Messing With NYC Transit

A law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the threat was "specific to place, time and method," which was a bombing. The official said the information resulted from the arrest of al-Qaida operatives in Iraq.

But in Washington, Homeland Security Department spokesman Russ Knocke said "the intelligence community has concluded this information to be of doubtful credibility. We shared this information early on with state and local authorities in New York." Knocke did not elaborate.

A counterterror official, who was briefed about the threat by Homeland Security authorities, said the intelligence was considered doubtful because it did not reflect "on-the-ground, detailed" information. Rather, the official, who also insisted on anonymity, said the intelligence was similar to "what can be found on the Internet and a map of New York City."

The law enforcement official in New York said that city officials had known about the threat at least since Monday, but held the information until two or three al-Qaida operatives were arrested in Iraq within the past 24 hours. Once the arrests were made, officials felt they could go public, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation was ongoing.

Authorities are concerned, the official said, that there might be al-Qaida operatives in New York City connected to the plot. They have no hard evidence of that, but are investigating.

Depending on who you hear this information from, it is either specific as to time, place, and manner, or it isn't. Later reports might be downplaying the find, to minimize details relating to how our intel services came upon the original information.

Confederate Yankee notes that the terrorists were apprehended by a joint FBI-CIA group (he's also liveblogging it. That must surely rankle Jamie Gorelick, who sought to keep that kind of fieldwork out of the realm of possibility.

My personal observation of the subway and transit systems in general is that even if you put cops on every single bus and railcar, something could still happen. However, we might get the bead on the terrorists before they're ready, and that gives our cops a chance to save lives. NJ Transit cops and special weapons teams have been more prevalent in Hoboken's terminal over the past week, but that could be a routine show of force.

NYC has been on a higher level of alert since 9/11 than the rest of the country. It has never gotten lower than orange since 9/11.

Ace notes that the deranged left is questioning the timing of the alert. Something about Karl Rove, Tom DeLay, itchy trigger fingers, and evil plots afoot. The Left is always with their negative waves.

UPDATE:
GOP and the City has more. They've even posted an email that smacks of the usual hoax/urban legend kind of deal - just enough information to be credible, but not so much that one really has anything to go on.

The fact is that the NYC metro area is chock full of targets. It's the target rich environment of target rich environments. Every subway stop in the city is a potential target. The stations mentioned are high profile, but certainly not the only ones - they're the kind of thing that anyone with a subway map could discern.

However, the fact that they're talking about 19 terrorists (Where have we heard that number before? Oh yes, on 9/11 when 19 hijackers took over four planes and murdered nearly 3,000 of my fellow Americans in the blink of an eye.) and that they're going to use briefcases. That's kind of specific, don't you think?

And that's why I've passed this information on.

Technorati: NYC, terror threat, subway.