Tag: Canadian Terror Cell

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The Fort Dix Plot

If you are George W. Bush you are delighted: “6 Arrested in Plot to Attack Fort Dix”.

That’s from the relatively sober New York Times.

“We Dodged a Bullet- FBI Says of Foiled Ft. Dix Terror Plot” says USA Today.

That’s as much as many people will read. George W. Bush to the rescue: the Patriot Act is working! We’re safe again.

Maybe.

It might be that these six men were actually, truly, really plotting to attack Fort Dix with RPG’s and automatic rifles and submachine guns.

It might be that once again a paid informant found a bunch of young Islamic loudmouths who could be infiltrated and manipulated, and cajoled into shooting off their mouths and making ridiculous statements that the FBI solemnly believe are genuine threats.

The evidence against the men is truly as magnificent as can be. They acquired guns and practiced with them. Guilty. Seriously, it’s a little odd to read this part of the criminal complaint because… well, isn’t it as American as apple pie to acquire a gun and go shoot it somewhere? The complaint notes that they did so “militia-like style” while shouting “God is great”. I suppose if they had been drinking beer instead, and shouting “Go Bears”, the FBI would have ignored them.

Do I even need to point out that the U.S. is full of “militia-like” groups who wear camouflage and go to shooting ranges?

At least three of the men are illegal aliens. The men are from Albania, Turkey, Kosovo. They are not from Indiana.

Why I don’t believe the indictment. Yet. I might. But I doubt it.

1. Two men, designated as CW-1 and CW-2 are identified as “cooperative witnesses” who willingly infiltrated the group. Doesn’t that sound nice? Good citizens, I bet. The trouble is that in many of these cases, it is eventually revealed that the “cooperating witness” is actually a paid informant, with a clear incentive to provide the FBI with the goods. They are paid some money, then more, and then more, depending on whether they find a hot suspect that can eventually be prosecuted. It is clear that the gravy train stops if he doesn’t get the goods on the suspects. So what happens is, he starts to “encourage” the suspects– always young Islamic men– to make more and more provocative statements.

Consider this: the gang asked CW-1 to lead the attack. Curious, don’t you think? If CW-1 is just dropping in and listening to a group of hard-core jihadists plot a violent assault on Fort Dix— and they just happen to think he would be a fine leader, out of the blue.

2. The conspirators allowed CW-1 to record conversations in which details of the plot are discussed. Okay– that CW-1 is a very convincing infiltrator. Or these young men are exceptionally stupid. Or both.

You are seriously plotting to attack a U.S. army base. A guy you barely know joins your group and asks, “do you mind if I record the plot?” You say, “sure.” Maybe there’s an explanation for this.

3. They chose Fort Dix because one of the men, Serdar, used to deliver pizzas there. That sinister “map of Fort Dix” they acquired to plan the attack? It came from the Pizza Shop. The FBI seemed to get very aroused by this map. They recorded the actual time of the cell-phone call that CW-1 received to tell him that Tartar had acquired the map and delivered it to him. They took the map, copied it, and then returned it. This is the map from the pizza restaurant.

4. One of the FBI informants brought up the idea of getting some firearms and told the gang he knew someone who could supply them. Once again, it is the informant who initiates the first concrete step towards a real act of terrorism.  That is textbook entrapment.

5. According to the criminal complaint, the suspects did not actually pay for the weapons nor acquire them. It would have been more interesting to me if they had handed over $5,000 or so for these weapons, and clearly demanded delivery of them. It would be logical to arrest them when they arrive for the weapons and charge them with…. ta da… trying to buy guns. In America. Okay. They could be charged with something like…. I don’t know. Making threats?

The truth is, they should be charged with the minor offenses that actually stick to them: overstaying their visas. Illegal possession of weapons. (Will the NRA step in here or not? Why are they so silent on the rights of these red-blooded men to own weapons?)

The truth is that if the FBI started investigating those red-blooded all-American white militia groups and their weapons and paintball and camouflage and confederate flags and so on, and decided to make them into something sinister, it would be easily done.  But we know why that will never happen.

The Bush administration would like you to believe that we now live in an era where we can no longer wait for crimes to be committed before arresting the…. what? The what? The person we think might commit a crime in the future?

