Embassies Closed To End Of Month

In the latest development, the government has closed the embassies and consulates at least to the end of the week and some to the end of the month. We have been considering the nature of the closures and ask the following question.  If the information is as specific as they say it is, why the vast number of locations that are being closed?

It is obvious to us that the information is not that clear but is painted so to help counter the attack on the NSA.   Who knows maybe the same information is available each and every week but this was the time to use it.

Whatever the goal of the Administration (which could vary from very real information to a smoke screen), it should be time for them to be forthright.  If it involves the US, should we not know it? From our reading of the information, it would indicate that the homeland is safe but on the other hand, if there is a valid threat, could it not also be here. If so, don't we need to know?

We checked the National Terrorism Advisory System (NTAS) which replaced the color coded alerts, and according to this site there are NO threats to the homeland. If there is such a big threat, should not the NTAS reflect it?

 

According to travel.state.gov, the State Department traveler alert system, the only area of danger due to terrorists are in the Middle East and northern Africa. No threat warnings for the US.

This brings up another question. If this information, as some our our "representatives" have intimated is the most telling since 9/11, why is the threat level here non-existent?  Did 9/11 not occur here?

There are just too many unexplained and convoluted reasons to believe that the threat is real, regardless of the pol who says it.  Lindsey Graham or Mike Rogers or Durban or Pilosi might say the world is coming to an end--but we would want more than their word. We have become a doubting Thomas.

Today on Rush Limbaugh's program he was saying something very similar. We all have questions and doubt the honesty of anyone in government.  This is not good for the country. We can only point to those in the gilded halls of Congress and in the White House as responsible for our doubt. 

It is our hope that nothing comes of this threat, we do not need a repeat of Benghazi. However, having the threat disappear does not mean there is no problem. Our government might have lied to us and that is a scarier proposition than terrorism.

Conservative Tom

Al-Qaida Terror Fears: 19 U.S. Posts Staying Closed All Week

August 5, 2013 by UPI - United Press International, Inc. 

WASHINGTON, (UPI) –  Nineteen U.S. diplomatic outposts in the Middle East and North Africa will stay closed all week “out of an abundance of caution,” the State Department says.

The move stems from ongoing fears of an imminent terrorist attack and not because Washington has any new intelligence about a suspected plot or plots, the department said.

“Given that a number of our embassies and consulates were going to be closed in accordance with local custom and practice for the bulk of the week for the Eid celebration at the end of Ramadan, and out of an abundance of caution, we’ve decided to extend the closure of several embassies and consulates including a small number of additional posts,” spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement late Sunday.

The Eid celebration, or the Feast of Breaking the Fast, is an important religious holiday celebrated Sunday by Muslims worldwide, marking the end of Ramadan, the Islamic holy month of fasting. Muslims are not permitted to fast that day.

Keeping 19 embassies and consulates shut through Saturday “is not an indication of a new threat stream, merely an indication of our commitment to exercise caution and take appropriate steps to protect our employees including local employees and visitors to our facilities,” Psaki said.

Nine of the 21 posts closed Sunday, including embassies in Kabul and Baghdad, were to reopen Monday, she said. The government added seven outposts to the closure list through Saturday.

The State Department statement can be found at tinyurl.com/UPI-Diplomatic-Outposts.

The department has told Americans abroad to take extra precautions all month, saying terrorists in the past have attacked subways, railways, planes, boats “and other tourist infrastructure.”

The location or the target of a current potential attack is “unspecified, but the intent seems clear,” Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Martin Dempsey told ABC’s “This Week”: “The intent is to attack Western, not just U.S., interests.”

“The assumption is that it’s probably most likely to happen in the Middle East,” House Intelligence Committee member Peter King, R-N.Y., said on the same program.

“But there’s no guarantee of that at all,” said King, who is also on the Homeland Security Committee. “It could basically be in Europe, it could be in the United States, it could be a series of combined attacks. … So we have to be ready for everything. And that’s what this is about.”

The Obama administration ordered the 21 initial posts closed and issued a global travel warning to Americans Friday, after U.S. intelligence agencies picked up electronic communications among known terrorists discussing “certain dates” and being “specific as to how enormous it was going to be,” King said.

Senate Intelligence Committee member Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., said the intercepted “chatter” was similar to information picked up before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

“We didn’t take heed on 9/11 in a way that we should, but here I think it’s very important that we do take the right kind of planning as we come to the close of Ramadan,” he told NBC’s “Meet the Press,” adding the “chatter” posed “the most serious threat that I’ve seen in the last several years.”

When asked what makes the threat so serious, Chambliss said: “What we have heard is some specifics on what’s intended to be done. And some individuals who are making plans such as we saw before 9/11. Whether there are going to be suicide vests that are used or whether they’re planning on vehicle-borne bombs being carried under an area, we don’t know. But we’re hearing some kind of that same chatter … that we heard pre-9/11.”

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., told the program Vice President Joe Biden gave members of Congress a classified briefing last week indicating about 25 U.S. embassies around the world were vulnerable.

All the lawmakers interviewed said the group believed behind the alleged plotting appeared to be the al-Qaida affiliate in Yemen.

That al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula affiliate, also active in Saudi Arabia, “is probably the biggest threat to the homeland,” House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, told CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

“They’re the al-Qaida faction that still talks about hitting the West and hitting the homeland,” he said.

The al-Qaida franchise is behind a man’s attempt to blow up a trans-Atlantic jet over Detroit Dec. 25, 2009, using explosives sewn into his underwear.

In August 2009 the group tried to kill the Saudi intelligence chief, a member of the Saudi royal family, with a bomb surgically implanted in the attacker’s body.

“The administration’s call to close these embassies … was actually a very smart call, particularly in light of what happened in Benghazi when warnings were not heeded in that case,” McCaul told CBS, referring to the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks on the U.S. diplomatic outpost in Benghazi, Libya.