IRAQ CRISIS: British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, ordered troops and tanks to Heathrow Airport yesterday in response to intelligence about a specific terrorist threat, writes Frank Millar, in London
The prime minister's personal authorisation for the deployment of some 500 troops and an extra 1,000 police dramatically underlined the seriousness with which the British security and intelligence services now treat the possibility of a major al-Qaeda attack on the capital.
Amid extraordinary scenes at Heathrow, security was also stepped up at possible terror targets across London and the south-east. The raising of the UK's overall state of alert coincided with renewed warnings by the CIA and FBI that the US could be the target for a chemical or radiological attack. First indications yesterday were that the deployment of troops to Heathrow - in numbers unequalled on home security duties for nine years - was a precautionary move related to the possibility that the end of the Muslim religious festival of Eid on Saturday, might, as Scotland Yard put it, "erroneously be used by al-Qaeda and associated networks to mount attacks".
Muslim groups criticised the police for suggesting a link between the religious festival and a possible terror attack. And Dr Zaki Badawi, the director of the Muslim College, reflected the immediate suspicion of many others that the deployment was "a ploy" to drum up support for war against Iraq.
However, usually reliable sources last night said the security service was extremely nervous about the possibility of a specific attempt to bring down a plane either landing or taking-off from Heathrow.
All car-parks along the A30 between Windsor and Staines were closed to prevent drivers stopping, while a heavy police presence was also reported in villages around Heathrow where officers were stopping drivers and checking vehicles. The prime minister's official spokesman said the action would not have been taken unless it was thought necessary and that it was "an ongoing operation in relation to a specific threat".
The threat was real and the response to it would "go up and down accordingly," he said. Declining to discuss details of the threat, the spokesman said: "In terms of these reports, I have seen them. I have got no comment to make. There are good operational and security reasons why we are not commenting in detail about this."
Asked if Mr Blair had discussed the deployment with the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir John Stevens, the spokesman confirmed the Commissioner had been party to the decision. While Sir John also refused to be drawn on the specifics of the threat, terrorism experts said the deployments pointed to fears of a possible missile attack on an aircraft similar to one carried out by al-Qaeda terrorists in Kenya last year. Mr Chris Yeates, an expert with the specialist journal Jane's Airport Review, said: "The key here is perimeter security. We can put all sorts of technology and security in airports but it doesn't take an Einstein to work out that you can park around the perimeter and launch something like a missile." The deployment of troops followed a tip-off from MI5 to Scotland Yard. It received specific intelligence which pointed to a missile attack on Heathrow and indicated it could come from a "portable" weapon. An attack involving high explosive is also a possibility.
"Al-Qaida has an interest in airports," said a source. Intelligence sources referred to the attacks in Mombasa last November when two missiles were fired at an Israeli aircraft carrying 270 passengers.