Bullshit. It will never be right or wise or good to arrest people for crimes they have not actually committed. Never. It only took Western civilization about 5,000 years to learn it. It has taken George Bush and his governing thugs less than six months to unlearn it.

Now we start over. Why is it wise to presume innocence?

“CW-2 [one of the informants] observed that Shnewer seemed to enjoy watching the video and smiled during the viewing.” From the criminal complaint.

When CW-1 asked Shain Duka if he was with them, Shain Duka responded, “God willing, we will see.”

Eljvir Duka stated that they would need a “fatwa” before they could proceed.

Here it is– I was waiting for it: “When CW-1 mentioned that CW-1 might have a source that could supply firearms, Shnewer expressed interest.”

I will believe that a crime is committed when a person freely and willingly commits a crime. When a female undercover cop goes after men for soliciting sex, she never offers sex for money. She just stands there and waits and lets the man talk. If she offers sex for money, and he says yes– it’s called entrapment and usually the charges won’t stick. If he says, without prompting, “I’ll give you $100 for sex”, he is soliciting for sex and can be successfully charged.

“Towards the end of the meeting, Shain Duka suggested they could also join the army and ‘do them, yes we can’. ” That’s pretty amazing to me. They planned to infiltrate the army. That’s long-range planning.

The really odd thing is this: if these men were really intent on committing terrorist acts in America, against Americans, and they really were only prevented from doing so by the chance act of asking a video store owner to copy a VHS tape to DVD for them, where are all the men who were not stupid enough to take a jihadist video to a commercial video store?

What’s with the paintball? One of the supposedly incriminating acts committed by the Canadian Terrorist Conspiracy was a game of paintball– obviously, they were training for jihad.

Is a pattern emerging? Are these groups linked? Or are the authorities linked?

I’ll bet the FBI now monitors paintball games very, very closely.

There is almost nothing in the criminal complaint about what CW-1 or CW-2 said or did. That’s not surprising. If there will be a trial– and there won’t be– I almost guarantee it (there will be a plea bargain on lesser charges so the government can claim they confessed) — but if there was a trial, we would find out just how much “encouragement” they offered to this group.

It doesn’t say they were paid– I will be very, very shocked if we find out they were not. I will guess that each of them got at least $30,000 and maybe more than $100,000, and both of them will claim that the money didn’t matter at all, and both of them will be lying through their teeth when they say that, because if it were true, I would not be so sure of myself when I tell you that you will find out they were paid.

They will have been paid. It is less likely, but also probable, that either or both of them are facing unrelated charges for petty crimes and both of them will have the charges dropped in exchange for their “objective” testimony.

Furthermore, Americans will read about their convictions with satisfaction as they sing their anthems and wave their flag in fervent admiration of the rights and freedoms generations of people fought bitterly for and which they now, with the cavalier disregard of a hunter swatting an insect, discard.

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The Supposed Alleged Possible Canadian Terror Plot: Entrapment

And there it is, near the bottom, almost as an aside:

He was paid.
He was paid more than $300,000.

That’s near the bottom of the article linked to in the left column, which describes, with great earnestness, the authentic, real, god-awful truth about Islamic terrorists operating in Toronto: that they really mean it, that they are serious, that they are a real threat.

Frontline and the CBC, which collaborated on the report, have a lot of credibility. Unlike Fox, or even CBS or NBC or ABC, they tend to take a more measured and less sensationalistic approach to stories about terrorist cells operating in North America. (Though even CBS’s “60 Minutes” recently ran a rather odd piece on how terrorists are using the internet to train young jihadists.) But there it is, a long, detailed, well-researched program (and website), detailing how the 17 young men were seriously plotting to storm the Parliament buildings, take MPs hostage, and behead them one by one until Canada withdrew it’s armed forces from Afghanistan.

And then, way down the page, there is that one little, embarrassing detail: the informant, Mubin Shaikh, whose revelations to CSIS (the Canadian Security Service) led to the arrests, was paid more than $300,000 for the information.

When the trial is held, Mubin Shaikh will be the star witness. Undoubtedly, he will have to reveal the fact that he was a paid informant to the court. Then the court will have to decide whether $300,000 is an incentive to exaggerate or distort his information. They should also decide whether $300,000 is an incentive for someone to incite. They should also consider the question of “entrapment”.

The question is, would Mr. Shaikh have been paid if he had not provided the RCMP with suspects?

