Category Archives: al-Qaeda

Radical Muslim books widely available, enjoy influence and popularity in Canada

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From The National Post

Radical muslim books too easily available: report

Stewart Bell, National Post Published: Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Members of the Toronto 18, seen here in a courtroom sketch, were found with radical Muslim books that encouraged terrorism. Kagan McLeod/National Post Members of the Toronto 18, seen here in a courtroom sketch, were found with radical Muslim books that encouraged terrorism.

TORONTO — When police rounded up 18 terror suspects around Toronto in 2006, they found cash, detonators and videos that showed some of them yelling “God is Great” as they trained in the snow with guns.

Police also found copies of manifestos with titles such as The Book of Jihad, The Virtues of Jihad, Fundamental Concepts Regarding Al-Jihad and 39 Ways to Serve and Participate in Jihad.

Such reading materials now enjoy “influence and popularity” in Canada, says a secret government study that identifies the ideologues whose writings it says are promoting “violent jihad” among Canadians.

The report by the Integrated Threat Assessment Centre names Sayed Qutb, Abdullah Azzam and Ibn Taymiyah as the “key ideologues whose works have contributed to Islamist radicalization in Canada.”

All three are dead. Qutb was a controversial Egyptian executed in 1966. Azzam was Osama bin Laden’s sidekick, killed in a 1989 car bombing, and Taymiyah was a 12th century scholar from what is now Turkey.

“In the context of this assessment, radicalization is defined as the process by which an individual progresses to an Islamist extremist viewpoint where violence is a justifiable means to achieve ideological objectives,” the study says.

“One of the key radicalizing elements in this process is exposure to Islamist extremist messaging which promotes violent jihad. A relatively small number of Islamist extremist authors are the source of this type of messaging, which includes literature, speeches and statements.”

These materials “can be obtained from newspapers and other publications, public audio and video broadcasts, and extremist forums on the Internet,” the report says. It does not mention, however, that they can also be purchased from online booksellers and borrowed from libraries.

The Toronto, Vancouver, Ottawa and Winnipeg public libraries list Qutb’s works in their catalogues, and his most radical books are posted in their entirety on a website for young Canadian Muslims.

“Syed Qutb’s books and Ibn Taymiyah’s doctrines are widely available in Canada, but more accessible on the Internet,” said the Canadian Muslim writer and activist Tarek Fatah, an opponent of Islamist extremism.

The “Toronto 18” group circulated extremist literature in electronic form. Some of the materials were found on a laptop seized during the arrest of Saad Gaya, whose sentencing begins today in Brampton. He has pleaded guilty to participating in a plot to detonate truck bombs in downtown Toronto.

The classified intelligence report, released under the Access to Information Act, is one of dozens of studies that analyze why some Canadians participate in al-Qaeda-inspired terrorist activities.

Previous studies have focused on the role of extremist fathers like Ahmed Khadr, spiritual mentors, the Internet and foreign paramilitary training camps but part of the answer was apparently on the bookshelf.

A common thread among the targets of counter-terrorism investigators was that they were consumers of extremist literature that portrays the West as the enemy and advocates violence as a duty.

“Radicalizing literature in the possession of individuals of interest to Canadian authorities indicates the ongoing influence and popularity of the works of Islamist extremist ideologues,” the report says.

The police search of the Ottawa home of terrorist Momin Khawaja in 2004 turned up not only military rifles, wooden ammunition crates and electronic detonator components but also copies of Taymiyah’s The Religious and Moral Doctrine of Jihad and Azzam’s Defence of the Muslim Lands and Join the Caravan.

A 2006 study by the Combating Terrorism Centre at West Point concluded that Azzam was among the modern authors most cited by Islamist terrorists. Qutb ranked number one. Taymiyah was the most commonly cited pre-modern author.

A 2007 paper by Carleton University’s Canadian Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies singled out the same trio as the foundation of al-Qaeda ideology.

