Major UK Terror Plot Foiled, "Mass Murder On An Unimaginable Scale"

Reports TheStar.com:

Britain was plunged into a full-scale terror alert today after police foiled a plot to blow up passenger jets headed for the United States.

In a bid to prevent attacks, anti-terrorist police squads carried out simultaneous pre-dawn raids in both London and Birmingham and arrested at least 21 people.

Early news reports in the U.K. singled out Continental, American and United airlines as the targeted carriers for the waves of simultaneous attacks, 10 of which were allegedly planned in total.

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the terrorists planned to use liquid explosives disguised as beverages and other common products and detonators disguised as electronic devices.

In response, many world airports - including those in Canada - banned carry-on luggage and all liquids save baby formula.

Here's a picture of signs posted in many airports banning liquids.

This will no doubt make travel by air far more hellish as "...international passengers would still face delays and a ban on cabin baggage 'for the foreseeable future.'"

The deputy commissioner at Scotland Yard, Paul Stephenson, went even further, saying that the plans amounted to "mass murder on an unimaginable scale."

And to show that political correctness still reigns supreme:

It is believed that most of the terror suspects were British citizens. Police said they contacted Muslim community leaders in the early morning hours to warn them of the operation underway – a clear indication that the suspects are believed to be somehow linked to Al Qaeda.

Yeah, that seems like a great idea, considering these attacks were probably planned within the British Muslim community, the British Muslim community in which 1 in 4 believe the terror attacks of 7/7 were justified, by-the-way.

The story continues:

British authorities only began publishing the perceived risk of a terror threat last month – a year after London's transportation system was targeted by suicide bombers who killed 52 commuters - and yesterday raised the alert to critical [in the UK], the highest possible level. That effectively means that police consider the country to be under attack.

Reid said police believe they have arrested the "main" characters involved in the bomb plot, but did not rule out the possibility of accomplices still being at large .

While British officials declined to publicly identify the 21 suspects, French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy said in Paris that they "appear to be of Pakistani origin." He did not give a source for his description, but said French officials had been in close contact with British authorities.

The suspects were "homegrown," though it was not immediately clear if they were all British citizens , said a British police official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case. Police were working closely with the South Asian community, the official said.

The suicide bombing assault on London subway trains and a bus on July 7, 2005, was carried out by Muslim extremists who grew up in Britain.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair is on vacation in Barbados and reportedly phoned U.S. President George W. Bush overnight to tell him about the terror sweep that was underway.