Al Qaeda claims responsibility for the Big Blackout

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Preacherman

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From the Arab newspaper Dar Al Hayat (http://english.daralhayat.com/arab_...bdd659-c0a8-01ed-0079-6e1c903b7552/story.html):

Al Qaeda Claims Responsibility For Power Blackout In U.S.!

Mohamad Saleh
Al-Hayat 2003/08/18 Cairo

A communiqué attributed to Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the power blackout that happened in the U.S. last Thursday, saying that the brigades of Abu Fahes Al Masri had hit two main power plants supplying the East of the U.S., as well as major industrial cities in the U.S. and Canada, "its ally in the war against Islam (New York and Toronto) and their neighbors."

The communiqué assured that the operation "was carried out on the orders of Osama bin Laden to hit the pillars of the U.S. economy," as "a realization of bin Laden's promise to offer the Iraqi people a present."

The statement, which Al-Hayat obtained from the website of the International Islamic Media Center, didn't specify the way the alleged sabotage was carried out. The communiqué read: "let the criminal Bush and his gang know that the punishment is the result of the action, the soldiers of God cut the power on these cities, they darkened the lives of the Americans as these criminals blackened the lives of the Muslim people in Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine. The Americans lived a black day they will never forget. They lived a day of terror and fear… a state of chaos and confusion where looting and pillaging rampaged the cities, just like the capital of the caliphate Baghdad, and Afghanistan and Palestine were. Let the American people take a sip from the same glass."

It added: "we heard amazing statements made by the American and Canadian enemies which have nuclear physics universities and space agencies, that lightning hit and destroyed the two plants. And we are supposed to believe this nonsense. If the blackout occurred in one or two cities, their lie would have been credible. But the fact is that the blackout hit the entire East and part of Canada."

The communiqué continued: "one of the benefits of this strike is that the U.S. will not live in peace until our conditions are met, such as releasing all the detainees including Sheikh Omar Abdulrahman, and getting out of the land of the Muslims, including Jerusalem and Kashmir."

The authors of the communiqué said that the strikes aimed at "hitting the major pillar of the U.S. economy (the Stock Exchange)," considering that the operation was "a message to the UN, which is opposed to Islam, and is based in New York. It is a message to all the investors that the U.S. is no longer a safe country for their money, knowing that the U.S. economy greatly relies on the trust of the investor." They added: "seven major airports stopped working, which is a strike to airlines companies; nine nuclear reactors broke down, something that never happened before, and this is considered as a major economic hit for the nine reactors in the states of New York, New Jersey, Ohio and Michigan. Means of transportation broke down: trains, cars and trucks, which resulted in great losses. The Internet stopped, leading to a freeze in trade transactions. The international banks headquartered in New York closed, not to mention the great losses incurred by the insurance companies, and the massive deployment of the police and security forces."

The communiqué mentioned that some economists said the blackout in the U.S. and Canada would cost the U.S. Treasury no less than ten billion U.S. dollars and in order to "break the hearts of U.S. officials, just know that the cost paid by the Moujahideen to sabotage the power plants was a mere seven thousand dollars. Die of sorrow!"

The communiqué ended with: "we tell the Muslims that this is not the awaited strike, but it is called the war of skirmishes (to drain the enemy), and that the American snakes are enormous and need to be consumed and weakened to be destroyed. We tell the people of Afghanistan and Kashmir that the gift of Sheikh Osama bin Laden is on its way to the White House; then the gift of Al Aqsa, and do we know what is the giftof Al Aqsa, where and when? The answer is what you are seeing!"

__________________________________________________________


And if you believe that, I have a bridge I'd like to sell you... cash only, please, and in small bills! :D
 
lach.gif
 
And I tried to claim that I won the $100mil Powerball the other week, but that doesnt mean I actually did.

Just heard... they're now taking credit for Gigli !!
Now thats a war crime! Get the UN! There's a whole lot of WMD (Weapons of Massive Dumbness (yes its lame, but its early and I cant think up any better ones)) in there.

Kharn
 
What horseradish. Story this morning is that a series of minor events like sagging power lines in Ohio, plus the programmed responses of several operators led to the failure. In the real world, most accidents are the result of a fragile chain of insignificant events, any one of which, if corrected, would have prevented the mishap.

TC
TFL Survivor
 
Insh'allah, people, Insh'allah. Remember when Mullah Omar said that Allah was soon going to cause America to crumble into dust? These wackos don't have to make any sense.

Anything to rally more to their cause.

And are we sure Baghdad Bob didn't issue this statement?:D
 
Al Qaeda also claims to have slammed two airliners into the World Trade Center buildings- sheesh those guys will take credit for anything.

No, I don't see conspiracy under every rock- but given that no plausible explaination has yet been given for the blackout why is everyone so ready to dismiss terrorism out of hand?

Do I believe Al Qaeda was responsible- I have no idea at this point. Do I believe the government when they say they have no idea what caused it, but they know it wasn't terrorism- excuse me for being a bit skeptical.