In his writing, Azzam appealed to Muslims around the world to join the fight in Afghanistan, claiming that an hour spent fighting for Islam was worth more than 70 hours of prayer.

“He brought modern warfare to the concept of ‘global jihad’ and passed on his acquired skills to his many protégés, including UBL [bin Laden],” the government report says.

Of the three authors, Qutb is arguably the most influential. Qutb studied in the United States but returned to Egypt after two years and wrote disparagingly about Americans, decrying their freedom, racism and “animal-like” mixing of races. He also began advocating for the global dominance of Muslims.

“He sought to transform Islam into a political movement in order to create a new society based on ancient Koranic principles,” reads the intelligence report. “Qutb is also known for articulating the concept of ‘global jihad.'”

In Milestones, he wrote that those who resist the worldwide spread of Islam must be fought until they are either killed or submit.

“Sayed Qutb defined jihad as a call to unremitting warfare against the forces of unbelief in order to ‘open the nations for Islam,” Angela Gendron of Carleton University wrote in “Al Qaeda: Propaganda and Media Strategy.”

A report by the RCMP National Security Criminal Investigations Section calls Qutb “the ideological father” of al-Qaeda. “Qutb validated extreme violence in the cause of faith, so ‘Islamic terrorism’ could more accurately be called ‘Qutbian terrorism,’ the RCMP report says.

National Post

sb***@**********st.com

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Obama treats soldiers as cops, terrorists as full US citizens?

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This is ulcer-worthy weirdness. Many possibilities of course for this kind of insane policy to be enforced in the US against it’s own forces, but what comes to my mind first is the notion that President Obama’s fantasy that the Islamic terrorist threat is a law and order matter, means that suddenly all the various branches of the US forces become police. Trained to treat all they encounter as suspects for a crime at worst with expecttions of being the cops who beat Rodney King if they do not act with all respect against people who are evil and dangerous beyond most of our imaginations ability.

From FOX News with a H/T to GOV Weasel Zippers Reportonarrakis

March 31, 2004: Iraqis chant anti-American slogans as the charred and mutilated bodies of U.S. contractors hang from a bridge over the Euphrates River in Fallujah, Iraq.

Navy SEALs have secretly captured one of the most wanted terrorists in Iraq — the alleged mastermind of the murder and mutilation of four Blackwater USA security guards in Fallujah in 2004. And three of the SEALs who captured him are now facing criminal charges, sources told FoxNews.com.

The three, all members of the Navy’s elite commando unit, have refused non-judicial punishment — called an admiral’s mast — and have requested a trial by court-martial.

Ahmed Hashim Abed, whom the military code-named “Objective Amber,” told investigators he was punched by his captors — and he had the bloody lip to prove it.

Now, instead of being lauded for bringing to justice a high-value target, three of the SEAL commandos, all enlisted, face assault charges and have retained lawyers.

Matthew McCabe, a Special Operations Petty Officer Second Class (SO-2), is facing three charges: dereliction of performance of duty for willfully failing to safeguard a detainee, making a false official statement, and assault.

Petty Officer Jonathan Keefe, SO-2, is facing charges of dereliction of performance of duty and making a false official statement.

Petty Officer Julio Huertas, SO-1, faces those same charges and an additional charge of impediment of an investigation. Continue Reading →

Islamist preacher inspired Hasan, other terrorists

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From The Telegraph U.K.

Fort Hood shooting: radical Islamic preacher also inspired July 7 bombers

The Islamic preacher who gave email advice to Major Nidal Hasan, the gunman in the Fort Hood massacre, also inspired the July 7 bombers and a number of other British terrorists.

By Philip Sherwell and Duncan Gardham
Published: 6:30AM GMT 23 Nov 2009

Imam Anwar al-Awlaki

Imam Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen October 2008,

An Islamic preacher who gave email advice to Major Nidal Hasan, the gunman in the Fort Hood massacre that left 13 dead, also inspired the July 7 London bombers and a number of other British terrorists, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.