No, he would not.

It is possible that CSIS has additional proof. We won’t know until the trial, of course. It is possible that the additional proof wouldn’t mean much if it wasn’t put into “context” by $300,000 worth of testimony. It is possible, if not likely– I say it is likely– that the additional evidence CSIS will offer will have been produced as a result of the activities and encouragement of Mubin Shaikh.

The question that should be asked is, would these young men have committed a crime if they had never met Mubin Shaikh?

Perhaps you believe that the police are willing to pay large sums of money to informants if their information clears suspects of suspicion. Perhaps you live in Disneyland.

Mubin Shaikh was paid an initial $68,000 U.S. So, suppose he reported back to CSIS that nothing was up. No reason to be concerned. There’s a couple of hot-heads, but they are just shooting off their mouths. They are kids who, not unreasonably, are against the war on Iraq because they believe it is motivated by the U.S. desire to control oil supplies and support Zionism. They believe the U.S. invaded Iraq. Oh yeah… Well, they believe the U.S. lied about weapons of mass destruction so they could invade Iraq to steal its oil. Okay– it it illegal to believe that? It is if you are an Arab living in North America or Europe.

Do you suppose Shaikh had any reason to believe he would receive an additional $300,000 if he continued to report that there was no serious terrorist plot?

I suspect that among the 17 youths that were arrested, were a small number of relatively serious-minded extremists, who genuinely hated decadent western culture, and dreamed of seeking revenge for the perceived humiliation of the Moslem world at the hands of the Israelis and Americans. (Shaikh is not going to propose the ridiculous to CSIS.) But I suspect that for every ten youths like that, maybe one or two ever actually end up doing something. Of that number, a smaller percentage acquire the means and determination to actually do something effective.

I wonder if the infamous 3 tons of ammonia nitrate will turn out to have been Shaikh’s suggestion.

Apparently, the RCMP ended up “providing” the (fake) material.

Stunningly– I say– the RCMP provided them with fake ammonia nitrate, in order to provide evidence for the crime they allege.

There are several American cases that sound alarmingly similar: a paid informant infiltrates a local youth group, encourages the boys to talk “jihad”, then reports on their conversations to Homeland Security and they sweep them up. In most of those cases, there is no evidence that any of the suspects ever took any steps to actually commit any terrorist acts. In some cases, there was bravado and bragging and macho posturing. The victims of this scam are threatened with years in prison for very serious charges, but then agree to plead guilty to a relatively minor charge, and then the government holds a parade and awards medals to everyone.  The plea, the result of bullying, becomes the proof that there really was a threat.

The boys went up north and took training… from Mr. Shaikh. They used paintball guns and pellet guns and, Mr. Shaikh claims, some live ammunition.

Why does this all look so pathetic?

Why is it so offensive to me that reporter Linden McIntyre of the CBC seemed to spend an inordinate proportion of his report on Mr. Shaikh’s civic-mindedness, and his concern for the Moslem community, and his own spiritual journey from misspent youth to respected leader of the Moslem community in Toronto… before telling us about the $300,000?

Mr. McIntyre knows a good story and how to package it.  A real journalist is more skeptical than he is.

If Mr. Shaikh really was a man of integrity, why would he even have accepted the money, knowing, as he must have, that a reasonable person would question how much honesty $300,000 can buy?

Frontline (PBS) on the Canadian Terror Plot Informant

Imagine, if you will, an Arab power that “takes possession” of a number of American citizens, declares them enemy combatants, and locks them away in solitary confinement in a horrible prison somewhere.  Suppose the U.S. protests, and demands their release.  Suppose this Arab state says, “these men are terrorists”.  And then the U.S. says, they are not.  We can prove they are not.  And the Arab state says, you can make those arguments at the trials.  Right now, the world is too dangerous for us to release these men.  What if they invade our country after we release them?  And the U.S. says, okay, when are the trials?  And the Arab state says, never.

Imagine the outrage.  How dare they?

I wonder how many people just assume that the government would never do such a thing — buy evidence. They couldn’t get away with it, could they? They can and they do, on a surprisingly regular basis. Sometimes our judges slap them down for it, and sometimes they don’t. Sometimes, like the rest of us, they seem to believe that a higher good is served by abridging the most precious rights we have in a democracy.