AnT's Journal

Terrorism in Australia
The terrorist raids last nights have both an obvious concern and a subtler concern akin to an opening of a can of worms. The obvious concern is that it is confirmation that we have terrorist cells in this country. Here in Sydney the raid was conducted in Lakemba, a heavy enclave for those of Middle Eastern origins. This confirmation makes the threat clear and present. The fact that we have such a large population of migrant middle Easterners means where there is one terror cell caught, they may be one that is not caught. This is the more subtle threat. With the legislation passed to make access to the homes of terror suspects easier, ASIO and The Federal Police wasted no time with their greater powers to swoop on the suspects. The subtler repercussion of this raid is that any other existing terrorist cells may be induced to expedite their plans.

Of course at this stage there is no evidence that those taken in through the raids are guilty of planning a terror attack. That is yet to be seen. If they are guilty, it will only be a matter of time before we learn about the ugliness of their plans and possibly, the location of their attacks.

Before 7/7 in London, and 11/9 in New York intelligence had made raids on terror suspects in the respective cities. It was only a few weeks after the raids in London that 7/7 occurred. I believe that the risk of a terror attack to Australia is inevitable based on the fact that it is the only country that participated in the coalition of the willing and one of the few with military involvement remaining in Iraq. On top of this, we have a heavy middle eastern population of which may come from fundamental muslim backgrounds. In addition, we have already seen terrorism in our regional neighbourhood in Indonesia where non-muslim tourists were primary targets on two occasions. Let's not forget the most recent proclamation after 7/7 by a mysterious anglo-saxon muslim "Today London and France, tomorrow Los Angeles and Melbourne are next"

I think we have taken the proper precautions to strengthen the invisible boundaries against terrorism but I think no level of preparedness can prepare us for the trauma and horror if and when it happens.

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