Lectures by Anwar al-Awlaki were found in the Iqra bookshop in Leeds, where the July 7 bombers held meetings. His lectures were also found among the material seized from a jihadist recruiter, Aabid Hussain Khan, from Bradford, West Yorkshire, who groomed Britain’s youngest terrorist, schoolboy Hammaad Munshi, then 15.

Al-Awlaki , 38, a US citizen, fled from the country to live in Britain after it was disclosed that three of the September 11 hijackers had worshipped at two different mosques where he preached.

He moved to Yemen in 2004, where he was arrested and then went underground, but he has been invited to give video lectures, most recently at East London Mosque in January, and his videos are still on sale in Britain.

Major Hasan, an army psychiatrist, worshipped at a mosque in Virginia where al-Awlak was imam at the same time as two Sept 11 hijackers.

Hasan, 39, has been charged with 13 murders. He shouted “allahu akbar” (“God is great”) and shot dead unarmed soldiers awaiting vaccinations before or after deployment. He is lying in a military hospital bed, paralysed from the waist down, after civilian police officers shot him to end the rampage.

It has since emerged that US intelligence monitored email correspondence during the past two years between the officer and the imam.

Hasan asked advice on jihad and whether it was permissible to kill innocent people in a suicide attack.

Al-Awlaki’s most influential lecture, Constants on the Path to Jihad, is based on a 2005 book by Yousef al-Ayyiri, the founder of
al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia.

According to Evan Kohlmann, a US terrorism consultant, the sermon was “a ‘virtual bible’ for lone-wolf Muslim extremists”.

Earlier this year, al-Awlaki also published 44 Ways to Support Jihad, a practical point-by-point guide to pursuing or supporting holy war.

“Constants spells out al-Qaeda’s home-grown terror strategy,” said Mr Kohlmann.

“Al-Awlaki didn’t just translate it, he applied its teachings for a Western audience. So when Ayyiri stated ‘jihad is everywhere’, al-Awlaki explained that meant jihad was in Europe too. This is a very clever individual who understands the power of the Internet to radicalise people. Had al-Awlaki not translated Constants, then most of the Western Muslims who were inspired by it would never have even heard of it.”

Al-Awlaki ‘s lectures were also found on a CD belonging to Mohammed Atif Siddique, 22, from Glasgow, an aspiring suicide bomber, who was found guilty of possessing bomb-making instructions.

Kalifornistan?

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I have no idea what to make of this. I’m told it’s good. But it looks like it could go either way. Hell Ill watch it anyway. The people who made it are associated with some truly outstanding films such as the path to 911 etc.

For more information please visit www.kalifornistan.com

Sears Tower Terror Plot Leader Gets 13-Year Sentence

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Batiste, who is heard calling the U.S. government “of the devil” and discussing how he wanted to build “an Islamic army for Islamic jihad.”

Narseal Batiste Fox News…MIAMI —  The ringleader of a group described by prosecutors as plotting terror attacks on Chicago’s Sears Tower and FBI offices in hopes of sparking an anti-government insurrection was sentenced Friday to 13 1/2 years in prison by a federal judge.

Narseal Batiste, 35, dabbed at his eyes with a tissue when U.S. District Judge Joan Lenard wondered in court how he was transformed from a hardworking family man struggling to build an inner-city construction business to the unquestioned leader of a quasi-religious, paramilitary group seeking support from Al Qaeda for terrorism.

“You’ve done great harm to yourself, your family, the young men who were your followers, and you’ve violated the trust of your country,” Lenard said.

Batiste, who faced a maximum of 70 years in prison, was convicted in May of conspiracy to provide material support to Al Qaeda, plotting to blow up buildings and conspiracy to wage war against the U.S. Four other men described as Batiste’s soldiers were also convicted and sentenced to between six and 10 years behind bars.

The sentencing marked the culmination of a case that began with an FBI raid in June 2006 on the group’s warehouse, known as the “Embassy” in an impoverished Miami neighborhood.

