Serves them right the fuckers. My theory at this point is that they had a bad batch of explosives which wouldn't go off and it wasn't them sucking at their job, but simply us being lucky. Perhaps someone sold them playdo as semtex or something like that ... hopefully they caught them and they'll rat out the network.
I thought it was a loose collection of cells with a central "corporate-style" hub that had very limited C+C over the outlying units, and mostly organised training.
Its curious about the bombs not going off, if the explosives were the same as the last bombing and they were acetone peroxide as reported, then its not hard to test that what you have got is really explosive (by taking a small quantity and dropping something on it for example). However as I understand it this is a relatively volatile compound which if not kept under ideal conditions will decay very quickly (albeit via another form which is even less stable) into something non-explosive.
If this was the same batch, in some ways the bombers were lucky that the bombs didn't go off when they picked them up.
I don't know how long this decay takes but its been pretty warm recently and if i were a bomber i wouldn't be keeping this stuff in my fridge with such a high risk of being raided.
Second alternative is that the TATP was only used in the trigger, and this was sound but whatever the secondary charge was was dud in some way, in that case i'm going with your play-doh argument as far as i understand it most secondary explosives are by definition pretty stable.
Third alternative was that the guys had run out of real explosives and thought that they might get some kind of effect by just blowing up the triggers.
Third alternative was that the guys had run out of real explosives and thought that they might get some kind of effect by just blowing up the triggers.
Now that is something I find really unlikely. Chances are that at least one of them was british-educated like last time and not some camel-herder and thus would know better than thinking that. Having said that, people doing this sort of stuff are clearly fucked up in the head, so anything's possible. But still... naaaaaaaaaaaaah. Noone's that stupid.
Likely possibility mentioned by some bomb squaddie who worked in N. Ireland for a while on news radio thingy, was that homemade C4 is relatively easy to make given a couple of petrol based chemicals and various things you can buy from a chemist or local supermarket but for any given detonator to detonate the stuff, you have to practice to get the mix right, which means having to blow things up in your back yard a few times before you've got a bomb that's worth anything. Since Britain doesn't have many places you can test out bombs if you're not the army or a legal arms manufacturer, it's possible the people involved just worked on a guess and got it wrong, which would create a bang from the detonator, loads of white powder and the smell of cordite, as was reported by witnesses present at the bus bombing.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2005-07-21 06:55 pm (UTC)And I was up all night and managed to sleep through it all.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-21 06:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-21 07:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-21 09:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-21 10:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-21 10:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-22 01:08 am (UTC)If this was the same batch, in some ways the bombers were lucky that the bombs didn't go off when they picked them up.
I don't know how long this decay takes but its been pretty warm recently and if i were a bomber i wouldn't be keeping this stuff in my fridge with such a high risk of being raided.
Second alternative is that the TATP was only used in the trigger, and this was sound but whatever the secondary charge was was dud in some way, in that case i'm going with your play-doh argument as far as i understand it most secondary explosives are by definition pretty stable.
Third alternative was that the guys had run out of real explosives and thought that they might get some kind of effect by just blowing up the triggers.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-22 08:03 am (UTC)Now that is something I find really unlikely. Chances are that at least one of them was british-educated like last time and not some camel-herder and thus would know better than thinking that. Having said that, people doing this sort of stuff are clearly fucked up in the head, so anything's possible. But still... naaaaaaaaaaaaah. Noone's that stupid.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-22 10:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-22 10:53 am (UTC)