translation].

The terrorists were fully aware that they were under surveillance. Once one of them stepped out of the car at a red light and calmly walked up to the car following them and slit their tires. [see the previous Spiegel-links]

Oh and concerning the Sept. 21^st put options: the answer was posted by patricio here. There is no connection, this practice, referred to as a box trade, is a method of borrowing without a bank as a middleman.

bin Laden transcript

ND¢ — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 13:54:37 -0800

Transcript of the most recent Osama bin Laden tape. [pdf] Likes: Noam Chomsky, Michael Scheuer, Jews, Jesus, Mary Dislikes: the Holocaust, Bush, corporations, global warming

CGI 9/11 Erotica

PostIronyIsNotaMyth — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 23:48:29 -0800

Rule 34 is alive and well. Latest example: 9/11 Terror Porn. [NSFW, requires login and as always via]

"50% of all Saudi fighters in Iraq come here as suicide bombers"

amberglow — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 16:50:29 -0800

The "same people who attacked us on 9/11"? It may be the very latest talking point from the Administration, but it's actually true--altho it's not Al Qaeda in Iraq, but Saudis. Although Bush administration officials have frequently lashed out at Syria and Iran, accusing it of helping insurgents and militias here, the largest number of foreign fighters and suicide bombers in Iraq come from a third neighbor, Saudi Arabia ... A historical note: 15 of the 19 hijackers on 9/11 were Saudis.

HANDLE CAREFULLY. NOT EXPECTED TO BE A HEALTH HAZARD.

[expletive deleted] — Sun, 17 Jun 2007 13:53:18 -0800

In an attempt to curb the production of crystal meth, more than 30 states have now outlawed or require registration for common lab equipment. In Texas, you need to register the purchase of Erlenmeyer flasks or three-necked beakers. The same state where I do not have to register a handgun, forces me to register a glass beaker.

America's War on Science: Chemistry sets and model rockets, the staples of any geeky childhood, have essentially become a thing of the past.Wired has more on how a security obsessed society is robbing both children and adults of the opportunity to discover science for themelves.

Al Qaeda speaks

scalefree — Wed, 30 May 2007 11:58:35 -0800

al Qaeda's "Legitimate Demands". Azzam al Amreki (aka Adam Gadahn) appears in a newly released al Qaeda video to recite his group's demands and promise more bombings and destruction if we don't comply. (previously)

US Muslims more peaceful than their fellow citizens?

laz-e-boy — Wed, 23 May 2007 12:00:19 -0800

Surprising findings in Pew study of US Muslims. The interweb is all atwitter over some of the findings of a Pew Research Center study of the attitudes of Muslim-Americans (the most comprehensive one done yet). While most of the findings should be welcomed (US Muslims are well off, appreciate being here, have non-Muslim friends, shun extremism, etc.), there is one troubling statistic: 6% of US Muslims - and 15% of US Muslims under 30 - believe that "bombing and other attacks intentionally aimed at civilians" are "often or sometimes justified". Sounds bad, but what happens when you ask the same question of non-Muslim Americans? Turns out that 24% of all Americans agreed - four times the 6% of US Muslims who share that view. So are US Muslims more peaceful than their non-Muslim neighbors?

Is it like having a "drug czar" for the war on drugs -- y'know, only it's for the war on war?

pax digita — Wed, 16 May 2007 15:20:29 -0800

"War Czar" -- another term for "highly paid radio operator"? So the Decider in Chief wants to have a War Czar* in the White House. He appointed Douglas Lute after three other general officers turned him down. Note that Lute, a three-star general, is actually inferior in rank to David Petraeus, the four-star who's commanding the Multi-National Force in Iraq. Black Five had some thoughts on this, as did Jules Crittenden.