by emptywheel
Boy I felt foolish clicking that category, "Terrorism," to start a post on Abu Gonzales' big terror bust today. I looked for the "Troubled Teens" category. Not finding that, I looked for a "Wasteful FBI Set-Ups" category, but I didn't find that either. So I settled for the terrorism category, for want of a category that really fits. Now there are already other posts questioning the degree to which a bunch of teenagers in search of a video camera, some boots, and a van constitute a real terrorism threat. And note, they only ever got the boots, a video camera, and a memory chip. They don't seem to have gotten close to the machine guns they asked for, the ones they were going to use to bring down the Sears Tower (shooting through the steel, no doubt).
So I'm going to make just two comments about the timing. You see, when I heard about this story this morning, I was sure they had timed the announcement to hide some news, perhaps the news that Bush was rifling through my checkbook. Or perhaps they've just rolled this as proof that one of their many fancy new surveillance techniques netted them some terrorists. Or perhaps it was part of a campaign that Rove, fresh off celebrating that he hasn't been indicted, had hatched to reverse Bush's flaccid flagging popularity.
Been then I saw this, from the indictment.
On or about May 24, 2006, NARSEAL BATISTE told the "al Qaeda representative" that he was experiencing delays because of various problems within his organization but that he wanted to continue his mission and maintain his relationship with al Qaeda.
Now, I'm just guessing, but when a teenager nicknamed Brother Naz tells you he's having "problems within his organization" a month and a half after that organization's last activity, that probably means his "organization" has collapsed, the other kids have taken their new boots and gone home. Which suggests that, as soon as it came to actually acting on their teen-aged fantasies, these guys got cold feet (cheap boots, I guess), and gave up their fantasy.
Sounds like a great time to move in and bust these kids, before your elaborately planted sting falls apart completely.
Alright, first I should admit these kids weren't kids. They were just acting like it. 22-32 year olds, looking for a free video camera.
Posted by: emptywheel | June 23, 2006 at 18:25
Wasn't one of them supposedly going by the name "Brother Sunni," too?
Who makes up these names? This is the worst one since Wayne's World called Wolf Blitzer, "Howitzer Explosion-guy."
Posted by: Kagro X | June 23, 2006 at 18:34
Yep, Brother Sunni, Brother Levi, Prince Manna.
Did they really need to include those aliases 12 times in the indictment, or did they do so in hopes of these characters attracting more attention.
Ooh, Brother Sunni. Now I believe Brother Sunni COULD bring down the Sears tower with his machine gun and new boots.
Posted by: emptywheel | June 23, 2006 at 18:47
I'm interested in the actions of the "informant". During the '60s various agents provocateurs mingled with student groups and tried to incite them to violent acts, so they could report them to Hoover and the kids could be arrested. Not long ago the New Yorker ran a story about supposed white supremacists who seemed mostly to ahve been goaded on by "informants." I bet they have a whole stable full of these kinds of cases for slow or problematic days.
Posted by: Mimikatz | June 23, 2006 at 20:15
are we feeling safer now...
no, the threat is no longer from the unexpected, now I'm beginning to feel threatened by folks who write the kind of indictment ew discloses for us...
Posted by: njr | June 23, 2006 at 20:20
The informant? "Undercover Brother," of course.
Posted by: Kagro X | June 23, 2006 at 20:21
I enjoy the careful reviews on this blog. So I'm curious to hear your comments re:Wayne Madsen and his take on the machinations of the Neocons in the following undated article (link below). He lists multiple examples of thwarted intelligence investigations (including FBIs O'Neil/USS Cole, Israeli art 'students' and DEA), as well as demotions/firings of government personnel in-the-know (e.x., Sibel Edmonds, US Treas. O'Neill, etc). Madsen is not mentioned too much on this site, and so I wondered if his views are discounted for some reason I should know about.
http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/Baffles.htm
Clearing the Baffles for 911 By Wayne Madsen
Top officials of the George W. Bush and, to a lesser extent, the Clinton administration, stymied a number of coordinated intelligence and law enforcement activities that could have prevented both the 911 attacks and the attack, eleven months before, on the USS Cole.
