JOURNAL: VBIEDs in London

Two car bombs were found in London today prior to detonation (one in Haymarket and one near Trafalger Square). The interesting analysis is that while the desire to manufacture of car bombs has percolated to London (in this case, an amateur DIY fireball through the use of propane cylinders, gasoline and cell phone triggers), the operational technique is still underdeveloped and likely to remain so in the majority of instances (until certain preconditions are met). However, in this security environment, there doesn't need to be much of an explosion in order to prompt a considerable and expensive over-reaction. Of course, the really smart organic guerrillas cognizant of their limitations won't plan for show, they will plan for leveraged effect and repeatability (systems disruption).

Comments

[adam]

John,

I agree. The keyword here is desire. The people that are attempting the bombing don't appear to have a good handle on physics or chemistry, nor do they appear to have materials to hand like actual explosives.

The good news is that the attempt used cheap and cheerful materials (neither gasoline nor propane in tanks is terribly lethal) in a ham fisted Hollywood manner (the missing component is oxygen). I'm told that the Anarchists Cookbook contains that particular piece of useful information. So we also know that the bombers don't even have access to that source of information - which you could quite cheerfully buy in bookshops in the UK about 5 years ago.

Hell, the key information is that a wandering plod had time to see the smoke, wander over, and turn off the "bomb". Sure, its a George Cross and the Queens Police Medal for the plod, but bluntly the bang is missing.

Its actually vaguely similar to the US Airport Pipeline bombing plot which would have worked fine, in an alternative universe where physics operated differently.

Of course none of that will matter to the press or the police, all of whom will treat it as a full-on Al Queda truck bombing.

Really cynically right now we have major flooding in the UK which actually really did kill people. The annual spend on terrorism is somewhere in the region of 20 times what we spend on flood defences, which are being cut again this year. Of course flood defenses are useful but so much less sexy.

[londamium]

Percolated to London? One of the more honest analysts canvassed on the BBC last night pointed out that the car bomb percolated to the Middle East from the West in the first place.

There have, of course, been numerous truck and car bombs in London/the UK since the 1970's - the most recent were in 2001 in Ealing and at the BBC TV centre. Other notable examples include the Docklands, Baltic Exchange, Omagh and Manchester attacks. A Palestinian group had a good go at using a car bomb to demolish Balfour House in Finchley in the, IIRC, early 1990's. If the UK cells had a quarter of the competence demonstrated by the IRA then the UK would be dripping in blood by now; fortunately, they don't and until they get their hands on real explosives the threat will remain, in real terms, far lower than the threat that the IRA posed in the 1974-1998 period.

Your analysis is utterly wrong: the biggest obstacle for the current generation of UK terrorists is that they have no access to explosives or ordnance, and that they lack the basic technical and operational competence to improvise around that. At present the lone nutter David Copeland, who managed to actually kill people using fireworks, represents a level of competence at creating "teh bang" that the vast majority of the UK jihadi aspirants are still incapable of.

The 7/7 bombers are the only UK example since 2001 of a group successfully marrying all the elements necessary to achieve their goals.

The media spin on this has been depressingly hysterical: it took until Newsnight at 10.30pm for the BBC to wheel out Mark Urban to accurately characterise situation, which was that there was no explosive component to the device, that the locution "potentially viable device" used by the police from the start indicated that the casualty risk was low, and that the talk of hundreds of casualties was hyperbolic.

The fact that the second device was ticketed and then loaded onto a lorry in the wee small hours for transfer to the pound is pure comedy gold.

[John Robb]

Londamium. Actually from Manhattan outwards. However, it seems those earlier examples were merely warm up for Iraq (essentially outliers, a distinction which always seems to confuse the "nothing new" crowd). Definitely don't agree with the hyperbolic coverage.

[londamium]

JR

Iraq represents something of a special case though, as there is a concatenation of specific factors and circumstances - vast quantities of explosives and ordnance, large cadres of trained personnel, foreign occupation, political fracture, vendetta culture, high intensity of operations, learning curves forged out of battlefield necessities - that have combined to produce the current situation, and these aren't readily reproducible elsewhere apart from Afghanistan and Sri Lanka.

Terminal guidance isn't a necessary condition for a mass casualty event - the Madrid bombings were all remote detonations, the Bali bombings used a suicide bomber to drive people towards a remotely-detonated truck bomb, the Bologna bombings were timer-activated. Quite a few of the large-casualty events in Iraq have resulted from remotely detonated devices.

