Super Soaraway No Bomb Plot

After at least 38 people, many of them apparently British nationals, were murdered on a beach in Tunisia yesterday, the last thing that we need is someone trying to cause panic. So, to no surprise, Rupe’s downmarket troops at the Sun have used their front page lead today to do just that. But, not for the first time with the red-tops, there is a suspicion that we are not seeing the full story - and much of what we are given doesn’t add up.

“I. S. PLOT TO BOMB UK TODAY … Lee Rigby parade blast plan smashed” screams the headline, and here, thanks to the Sun not secreting the article behind a paywall, we can see the first seriously misleading claim. What the Sun is saying is that someone they believe to be in Syria has told one of their hacks, posing as an IS follower, how to make a bomb using a pressure cooker. There is no IS plot.

It get worse: the IS follower is claimed to have told the Sun journalist “can u be ready for 27th of this month? Its armed forces day. There will be a parade in Woolwich. I’ll get you the details”. But readers have already been told “He ordered our team to target today’s parade in Merton, South West London - selected as closest to the Woolwich barracks where drummer Lee Rigby, 25, was murdered by Islamist extremists in 2013”.

Those with any knowledge of that part of London south of the river will know that it’s a bloody long hike from Merton - that’s the area just to the east of Wimbledon - to Woolwich. There is, in fact, an Armed Forces Day event in Woolwich (details HERE), so why would IS want to target a parade several miles away, if their contact had already said “There will be a parade in Woolwich”? And there’s more. Rather a lot more.

When the Sun took their information to the Metropolitan Police, the only reported response was “Scotland Yard urged the public to be ‘vigilant and alert’ at today’s events. A spokesman said: ‘We’d like to reassure the public that we constantly review security plans for public events. Our priority is safety’”. No congratulations on supposedly smashing this dastardly IS ‘plot’? And there is one other problem with this article.

While the Sun tells readers what the IS follower is saying to them, we do not see the full exchange of messages. Did the Sun hack claim to be an IS follower himself? What encouragement did he give to the man in Syria? Did the Sun man claim (for instance) that he was going to perform a suicide attack anyway? Who proposed making a pressure cooker bomb (the kind of device used at the Boston Marathon) to whom?

The Sun claims “He first approached our man on June 1”. It does not claim “He approached our man first”. The claim “The Sun had infiltrated extremists on social networks” equates to having a conversation with one of them. And, as for the IS man in Syria being “confident he was beyond the reach of security services”, er, he still is. Let’s have full disclosure of that correspondence, so we can make our own minds up.

The only “plot” is the Sun plotting to con its readers. So no change there, then.