Top U.S. officials acknowledged at the time that the Sears Tower and FBI plots never got past the discussion stage and the group never acquired the means to carry out such audacious attacks.

The case was viewed as a prime example of the post-9/11 law enforcement strategy of stopping terror plots in the earliest possible stages, before proverbial fuse is lit. Continue Reading →

Major Hassan and his pen pals.

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Here are a couple of videos from an article on Tundra Tabloids. I rearanged them a bit but go over and have a look he has some other great stuff there as well. The man can photoshop what can I say.

In any case it appears that Hassan gave a lot of zakat, or charity money for Islamic terrorist groups, and had for years before he decided to go out in a blaze of murder. Quite the choice of pen pals. It must be getting hard for leftist defenders of Islam to claim he was acting against the peaceful intentions of the faith and was really just some nut.

Here is the video from ABC News on his pen pals. Click over for more info if you like.

Now after watching this, it may be worth noting that he could have spared himself a lot of time and trouble if he just watched a few Robert Spencer lectures. Hell most of us in the anti-jihad could have answered his questions with chapter and verse. Spencer would be who I would go to first though:

Vlad Tepes’s prediction for the trial of Khalid Sheik Mohammed

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Before reading my prediction, I would recommend reading the Stratfor Analysis and the Washington Times one as well and then hopefully, my prediction will make some sense.

Khalid Shiek Mohammed

First of all, the prosecution has been put in an impossible position. They have to get a conviction to avoid massive anger by the public, and they have to do it with a likely uncooperative CIA etc, as the evidence may both make these agencies look bad in the public eye for reasons such as water-boarding etc. as well as the fact that a great deal of the evidence may compromise existing operations and tip off various groups both within the US and terrorist cells overseas. This was one of the reasons given that the one person so far taken to a civilian court over 911 was allowed to walk from a German court. So its quite possible that the agencies with the evidence will not provide it. Other reasons will likely include the fact that this evidence was never collected with the methods standards or intentions of a criminal proceeding. So it most certainly will not make the cut unnecessarily embarrassing all in the process.

It should also be noted that intel agencies have turned on US administrations before. The FBI for instance had a grudge against Nixon and supplied one major US newspaper with a carefully crafted series of leaks which became known as ‘Watergate’.

Some years later, the CIA was displeased with G. W. Bush’s choice on how to conduct the Iraq war and leaked material to the NYT in order to create hostile public sentiment and it worked rather all too well.

I can easily see an environment where the constraints placed on security agencies by the Bush admin, and now being turned against them by the Obama admin, will make them happily take the only logical course open to them.

Refuse to cooperate with the prosecution, allow Mohammed to walk, and see the fastest decline in popularity of a US president in all of history.

As I see it, public perception will be that the refusal to cooperate with the prosecution will be on orders from the white house. People typically see the government as monolithic hence the preponderance of 911 conspiracy theorists. When the prosecution has no decent evidence to convict, and they likely would have had none even if the CIA and so on wished to cooperate, it will be seen as evidence of an administration that does not have American interests as front and centre.

I suspect that the CIA would rather see Khalid walk because he wasn’t read his Miranda rights as opposed to walk after a humiliating 8 month massively public condemnation of the nature and methods of the CIA itself, when it was actually doing its job according to the rules of the previous administration.

Eeyore for Vlad. Nov 17 2009

Please feel free to comment, add corrections or alternate ideas.

Here is a radio interview on point. Description and link below:

On our radio show last Saturday     
on the Obama administration’s decision to try five top terrorists, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, in federal court in New York for their “crimes,” i.e., making war against the United States. It’s a great interview, I think, and as high-level a discussion as you will ever hear of the issues raised by that potentially fateful decision. Not because of my skill as an interviewer, but because Andy is uniquely qualified to speak authoritatively on the subject. In a better world, he, rather than Eric Holder, would be making such decisions. So here it is: the podcast of our interview with Andy McCarthy.


