Implications of the Washington ‘sniper case’ – A scenario for US-Iraq war-time terrorism

Who predicted that Washington, the capital of the world’s only superpower, would be terrorised for three weeks by a sociopathic Islamic terrorist and a 17 year old, illegal immigrant accomplice?

Who predicted that the ‘snipers’ were using a customized van for assassinations?

Not the 600 FBI personnel, 454 federal agents, 101 ATF analysts, 59 inspectors, 50 secret service agents and local police from five jurisdictions, who remained locked in the pre-9/11 law enforcement dominant paradigm.

Not a single ‘expert ‘imagined that two mobile snipers operated from a custom made car designed as a ‘killing machine’: with two holes in the trunk, one for the rifle, the other for the scope. Shots could be fired without opening the trunk. The back seat could be folded down so the sniper did not have to step outside the car.

The primitive category mistake of  confusing criminal acts with terrorist acts and using law enforcement techniques to identify and capture terrorists, resulted in a rainbow coalition of overweight criminologists, bearded forensic psychologists and a host of ‘experts ‘ and geographical/ psychological profilers recoursing to the following stereotypes:

Bin Laden spokesman threatens assassination campaigns

The 1993 World Trade Centre and the 9/11 terrorist attacks revealed that US intelligence agencies lost focus on  the internal threat to US security from Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, who have openly discussed their commitment to urban terrorism within the United States for the past decade. In 1997, Bin Laden threatened to ‘move the fight inside the United States of America itself’.

Al Qaeda must have been enthused watching the politically correct investigation of the ‘Washington sniper’ diverting valuable resources and the hapless local police chief who provided a televised comic dimension against a backdrop of ten murders by a former soldier conducting his own version of jihad.

Al Qaeda manuals correctly emphasises that 80% of intelligence derives form open source collection. HUMINT is not needed to assess the trend in Al Qaeda operations to foster internal war within the US. Bin Laden and his spokesmen are frank and explicit. In early July 2002, Al Qaeda’s chief spokesman Sulaiman Abu Ghaith declared in a statement resonant with meaning:

‘Our military and intelligence networks are assessing and monitoring new US  targets that we will strike in a period of time which is not long. Al Qaeda is ‘preparing for a coming period …of guerrilla war’. We have started changing the war to attacks and assassinations and we have successes in that with God’s help. And we, the fighters of the holy war, in general, are hoping to enter the next phase, which we in the military call the gang war phase. We are attempting expand the frontlines. …it will be a war of killings, war against businesses which will hit the enemy where he does not expect’.

The following scenario is based on a study of the ‘Washington sniper case’ and is derived solely from publicly available information, primarily Al Qaeda training manuals from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Germany and the UK. Some of the incidents described in the scenario have occurred in the United States and Australia. Highlighted quotations are from AL Qaeda training manuals.

The scenario is based entirely on open source information.

Immediately following the US ‘invasion’ of Iraq…

The US peace movement ‘spontaneously’ and swiftly mobilises pre-planned mass demonstrations in capital cities; dual purpose effigies of President Bush are burned in the street and quickly used as firebombs thrown into traffic and buildings; demonstrators throw ball bearings, urine filled containers and balloons, bolts, nails and nuts at police. Banners are constructed to be dual purpose and are used by demonstrators and terrorist elements within the demonstrations as weapons against police.

University buildings allegedly involved in US defence projects are seized, occupied or firebombed; riots erupt between competing student activists as the campuses split on racial, religious, ethnic fault lines.

~ ~ ~

‘The mujaheed should be young, so he can start the mission ten years before the start of the jihad…Using fast moving, light forces that work with complete secrecy’  Mujaheed respond to coded recognition signals including hand movements, ‘brush contacts in streets that avoid surveillance’, single word commands embedded in emails, porn sites and chat rooms. Websites conceal maps and target instructions toward ‘sleeper cells’.

Videotapes and Friday sermons in Mosques also inform terrorists of targets. Coded instructions collected at dead drops or ‘dead boxes’ located in mosques, whispered instructions from’ brothers’, and drawing on ‘stacks and stores’ of weapons, Islamic terrorists and their networked cells of sympathisers and sleeper agents,  hit ‘high density targets‘ Washington, creating social panic, disorientation and diversion using ‘the basic rules of sabotage and terror’.

~ ~ ~

Emerging swiftly from ethnic enclaves and a system of safe houses and safe mosques, which are legally insulated from systematic surveillance, Islamic terrorists wage co-ordinated and synchronised attacks throughout the US. Civilian airports are seized and sabotage campaigns are launched against US Naval Air Force and Defence facilities.

Truck bombs are driven at major Washington embassies. Radio controlled model boats are floated on rivers lakes and dams near strategic installations and are detonated by a remote switch. Cities face massive flooding. Small boats packed with bombs are targeted at aircraft carriers. The terrorists increase social disorientation by ‘blasting and destroying bridges leading into and out of the cities’.