Can they show me that it could NOT have possibly been terrorism?

The WTC was so blatant it could not be denied- and I think the goverment has a vested interest in denying as much as they can (except in those cases where admitting something works to their advantage).

OK- feel free to snicker. :)
 
2dogs -

to my mind, the greatest evidence that Al Qaeda had nothing to do with the blackouts is that nothing else happened - no bombings, no mass asassinations of civilians, no poisoning of the water supply while all of the early warning and alarm systems were out of commission.

If Al Qaeda were behind the blackouts, don't you think that there would have been suicide attacks in the middle of the massive crowds walking out of midtown Manhattan?

Inquiring Minds Want To Know! :)
 
Did Al Qaeda also cause the previous major blackouts in the U.S. or were they just accidents like this one?

OK, that's a fair question and the likely answer is no.

However, you now have a group of committed (and apparently insane?) terrorists who have shown that they are willing to die to kill our people and destroy our country. They have shown that they have the ability to kill our people, and have caused severe economic damage. They have stated that they wish to destroy this country economically. They now claim responsibilty for the blackout and nobody has demonstrated that they could NOT have done it.

I say the unreasonable position is to dismiss terrorism as a cause- at least at this time, and until it is shown that there was (as nearly as possible) a specific cause and a specific reason to rule out terrorism.

Why is it so hard to believe that an Al Qaeda operative in this country put a bullet or two into some vital piece of the grid?
 
I'm waiting for a local news reporter, covering a convenience store stick-up, to conclude her report by breathlessly concluding "There seems to be no connection to terrorism!" ;)
 
I can see Al-Qaeda causing a blackout by sabotage.

What I can't see is Al-Qaeda causing a blackout by sabotage, then not going out and using the resulting chaos to kill lots of people and blow things up.
 
What I can't see is Al-Qaeda causing a blackout by sabotage, then not going out and using the resulting chaos to kill lots of people and blow things up.

Good (albeit unfortunate) point.:(
 
Not that I care much for this guy- a RINO if ever there was one, but at least I'm not the only fool.;)


Tuesday Aug. 19, 2003; 9:20 a.m. EDT
Rep. King: Terrorism Shouldn't be Ruled Out as Blackout Cause

Congressman Peter King, R-NY, is warning that terrorism should not be ruled out as a possible cause for the eight state blackout that left 50 million Americans in darkness Thursday night.

"So long as that possibility is there, we should not rule it out," King told WABC Radio's Steve Malzberg on Sunday, adding, "I think all of the facilities of the U.S. government should be used to totally rule this out."

The New York Republican explained that even if terrorism had nothing to do with the blackout, "we can learn a lot about how to prevent this from happening in the future if terrorists do plan this. If they didn't do it this time, they'll try to find a way to do it the next time."

King was reacting to comments from former White House terrorism adviser Richard Clarke, who told ABC News on Friday, "Anybody who says they know what happened last night is lying. If it were a cyber-attack you wouldn't know it right away. And you might never know."

In separate comments to the network, Clarke also noted, "Three weeks ago, the Homeland Security Department announced that there was a potential cyber-security threat, that hackers might be going after critical infrastructure sometime in August."

King said that early pronouncements by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and President Bush that the blackout was definitely not caused by terrorism were "poetic license." What they meant, he said, was that "there was no evidence of terrorism."

"But on the other hand, we can't rule it out," he insisted.



http://www.newsmax.com/showinsidecover.shtml?a=2003/8/19/92637
 
No, I don't see conspiracy under every rock- but given that no plausible explaination has yet been given for the blackout why is everyone so ready to dismiss terrorism out of hand?

Because there is a plausible explanation. It's called cascade failure. We have an overworked, inadequate, and antiquated power grid. When one part fails (as it is all too likely to do), those portions it is connected to must take steps to protect themselves, which often requires shutting down or dropping out of the grid. That leads to blackouts.

That explanation has been offered on nearly every newschannel I've seen, so I can't believe you haven't encountered it. If you have seen the explanation, is it possible you didn't want to believe it?
 
AQ claiming they did it does not make me believe it at all. However, what I found interesting was how quick, like in the first hour, our Dept of Homeland Defense was to say it wasn't terrorism. Yet, for everything else that clearly isn't terrorism, earthquakes, car crashes, etc, it seems to take them days to say it wasn't terrorism.

Then again, if this was AQ, they're losing their touch. Their plan is to make lots of people slightly uncomfortable for a few hours? "Ah-ha! No amereecas funniest home veedios or cool refreshing pepsis for you, you imperial pig dogs!" It just seems slightly underwhelming.
 
what I found interesting was how quick, like in the first hour, our Dept of Homeland Defense was to say it wasn't terrorism.

Because utility companies are fairly rapidly able to figure out what went wrong. We have to be quick in order to fix it. The fingerpointing and refusal to acknowledge what went wrong is what takes a while.
 
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