Stratfor: Deciphering the Mohammed Trial

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Deciphering the Mohammed Trial

November 16, 2009 | 2035 GMT


Graphic for Geopolitical Intelligence Report

By George Friedman

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has decided that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will be tried in federal court in New York. Holder’s decision was driven by the need for the U.S. government to decide how to dispose of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, a U.S. Naval base outside the boundaries of the United States selected as the camp in which to hold suspected al Qaeda members.

We very carefully use the word “camp” rather than prison or prisoner of war camp. This is because of an ongoing and profound ambiguity not only in U.S. government perceptions of how to define those held there, but also due to uncertainties in international law, particularly with regard to the Geneva Conventions of 1949. Were the U.S. facility at Guantanamo a prison, then its residents would be criminals. If it were a POW camp, then they would be enemy soldiers being held under the rules of war. It has never really been decided which these men are, and therefore their legal standing has remained unclear.

War vs. Criminal Justice

The ambiguity began shortly after 9/11, when then-U.S. President George W. Bush defined two missions: waging a war on terror, and bringing Osama bin Laden and his followers to justice. Both made for good rhetoric. But they also were fundamentally contradictory. A war is not a judicial inquiry, and a criminal investigation is not part of war.

An analogy might be drawn from Pearl Harbor. Imagine that in addition to stating that the United States was at war with Japan, Franklin Roosevelt also called for bringing the individual Japanese pilots who struck Hawaii to justice under American law. This would make no sense. As an act of war, the Japanese action fell under the rules of war as provided for in international law, the U.S. Constitution and the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). Japanese pilots could not be held individually responsible for the lawful order they received. In the same sense, trying to bring soldiers to trial in a civilian court in the United States would make no sense. Creating a mission in which individual Japanese airmen would be hunted down and tried under the rules of evidence not only would make no sense, it would be impossible. Building a case against them individually also would be impossible. Judges would rule on evidence, on whether an unprejudiced jury could be found, and so on. None of this happened, of course — World War II was a war, not a judicial inquiry.

It is important to consider how wars are conducted. Enemy soldiers are not shot or captured because of what they have done; they are shot and captured because of who they are — members of an enemy military force. War, once launched, is pre-emptive. Soldiers are killed or captured in the course of fighting enemy forces, or even before they have carried out hostile acts. Soldiers are not held responsible for their actions, but neither are they immune to attack just because they have not done anything. Guilt and innocence do not enter into the equation. Certainly, if war crimes are in question, charges may be brought; the UCMJ determines how they will be tried by U.S. forces. Soldiers are tried by courts-martial, not by civilian courts, because of their status as soldiers. Soldiers are tried by a jury of their peers, and their peers are held to be other soldiers.

International law is actually not particularly ambiguous about the status of the members of al Qaeda. The Geneva Conventions do not apply to them because they have not adhered to a fundamental requirement of the Geneva Conventions, namely, identifying themselves as soldiers of an army. Doing so does not mean they must wear a uniform. The postwar Geneva Conventions make room for partisans, something older versions of the conventions did not. A partisan is not a uniformed fighter, but he must wear some form of insignia identifying himself as a soldier to enjoy the conventions’ protections. As Article 4.1.6 puts it, prisoners of war include “Inhabitants of a non-occupied territory, who on the approach of the enemy spontaneously take up arms to resist the invading forces, without having had time to form themselves into regular armed units, provided they carry arms openly and respect the laws and customs of war.” The Geneva Conventions of 1949 does not mention, nor provide protection to, civilians attacking foreign countries without openly carrying arms. Continue Reading →

Costly taps installed for hooked hate preacher

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From The Daily Mail

Hate preacher Abu Hamza gets new £650 taps fitted in his prison cell… so he can operate them with his hook

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 1:11 PM on 16th November 2009

The jail cells used by extremist Muslim preacher Abu Hamza have been specially-adapted to accommodate his hook – prompting angry claims that prison officials are ‘bowing down’ to him.

