Brits chasing 30 terrorist plots

AP/NY Times:

British authorities are tracking almost 30 terrorist plots involving 1,600 suspects, the head of Britain's domestic spy agency said, adding that many of those under surveillance are homegrown terrorists plotting suicide attacks and other mass-casualty bombings.

Prime Minister Tony Blair backed his spy chief's assessment and warned that the terrorist threat facing Britain ''will last a generation.''

In a speech released by MI5 Friday, Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller said her agency had foiled five major plots since the July 2005 transit bomb attacks in London.

Speaking to a small audience of academics in London on Thursday, Manningham-Buller said officials were ''aware of numerous plots to kill people and to damage our economy.''

''What do I mean by numerous? Five? 10?'' she said. ''No, nearer 30 that we currently know of.''

She added that, ''Today we see the use of homemade improvised explosive devices, but I suggest tomorrow's threat will include the use of chemicals, bacteriological agents, radioactive materials and even nuclear technology.''

She said MI5 and the police were tracking 200 cells involving more than 1,600 individuals who were ''actively engaged in plotting or facilitating terrorist acts here and overseas.''

The threat includes ''resilient networks, some directed from al-Qaida in Pakistan, some more loosely inspired by it, planning attacks including mass casualty suicide attacks in the U.K.,'' she said.

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''It is the youth who are being actively targeted, groomed, radicalized and set on a path that frighteningly quickly could end in their involvement in mass murder of their fellow U.K. citizens,'' Manningham-Buller said. ''Young teenagers are being groomed to be suicide bombers.''

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The preachers of hate have had more success in the UK than in this country. The UK is already fighting the terrorist on their own soil. If the Democrats forces a retreat from battles in Iraq, the terrorist there will follow us home. It was the retreat from Mogadishu that convinced Osama bin Laden that the US did not have the will to fight. While he was right about the Democrats, he has been wrong about the Bush administration and has paid a heavy price, but the Democrats are threatening to let him have a cheap victory in Iraq.