These subscribers and ardent supporters of the Project for a New American Century’s (PNAC) blueprint for U.S. global domination interfered with covert projects by the CIA, FBI, Defense Intelligence Agency, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Treasury Department, and National Security Agency (NSA) that could have exposed an international organized criminal cartel that included the 911 hijackers, arms and drug traffickers, and Mafia financiers. According to a number of former CIA, FBI, and DIA officers, the one glaring missing link in the 911 attacks and the USS Cole bombing is the lack of provable involvement by organized Islamist fundamentalists, including the generic bogeyman consistently cited by the PNAC supporters: “Al Qaeda.” (continues)
Posted by: pdalya | June 23, 2006 at 20:22
Madsen doesn't get much notice because he peddles over-the-top conspiracy theories that rely entirely on anonymous sources, that fly in the face of known evidence, and that don't pan out.
Posted by: CaseyL | June 23, 2006 at 20:47
Somehow, a bunch of Muslim brothers talking about "killing all the devils" was something said repeatedly in the 60's and 70's. These boys (like the Yemeni boys) are a group of wannabes with no possible way of actualizing a plan. That's the National security plan: protect us from the brown and black people. Osama must be laughing in his cave!
Posted by: Gore Won | June 24, 2006 at 01:04
Well, if they didn't set a few of these folks up, how could they claim to be protecting us from terrorism? I mean, they need a result right? And if you can't find a serious, actually dangerous, terrorist cell, ya gotta manufacture one...
Posted by: Paul Lyon | June 24, 2006 at 01:06
This is all so funny. Gonzales and Company, the gang who can't shoot straight, taking down this pathetic terrorist group. There must be more of the same we'll hear about up until election day. Terrorists! Music to the Republicans' ears.
Posted by: Sally | June 24, 2006 at 06:11
I hasten to add this is not funny to those caught in the trap who may well spend the better part of their remaining years in Gonzales's designated spider hole. This should be a lesson to those who "have nothing to hide" and don't object to having their phones tapped, their e-mail read, their bank statements scrutinized, their doors broken down by the Gestapo. Or were none of these things at all useful and an informant required to bring down the terrorists-in-waiting? Orwell's 2006.
Posted by: Sally | June 24, 2006 at 06:29
Back in the 60's they used the University ROTC types to spy on students -- in the classroom and in the various organizations. It was part of the training for admission to the intelligence branches of the various services. I suspect they have turned that system back on again, and what that means is one must be super carefull what one says in the classroom, and what one says in groups that are anything other than trusted and fully vetted.
It is useful, if you can establish without doubt that someone is on some sort of intelligence mission, report them to the local police. For instance, if the young folk in Florida had reported that someone was trying to "Swear them into al-Qaeda" -- my guess is they would have had many fewer problems. That should be a dead eye sucker for a ringer.
Posted by: Sara | June 24, 2006 at 11:01
Cheney's comments on this "very real threat" echo Ron Suskind's new book, "The 1% Doctrine", wherein various agents chase shadows that Cheney thinks have a "1% chance" of being a real threat. Meanwhile, port security remains a joke, even as the gov't runs exercises based on smuggling a suitcase bomb into the US; chemical and power plants are left unguarded; and funds for NYC and DC are cut. Truly, the inmates are in charge of the asylum here.
Posted by: Mimikatz | June 24, 2006 at 12:06
Great post as per usual emptywheel.
It seems to me that "Brother Naz" illustrates the need for a Roosevelt style "New Deal" that invests in job training and jobs. Slowing the rate of illegal immigration is going to open up a lot of low skill jobs.
Posted by: John Casper | June 24, 2006 at 12:13
I hear Tommy Chong is on the loose again.
Posted by: shep | June 24, 2006 at 14:10
If I may be crude, for a moment, shall I point out that when your support is falling away from you; you lynch a few n*ggers. That gets all your people back on board.
Consider that base of Mr. Bush's support. They torpedeo the Civil Rights Bill in Congress; they deny a woman's right to make her own choices about her own body; and they entomb a code of behavior that they don't follow in government marble. "Thou shalt not steal." Think of all the billions that they have stolen from Indian Tribes, U. S. Troops, the Iraqi people...the list is too long.
Did you ever wonder about all those U. S. Lynchers? Who they were and why they performed such despicable acts and how they justified those acts to themselves and others? Look at the Bush administration. There are your lynchers. This is how it works.
Posted by: rukus | June 24, 2006 at 15:11
rukus
Yeah, I was thinking of that, that in the same week they've tried to legalize disenfranchisement again, they went after these guys.
Posted by: emptywheel | June 24, 2006 at 15:24