The cells used by the 51-year-old – who is serving a seven-year sentence for inciting murder and preaching hate  – have been fitted with lever taps costing £650, despite claims he is prefectly capable of using the standard twist ones.

Handrails were also put in the lavatories used by Hamza, who is allowed to wear his prosthetic limb fitted with a hook inside the high-security Belmarsh prison.

Jailed: Hate preacher Abu Hamza, pictured outside the North London Mosque at Finsbury Park surrounded by supporters in 2003Jailed: Hate preacher Abu Hamza, pictured outside the North London Mosque at Finsbury Park surrounded by supporters in 2003

A prison source told The Sun that officials at the jail were always catering to his whims.

‘It seems that whenever he says, ‘Jump’, the authorities ask him, ‘How high?’,’ said the source.

‘No one in here can understand why we’re spending the money to do this when he’s had no problem using the same taps as everyone else for the five years he’s been here.’

Egyptian-born Hamza lost both arms and an eye in a blast in Afghanistan and now uses a hook in place of his right hand. He has been held at Belmarsh, in south-east London, since 2004.

Two cells have already been kitted out for him because prisoners held at the jail are moved every month. The work, all at taxpayers’ expense, took two days.

He had spent 21 months on remand when he was jailed for seven years in February 2006 for inciting murder and preaching hate at Finsbury Park Mosque in North London.

American prosecutors want him extradited to stand trial on terrorism charges, including setting up al Qaeda training camps.

The TaxPayers’ Alliance estimates father-of-eight Hamza has so far cost Britain £2.75million in welfare payments, council housing, NHS and prison bills, trials and legal appeals.

It is feared his fight against deportation could take five years and soak up another £250,000.

A spokeswoman for the Ministry of Justice said: ‘Two cells have been fitted with hospital-style taps to enable disabled prisoners to use them. The cost is approximately £650, which will offset the cost of prison staff providing physical assistance to prisoners.’

thanks kitmanTV:

New York to try 9/11 mastermind

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From The Telegraph U.K.

9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to go on trial in New York

President Barack Obama said the September 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other Guantanamo Bay detainees will be put on trial in New York City.

Published: 12:24PM GMT 13 Nov 2009

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed: 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to go on trial in New York

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed Photo: AP

Speaking in Tokyo, Mr Obama said Mohammed, the self-proclaimed organiser of the al-Qaeda terrorist plot that killed almost 3,000 people in 2001, would face “exacting” US justice.

Bringing such notorious suspects to US soil to face trial would be a key step in Mr Obama’s plan to close the US detention centre at Guantanamo Bay.

Mr Obama initially planned to close the centre at the US naval base on Cuba by Jan 22 next year, but his administration is no longer expected to meet that deadline.

It is also a major legal and political test of Mr Obama’s overall approach to terrorism. If the case suffers legal setbacks, the administration will face second-guessing from those who never wanted it in a civilian courtroom.

The New York case may force the court system to confront a host of difficult legal issues surrounding counter-terrorism programmes begun after the 2001 attacks, including the harsh interrogation techniques once used on some of the suspects while in CIA custody. The most severe method – waterboarding, or simulated drowning – was used on Mohammed 183 times in 2003, before the practice was banned.

The US attorney general Eric Holder is due to annonce that a major suspect in the bombing of the USS Cole, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, will face justice before a military commission, as will a handful of other detainees to be identified at the same announcement, an official said.

The transfer of the detainees from Guantanamo to New York is not expected to happen for many more weeks because formal charges have not been filed against most of them.

STRATFOR: The Hasan and Fort Hood case

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Global Security and Intelligence Report

By Scott Stewart and Fred Burton

In last week’s global security and intelligence report, we discussed the recent call by the leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Nasir al-Wahayshi, for jihadists to conduct simple attacks against a variety of targets in the Muslim world and the West. We also noted how it is relatively simple to conduct such attacks against soft targets using improvised explosive devices, guns or even knives and clubs.

