President Trump says he was “surprised” that Britain released five suspected terrorists on bail. The suspects were arrested after a farmer saw the masked men and several vans 100 yards from a British air base the U.S. has used to conduct bombing runs on Iran.
British authorities said tests on the vehicles did not reveal any “viable explosives.” Maybe not, but such suspicious behavior might have been a test run ahead of an attack on the base. Predictably, Iran, which has threatened to retaliate against any nation aligning itself with the U.S. attacks, has denied any connection to the men. Did we expect Iran to tell the truth?
Why not wait until the investigation is complete before considering the release of the suspects on bail? The public doesn’t know the names of the five men because British laws restrict such disclosures, so their backgrounds cannot be independently investigated.
More evidence that Britain is letting its guard down — if it ever had it sufficiently up — comes with news that London granted refugee status and later citizenship to a former bodyguard of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, though his ties to terror groups were publicly known. They kept on hosting him even after he was accused in a German terror plot.
One might think that Britain, which suffered its own “9/11” on July 7, 2005 when terrorists targeted London’s public transportation system, killing 52 people, might take subsequent threats more seriously and not release the five suspects on bail. Human nature and their ideology suggest these men are unlikely to show up for their court date and could flee the country.
Though America has not experienced another terrorist attack on the scale of 9/11, Britain has been the target of several other catastrophic attacks. Unfortunately, the power of political correctness and not wanting to call the motivation behind these attacks for what it is, overcame common sense.
There was the Manchester Arena Bombing on May 22, 2017 at an Ariana Grande concert. Twenty-two people were killed.
On March 22, 2017, there was an attack on London’s Westminster Bridge. The driver of a vehicle struck people walking on the bridge. He then got out and stabbed others. Five people died.
Then there was the attack on London Bridge on June 3, 2017 — A van and knife attack on London Bridge and in Borough Market killed eight people. It appeared to be a copycat of the March 22 attack.
What does it say about Britain’s seriousness in fighting terrorism when it took a farmer, not the police, to discover suspicious activity so close to an air base? Did the base not have cameras, or military patrols? Was anyone paying attention besides the alert farmer?
Britain has been in decline for years. As in other European countries, London has had issues with high levels of cross-border asylum-seekers. The border policy of the Biden administration also contributed to the immigration crisis at America’s southern border. To his credit, President Trump effectively closed the southern border to asylum seekers and unauthorized migrants and has deported thousands of criminals who violated U.S. immigration laws, potentially making the country safer.
Letting these five suspects out on bail was a major mistake that could come back to haunt the British government. If terrorists, or any like-minded people manage to attack the air base and people are killed, it will be the government that will have blood on its hands.
Readers may email Cal Thomas at tcaeditors@tribpub.com. Look for Cal Thomas’ latest book “A Watchman in the Night: What I’ve Seen Over 50 Years Reporting on America” (HumanixBooks).