~ ~ ~

Pre-occupied with containing demonstrations, authorities are incapable of monitoring and taking counter measures against ‘breakaway elements’ of terrorists, terrorist sympathisers and foreign agents within the demonstrators who begin ‘blasting and destroying the embassies and attacking vital economic centres …including …high density targets …buildings, bridges, embassies, schools, amusement parks.’ They also ‘target and occupy government buildings, drop poisonous materials in air conditioning systems and containers of odorless gas which incapacitate thousands of victims’.

~ ~ ~

C-4 and C-3, astrolite, the world’s most powerful non-nuclear explosive, and at least 60 other chemicals used in explosives are planted by cells or sympathisers. They are aimed at US ‘vital points’ and essential service of the social infrastructure, such as dams, nuclear plants, power stations and power grids. ‘Explosions strike the enemy with sheer terror and fright.’

~ ~ ~

Under the cover of mass pro-peace demonstrations and anti war protests, Islamic terrorists target US political elites for assassination: their targeting is based on ‘microscopic surveillance of the target… his habits, his daily errands, his children and his wife, his standing in the community, his skills and educational goals, his income, when he awakes, the best times for inspecting his house, places he goes regularly’ targets include:... ‘Those personalities that block the call’s path, all types of military and civilian intellectuals and thinkers for the State.’

~ ~ ~

Key political intelligence and military leaders and commanders are assassinated by Jihad suicide groups or ‘four man fire teams’  … ‘killing personality and guards from cars.’ In 1997, Bin Laden offered $US 9 million reward for the deaths of the chiefs of the US State Department, Department of Defence and CIA/FBI.

Nuclear power plants are fire bombed and naval installations and bridges are assaulted by use of  “Green peace ‘style  boats showing ‘white flags’. Terrorists disguised as demonstrators parachute into denied areas such as military naval and air force bases and nuclear power stations and plant explosive devices; cyber-war attacks cripple vital aspects of US C3 functions and civilian IT infrastructure is downed as e-Jihad  is launched, including denial of service attacks, web defacement, and disruption of email. 

~ ~ ~

Reflecting the breakdown of US counterintelligence, Iraqi and anti US moles and Islamic sympathisers in sensitive positions in US government provide tactical and timely information to Islamic terrorists to further their strategic objectives.

~ ~ ~

Food supplies and food sources are threatened as terrorists announce that frozen foods in shops and homes have been injected with biochemical agents. Food importers fear that they stored or sold contaminated food. 

~ ~ ~

Terrorists inform media of the location of nuclear suitcase bombs which are ‘hot wired’ to bypass coded instructions; some locations are genuine; some are disinformation; all involve the massive deployment of scarce intelligence and law enforcement resources in a war-time situation.

Terrorists employing a psychological warfare trump card announce ‘catastrophic terrorism’ and claim to have a ‘dirty bomb’ in the form of radioactive material lashed to high explosives, which is aimed at Washington. They threaten to contaminate the city and blow radioactive debris for miles resulting in the death of over 100,000 people when used in a densely populated area. The use of the words ‘nuclear’ radiological’ weapon’ creates mass panic, increasing casualties.  

~ ~ ~

Government analysts perplexed by the ‘signal to noise ratio’ and ‘warning fatigue’ are unable to assess the salience of the threats and whether they are the targets of a psychological warfare campaign. Early warning indicators are awry as terrorists exploiting an identified deficiency in US intelligence, use regional dialects to communicate messages to agents and terrorists, defying rapid translation.

~ ~ ~

Throughout major US cities, sniper assassins continue against random targets creating social and political disorientation and widespread social anomie. Riots break out accompanied by widespread looting and vandalism. Retail businesses close down. Factories slow down or cease production in some cases.

~ ~ ~

Strategically timed calls for the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq are placed in the media as cases of CBW are reported, including botulism and anthrax which are communicated via the postal service on the edge and inside envelopes by  ‘the poisonous letter’. Some envelopes have been booby trapped with a slim lead of C4 explosive.

A prominent academic commentator on Islamic affairs is assassinated as he adjusts his motorcycle helmet which is lined with explosives and detonated by a remote controlled device. Government press conferences dissolve into chaos and confusion as cameras aimed at the speakers explode Jewish media identities. Communities and synagogues are attacked by  terrorists as part of the war against the hated ‘Zionist entity’-Israel.

~ ~ ~

Parcels containing cigarettes are opened and explode; ‘This system is normally used in an empty pack thrown in front of a house where the targeted person lives or just to create chaos in a certain area’.  Hoaxes increase confusion: ‘spreading rumours and writing statements that instigate people against the enemy’.