One of the "fortunate" things about the 7/7 bombers is that the terminality of their operation resulted in the failure to preserve the bomb-making skill that differentiates them from their current counterparts. Until such time as our local Jihadis can emulate the IRA in the compartmentalisation of functions within a larger network there will be, at worst, the occasional successful attack - and European publics will have little difficulty in absorbing this, irrespective of the political and media hysteria.

[Scout006]

It is way too early to base arguments on fact; however, what this amaetuer attempt reinforces is the power of the media to amplify the impact of terror/terror attempts, as stated in Mr Metz' study on rethinking insurgency. The proliferation of 24 hour news shows, and their constant hunger for anything they can dramatize allows a small or non-event to become a major event, whether it is Paris Hilton going to jail, or the three stooges attempting a terrorist attack in London.

If the initial reports are correct (and they rarely are), the IED device would not have produced much in the way of casualties due to low RE factor of the materials used. The nails were a waste of time, without a true explosives, but they have ended up poking someone in the eye.

Of course this is a serious warning sign that not only confirms, reaffirms, the emergence of terrorist cells in the West that are "willing" to high casualty attacks, which completely supports the open source warfare theory. Second, where there is a will there is a way, and the bazaar will eventually provide the materials and services necessary to fill this demand.

[Duncan Kinder]

I'm sure the Sheriff of Nottingham regarded Robin Hood as a "terrorist."

One obstacle for a contemporary British Robin Hood would be the apparent lack of any Sherwood Forest.

[londamium]

More frolics at Glasgow airport - a "burning" cherokee jeep has been driven into the terminal building.

The only confirmed casualties are the two Asian males who were in the vehicle - suffering from minor burns - who then got involved in a fight with the police and a bystander. Both men have been arrested. Airport evacuated, flights suspended. Images of a small fire at one of the entrances.

Local police are saying that the incident is the result of a collision outside the terminal building - but that strikes me as unlikely.

[Cavolonero]

" However, in this security environment, there doesn't need to be much of an explosion in order to prompt a considerable and expensive over-reaction ... "

( exactly what just happened in Glasgow )

[jtin]

I agree with John and most of the other comments. However, I beleive the troubling characteristic in the London bombings is not the fact that they occurred, but that the plotters were willing to use an likely untested technology, at least by them. Is it possible they believed the would actually get away? Never-the-less, based upon past operations around the globe and the ability to learn quickly, it is highly likely that such attacks, while sporadic, will continue, but that mistakes will be corrected and they will become more lethal.

It is my opinion that thus far we have been lucky, i.e, these bombings, the planned attacks on Ft. Dix and the airport nearby. We cannot expect these people to not become more capable, neither can we expect law enforcement to continue to apprehend and learn about such incidents from luck. History has shown us, as one poster mentioned, there is a quick and over-reactive response that costs significant resources.

Perhaps the question is how can an over response be prevented and how do we get a better handle on domestic terrorism given that those perpetrating it will likely get better? A matter of when, not if.

[georgelarson]

There is a lot of flakey bomb information on the internet. According to current reports 2 and possibly 3 of the bombers had medical degrees. They should have known enough chemistry and physics to select a better bomb design or at least test the concept first. That makes the defective bomb design more curious.

Would that be a way to reduce the problem? post a lot of dud bomb designs on the internet?

[adam]

I was a bit dismissive of the situation earlier, mainly because they're complete amateurs. Now its plain weird.

We've now achieved the jump of militant Islam suicide attackers from urban poor to educated, middle class and cosmopolitan doctors. Thats not good in so many ways its not funny.

That said we were chatting about this at work and the "completely out there" theory was that they were deliberately inept as the attackers were under duress. Personally I doubt it.

[londamium]

George

Events like this remind me of how grateful I am that my appendectomy was done by a qualified medical practitioner and not an ordnance expert.

[georgelarson]

adam,

Being under duress makes their attempt appear more rational to me. Could some group be holding their relatives hostage? I wonder why one would not have secretly gone to the authorities. Maybe they did and the failed attempts were the planned result.

Engineering the public incompetence, humiliation and failure of a terrorist group would be a way for the authorities to strike back at terrorists without actually killing anyone. How many doctors does it take to make a bomb...? It would be an excellent media tactic. It could even be a bloodless form of black terror.

[georgelarson]

From todays Washington Post

Al Qaeda bomb making advice

"Make use of what is available at your dispoal and ... bend it to suit your needs"

Maybe the Post left something out, but

Do you think ignorant improvising with explosives is a recipe for failure? Or am I full of low nitrate fertilizer?