It's Still Not a WMD

The FBI tricked a Somali-born American citizen into building a fake bomb and attempting to blow it up in Portland, Oregon. So of course, they want to charge him with attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction - when it was known to be a non-functioning improvised explosive device.

Agents arrested [Mohamed Osman] Mohamud moments after he tried to detonate a van he thought was packed with explosives in the crowded public square Friday night, the Justice Department said. As he was taken away, Mohamud, 19, kicked agents and screamed "Allahu Akbar!" - Arabic for "God is great,'' officials said. The bomb was an elaborate dud, assembled by FBI technicians.

Mohamud, a Somali-born naturalized U.S. citizen and former Oregon State University student, is expected to appear in federal court Monday. He faces up to life in prison if convicted of attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction. Neither an attorney for Mohamud or his family could be located Saturday.

Mohamud became "radicalized" when he was 15 - in 2006, just when things were getting nice and hot in Iraq and Afghanistan. Not really a shock. I get it, he was a bad guy, but he was also exceptionally stupid. I really have to disagree with the WaPo journalist's suggestion that there are "extremist cells" and "a wave of homegrown terrorism" in the United States. But then again, I shouldn't be surprised by WaPo's continued trend toward replacing the Washington Times as the local right-wing sensationalist newspaper.

Glad to see the FBI continue its trend of entrapping brown-skinned US citizens with crimes of attempted terrorism. They're almost as good as the police detectives in "Minority Report" when it comes to arresting people for crimes they were thinking of committing. But it continues to drive me to irritation to see six 55-gallon drums of an inert material, a gallon of diesel fuel, some det cord and blasting caps labeled as a "WMD."

UPDATE: George Smith notes that the recent stories about authorities arresting white middle aged men with explosives didn't get into the national news. And they also didn't get charged with possessing "WMDs." 

Comments

[tammy swofford]

Could we identify the "brown skin" as a Muslim who has been swept up into the undercurrent of an ideology sweeping the globe which is stridently anti-West? It is perhaps good to mention also that within Maghazi (battle literature) jihad is valid at the point of intent, not operation. Thoughts precede action.

What, exactly, do you propose for an alternate threat deterrence? After-action clean-up? The man had earlier texted a friend asking where he could shoot off weapons without being heard. He also seemed unfazed to consider the loss of life of children. He was dangerous, and hence, had to be taken off the streets.

Should we issue the F.B.I. wet-dry vacs to just clean up body parts?

Now I DO think it stupid to allow the clown to precede along with a plan to "blow up" a Christmas tree lighting ceremony. That got the mosque torched. Better to redirect the target to the EPA building in Dallas, or something which does not evoke a strong grass roots communal response to threat perception. I give the F.B.I. a thumbs down for operational tactics on that one.

Tammy

[Ray]

Right reasons, but wrong charge.

[J.]

My alternative threat deterrence is to address all "homegrown terrorism," be it by foreign-born immigrants or US-born white male-dominated militias, with local law enforcement in the lead, FBI supporting, and through the use of existing legal statures on the violent use of firearms and explosives.

If the fusion cells are the way to do this, fine, let's do it. But I feel as if the FBI is deliberately teasing out those frustrated, alienated immigrants and enabling them to act as terrorists to beef up their creds. They are manufacturing the threat, not defusing it. And using the WMD charge is just silly, which was my real point here. It's a legal maneuver that continues to frustrate interagency discussions on addressing real WMD terrorism.

[tammy swofford]

Right jurisdiction on U.S. soil, wrong to identify as an issue of targeting skin color. smile

Tammy

[Dean]

This is an interesting move for the Portland FBI office, given its poor record associating locals with terrorism. Think back to Brandon Mayfield who they arrested in connection with the Madrid bombing based on a partial fingerprint match on a handbag found in the wreck. The media has been all, "Whew! Disaster averted! Thank you FBI!", but I think soon some serious questions will come out and his defense with have plenty to work with.
I prefer to think of this guy as more like Klebold and Harris of Columbine, or Kip Kinkle of Thurston, or the Virginia Tech guy. Loner, angry and just have that 'goin out in a blaze of glory' fantasy. They all thought they were making a point too.
But clearly this kid was not really that competent, resourceful or organized. Many of us here in the Rose City have been sleeping just fine after seeing what the big scary threat we should all be afraid of looks like. Yeah, I'm good with that, I think we got that.

[student]

How about a "pretend quasi-WMD?"

From: http://www.hsaj.org/?fullarticle=6.3.3

"The term “WMD” was the word of the year in 2002, but quickly fell into abuse as a term of political rhetoric and comedic punch lines. It was originally developed in 1948 by the United Nations as an accepted arms control term to describe the nation-state use of nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons. But today, the term means different things to different people and agencies....

The military defines WMD as nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons that can cause a “high order of destruction.” I would add to this definition that the intentional use of these weapons needs to cause mass casualties, defined as more than one thousand injured or dead, during a single incident. I disagree with the FBI’s use of the Title 18 U.S. Code definition of WMD because of its deliberate lack of reference to the scale of the incident. To the Department of Justice (DoJ) lawyers, any amount of CBRN or explosives, no matter how small, constitutes a WMD. Even innate devices or hoaxes can have WMD aspects.

The presence of mass casualties is a key aspect of the WMD incident, but “mass casualties” is an undefined and nebulous phrase. In general, people use the term to describe a situation in which there is one more casualty than the number of available hospital beds in the local area. Because we want to focus on the federal response, we need to quantify that number to understand what federal actions are adequate. The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) chose the number of 1,000 injured or dead people for the trigger for its Metropolitan Medical Response Forces.

In my mind, the term “WMD” is only useful as an arms control term. It is often used by international agencies and government officials to discuss a particular class of unconventional weapons. However, the United Nations wanted to keep the term open to other forms of technology that might equal nuclear weapons in the scope of their destructive force, so I’m not against consideration of high-yield explosives, directed energy lasers, or other weapons that could realistically cause mass casualties. Ricin and botolinum toxin, often used in small amounts for assassinations, are not WMD. Airplanes used to cause mass casualty events are not WMD. Pipebombs and grenades are not WMD."

[Ray]

A machine gun, for example. Obviously that's a WMD- if lesser objects have been stated to be.