Overt difficulties for the police

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Sep 11th 2008
From The Economist print edition

A big trial convicts three terrorists, but dismays counter-terrorism officials

AP
IT MIGHT have been the biggest act of mass murder since the attacks on America in 2001: at least seven airliners flying from London to cities in North America would have been blown up by liquid explosives smuggled on board as soft drinks. Thousands would have died had the plotters not been arrested in August 2006.

That is how American and British officials recount Operation Overt. But on September 8th, when a London jury returned its verdict on eight British Muslims charged with the plot, it could not agree that the targets were civilian aircraft. Instead it convicted three men on vaguer charges of conspiring “to murder persons unknown”, and was stuck on whether four others were guilty of the same offence. The eighth defendant, Mohammed Gulzar, al-Qaeda’s alleged emissary, was acquitted.

It was a bittersweet end to one of the West’s biggest anti-terrorist inquiries. Prosecutors had set out a mass of evidence gathered by the police: hydrogen peroxide for explosives, alleged bomb-making equipment, hollowed-out batteries to hide detonators, a memory stick containing details of transatlantic flights and “martyrdom” videos in the style of al-Qaeda.

MI5, Britain’s domestic-intelligence agency, had video and audio recordings from bugs in the gang’s safe house in Walthamstow, east London. The plotters were seen rehearsing how to turn plastic bottles into bombs; they were even heard recording their valedictory messages. “Now the time has come for you to be destroyed,” says Abdulla Ahmed Ali (pictured above), the group’s leader, jabbing his finger.

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Mr Ali told the court that his group did not intend to destroy aircraft; it only wanted to stage a stunt by harmlessly setting off small bombs, perhaps at Heathrow airport. The jury did not believe him, but was in doubt as to his real target and how many were involved. With airlines demanding the end of restrictions on carrying liquids in hand luggage, British prosecutors said they would apply for a retrial of seven of the men, alleging that they all “conspired to detonate improvised explosive devices on transatlantic passenger aircraft”.

Operation Overt underscores the difference between intelligence and evidence that can stand up in court—particularly when cases deal with conspiracies rather than with acts of violence actually committed. Prosecuting terrorists in ordinary criminal courts—not American-style military commissions or the juryless Diplock courts from Northern Ireland’s Troubles—has many benefits: it underscores the fact that the terrorist threat is real, helps maintain public consent for anti-terrorist measures and may encourage Muslims to address the problem of violent Islamist radicalism in their midst. But many people, convinced that these defendants were guilty, are chagrined by the verdict.

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Those advocating new legal powers against terrorism—lengthening pre-charge detention, increasing the scope for post-charge questioning or making telephone intercepts admissible in court—will find little to support their case in Operation Overt. Rather than seek such authority, senior policemen involved in the investigation have singled out the importance of electronic surveillance and the need for a country-wide counter-terrorism squad.

For now, most scrutiny has fallen on the delicate business of international intelligence co-operation. For America’s security services, the biggest threat comes from Europe’s Muslim extremists, especially Britain’s, who can enter America relatively freely. It counts on Britain to share what it knows. In turn Britain, which is hated by al-Qaeda almost as much as America, relies heavily on the latter’s vast intelligence resources—not least its monitoring of e-mails and money transfers.

Both countries are vitally dependent on the assistance of Pakistan, in whose lawless tribal belt al-Qaeda’s leaders are thought to have found sanctuary. Britain’s large population of Pakistani origin—particularly the angry sons of migrants—gives al-Qaeda an obvious avenue of attack.

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Intelligence collaboration, say Western security officials, is the “unsung success” of the fight against al-Qaeda. But the Overt case offers a glimpse of its pitfalls. Senior British police sources say they were rushed into arresting the plotters because a related suspect, Rashid Rauf—allegedly al-Qaeda’s linkman—had been unexpectedly arrested in Pakistan at America’s behest. News of the arrest, they say, might have prompted the plotters to destroy evidence, disperse or, worse, attempt a “desperate attack”.

Some say that allowing the investigation to run longer would have increased the chances of gathering evidence—complete bombs, or purchased airline tickets—for a more convincing prosecution. In truth, though, British police planned to make the arrests just three days later because the plotters seemed close to striking.

“I think the Americans lost their nerve. They could not stand the risk of another attack,” says one British source, who claims the decision to arrest Mr Rauf came from the White House. Not true, retort the Americans. Philip Mudd, an official at the FBI, says Mr Rauf was arrested because he was about to travel to the tribal areas; America might have lost a big al-Qaeda figure and potentially important intelligence.

Debates about tactics are to be expected. More alarming is the ineptitude of the Pakistani police, who allowed Mr Rauf to escape last December. As he was brought from court to prison, he asked to stop and pray in a mosque and slipped out, never to be seen again. If he is busy planning the next attack, American and British spooks had better be on good terms.