~ ~ ~

The US government faces unprecedented nation-wide political demonstrations involving hundreds of thousands of Muslims, pro Iraqi groups, radical leftists, anti-globalisation activists, environmentalists and anti–US groups inspired by a single objective: the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq and bonded by a shared sentiment: hatred of the United States.

~ ~ ~

Foreign and US Islamic ulema, scholars and religious figures issue a fatwa against the US government and claim that the US government is waging a war on Islam; that there is a ‘conspiracy to destroy Islam’ thereby raising persecutory anxieties amongst ethnic groups and further inflaming protests and direct action.

Using cognitive dissonance and taqiyya as a strategic weapon, Islamic spokesmen appear on television insisting Islam is a peaceful religion and claim that Islam is the victim of discrimination. Major cities burn as rioting and ransacking mobs run through the streets, plundering shops and department stores. Many states declare a state of emergency. The National Guard is mobilised. The US government faces unprecedented organised dissent and terrorism creating a protracted legitimacy crisis while it is conducting the war against Iraq.

The ‘Washington sniper case’ is a warning to the United States and other Western countries. A sociopathic convert to Islam and his teenage accomplice in a custom designed sedan described as a ‘killing machine’ paralysed the business and social context of the capital of the United States for three weeks though a program of random assassination.

The US may confront an organised ‘enemy within’ combining illegal mass action, demonstrations, planned strategic assassination and the manipulation of anomie in a time of war. There were two ‘Washington snipers’. There are many more, throughout the United States and elsewhere, waiting… silently.

Previous editorials
20th June 2004		Lakemba's terrorist connections: The 'axis of evil' in Australia
9th May 2004		Australia’s Mufti Sheikh Hilaly meets Hezbollah in Lebanon
23rd April 2004		Pakistan-born Faheem Khalid Lodhi, aka Abu Hamza, charged
12th April 2004		Lakemba, Australia: A great place for transnational terrorists
15th February 2004		Sydney’s Sheikh Feiz and his students
7th January 2004		The Al Qaeda CI /CE challenge
16th December 2003		ASIO management and Willie Virgil Brigitte’s dark terrorist network in Australia
11th November 2003		Australia’s Islamic fundamentalist Sheikh Mohamed Omran’s Mystery Train
13th October 2003		Al Qaeda and Islamic rules on espionage
22nd September 2003		REVIEW: INSIDE AL QAEDA: How I infiltrated the World’s deadliest terrorist organisation
9th September 2003		ANDREW WILKIE: ONA and Australia’s Progressive Intelligence Officer
16th March 2003		Al-Jazeera –‘Taqiyya Television’- Begins in Australia
4th March 2003		Yosri Fouda of Al Jazeera meets Saddam Hussein and the Director of Iraqi Intelligence: Why? Fouda - A contaminated source
17th March 2003		Yosri Fouda and Al- Jazeera- Journalism as terrorism by other means
2nd December 2002		Taqiyya and kitman: The role of Deception in Islamic terrorism
6th November 2002		A noted Anglican theologian discusses the ‘Terrorist Threat’
31st October 2002		Implications of the Washington ‘sniper case’: A scenario for US-Iraq war-time terrorism
19th October 2002		Bali and Australian Intelligence Failure: ASIO / ONA / DFAT / DIO Directors should be dismissed
6th October 2002		Terrorism with a return address: The nuclear suitcase bombs threat
23rd September 2002		In the name of Allah, the wise and the merciful
19th August 2002		Intelligence  (mis)management :  The Platitude Masters versus intelligence analysts
10th May 2002		Record of conversation between (deleted) Australian Intelligence Officer and USIO
10th March 2002		The Assassination of Daniel Pearl:  Islam hates “The Other”
11th February 2002		Australia's most sophisticated Anti-American Elite Organisation: Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT)
15th January 2002		The neutralisation of intelligence: The rise of the legal mystique, the decline of intelligence capability and the rise in terrorism
25th November 2001		Interview with Professor I C Comfort, Professor of Multicultural Law and Inter Ethnic Jurisprudence
10th November 2001		Lakemba's Sheik Hilaly:Australia’s anti-semitic multicultural Mufti with many masks
26th October 2001		Muslim fundamentalism: the false comfort of illusions
19th October 2001		One thousand Bin Ladens: Inflammatory Australian Muslim Web Site - pro Bin Laden and pro Taliban
15th October 2001		Psycho-linguistic warfare and Terrorism: the use of ‘BUT’
12th October 2001		The methodology of theories of conspiracy
7th October 2001		The Australian Broadcasting Commission’s  Propaganda:  War by other means
30th September 2001		Bin Laden in Australia
26th September 2001		BIN LADEN'S war against the United States of America and the West
21st September 2001		Australia: elite anti US opinion

 

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