The next day, a lone gunman, U.S. Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, opened fire on a group of soldiers at Fort Hood, Texas. The victims were in the Soldier Readiness Processing Center, a facility on the base where troops are prepared for deployment and where they take care of certain processing tasks such as completing insurance paperwork and receiving medical examinations and vaccinations.

Even though the targets of Hasan’s attack were soldiers, they represented a very soft target in this environment. Most soldiers on bases inside the United States are normally not armed and are only provided weapons for training. The only personnel who regularly carry weapons are the military police and the base civilian police officers. In addition to being unarmed, the soldiers at the center were closely packed together in the facility as they waited to proceed from station to station. The unarmed, densely packed mass of people allowed Hasan to kill 13 (12 soldiers and one civilian employee of the center) and wound 42 others when he opened fire.

Hasan is a U.S.-born Muslim who, according to STRATFOR sources and media accounts, has had past contact with jihadists, including the radical Imam Anwar al-Awlaki. Al-Awlaki is a U.S.-born imam who espouses a jihadist ideology and who was discussed at some length in the 9/11 commission report for his links to 9/11 hijackers Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi. Al-Awlaki, who is currently living in Yemen and reportedly has contacts with al Qaeda, posted a message on his Web site Nov. 9 praising Hasan’s actions. Despite Hasan’s connections to al-Awlaki and other jihadists, it is unknown at this point if he was even aware of al-Wahayshi’s recent message calling for simple attacks, and therefore it is impossible to tell if his attack was in response to it.

However, one thing that is certain is that investigators examining Hasan’s computer hard drive, e-mail traffic and Internet history will be looking into that possibility, along with other indications that Hasan was linked to radicals.

We noted last week that by their very nature, individual actors and small cells are very difficult for the government to detect. They must somehow identify themselves by contacting a government informant or another person who reports them to the authorities, attend a militant training camp or conduct correspondence with a person or organization under government scrutiny. In the Hasan case, it now appears that Hasan did self-identify by making radical statements to people he worked with, who reported him to the authorities. It also appears that he had correspondence with people such as al-Awlaki, whom the government was monitoring. Because of this behavior, Hasan brought himself to the attention of the Department of Defense, the FBI and the CIA.

The fact that Hasan was able to commit this attack after bringing government attention to himself could be due to a number of factors. Chief among them is the fact that it is tactically impossible for a government to identify every aspiring militant actor and to pre-empt every act of violence. The degree of difficulty is increased greatly if an actor does indeed act alone and does not give any overt clues through his actions or his communications of his intent to attack. Because of this, the Hasan case provides an excellent opportunity to examine national security investigations and their utility and limitations.

The Nature of Intelligence Investigations

The FBI will typically open up an intelligence investigation (usually referred to as a national security investigation) in any case where there is an indication or allegation that a person is involved in terrorist activity but there is no evidence that a specific law has been broken. Many times these investigations are opened up due to a lead passed by the CIA, National Security Agency or a foreign liaison intelligence service. Other times an FBI investigation can come as a spin-off from another FBI counterterrorism investigation already under way or be prompted by a piece of information collected by an FBI informant or even by a tip from a concerned citizen — like the flight instructors who alerted the FBI to the suspicious behavior of some foreign flight students prior to the 9/11 attacks. In such a case, the FBI case agent in charge of the investigation will open a preliminary inquiry, which gives the agent a limited window of time to look into the matter. If no indication of criminal activity is found, the preliminary inquiry must be closed unless the agent receives authorization from the special agent in charge of his division and FBI headquarters to extend it.

If, during the preliminary inquiry, the investigating agents find probable cause that a crime has been committed, the FBI will open a full-fledged criminal investigation into the case, similar to what we saw in the case of Luqman Ameen Abdullah and his followers in Detroit. Continue Reading →