Remember the terror alert about possible attacks on the NY subway system ? Remember the details about 19 men already in the city making contact with terror cells previously put in place ? The link to Iraq ? The stories about pharmacists and biological attacks ? Well, the whole thing was apparently a hoax
Information that led to heightened security for the New York City transit system was a hoax, government sources said Tuesday.
The sources said an informant in Iraq who provided the tip had told investigators there was a terrorist plot involving New York’s subway system. That informant admitted he gave false information, the sources said.
He also admitted to fabricating a story about another individual who had made his way into the United States to help lay the ground for the alleged bomb plot.
The truth, of course, is that there were doubts about the intelligence that New York City relied on in raising the terror level last week to begin with, but the Mayor of New York and NYPD choose to act in the way they did. Why ?
Bloomberg, who is seeking a second term in mayoral elections next month, told reporters on Monday that he had no regrets about his decision to inform the public and ramp up security.
“We’re going to take every single threat that has any chance of being credible seriously and do exactly what we did,” he said.
Its sad to think that election pressures motivated Bloomberg’s decision to send thousands of police into the subway system and subject New Yorkers to random bag checks, but its not inconceivable that this had at least something to do with the way city officials reacted.
The broader question is this: How good can our intelligence be when we can’t really tell the difference between a legitimate threat and a hoax ?
