Al Qaeda is little more than a slightly more organised framework for communication and (sometimes) transfer of cash to various groups than has always existed. Terrorist groups have always collaborated - look only recently at IRA people running around Colombia. Al Qaeda is merely one of many frameworks which facilitates various levels of support for the relatively few groups who come up with plans which are actually workable. These groups are not necessarily anything directly to do with Al Qaeda - the 9/11 hijackers were only distantly linked to Osama Bin Laden and the hardcore of Al Qaeda; and even then the hardcore does little more than act as a figurehead for recruitment and to point people to the right place for training or contacts. And then, a lot of the "training camps" we’ve heard so much about in the past are not in fact Al Qaeda camps (those that did exist at one point in Afghanistan were quickly closed down by the Taliban) but camps in Pakistan, often ran by the Pakistani government & the ISI (the Secret Service, the appointment of whose chief has to be okayed by the CIA) and with the full knowledge of the USA.

Pakistan is, was, and probably always will be, the worlds leading sponsor of terrorism. Not Iran. Or Syria. Or Iraq. Or any other country the USA and puppet B.Liar want to point the finger of expediency at. Closely followed by Saudi Arabia. Both with the full knowledge and tacit blessing of the USA. If our leaders really wanted to "get tough" on terrorism, the first steps are real easy; distance yourself from the real bad guys and stop telling lies to your own people. Problem is, they don’t - I could go on about the reasons but people will only listen when it’s too late.

Once identified a person ceases to be such a danger - ‘cos one can monitor them.

Now one of the biggest mistakes that folk make is to assume that terrorists are stupid [because some of them will die for their cause] - however, it is quite feasible that the 200 (maybe) suspects are decoys to absorb the resources of the security forces - whilst the unknown dedicated and well trained few get on with the job of planning and executing their ‘terror’.

I have great fun scaring the sh*t out of friends explaining some of the easy but spectacular things that a terrorist could do - so lets get real - if there are 200 terrorists in the UK today then they are exceptionally unimaginative and lazy to have not yet acted. However if there are a ‘few’ real terrorists in the UK and they have been planing for several years then we can expect a real "newsworthy" event when they do get active.

None of this political crap addresses the need for enough security forces and police to detect the ‘few’.

Legislation is cheap - real ‘feet on the street’ costs money

What is the debate about? ……. cheap legislation,

nuff said.