Downing Street Says » Counter-Terrorism Strategy

» Monday, July 10, 2006

Counter-Terrorism Strategy

Asked how the government wanted people to respond to elevations of the threat level, the PMOS said that it would depend on the nature of the threat level. We had always said that we would advise the public of any specific threat and any response that was necessary to it. In terms of the public response he was not sure the government had been short of taking and advising the appropriate action. For example there was the action that had been taken at Heathrow, which had been criticised at the time, but it had turned out to be absolutely right. Asked why the public needed to know, the PMOS said that there were times when it was right and proper that the public understood why they were seeing more armed police around Whitehall and why there were more searches and a greater presence on the underground. It was important that people understood that this was not just out of the blue but part of a wider picture. It was also important that people understood the recent operations were not ad hoc but part of a strategic counter insurgency operation. It was important that people understood the context of why a police operation took place. We had made it clear that we believed the level of the current threat to be severe.

In response to the suggestion that a terrorist might postpone his attack because of an increase to the threat warning, the PMOS said that it did not operate like that. The bigger danger was that people did not think there was a serious threat and that they became complacent. The public needed to know when they should be vigilant and alert. Complacency was a risk if the government did not talk openly about the threat level. Asked why intelligence delivered threat assessments not arrests, the PMOS said that intelligence worldwide by its very nature was often fragments of information, not a complete picture.

No Comments »

No comments yet.

RSS feed for comments on this post.

Post a public comment

Name (required)
E-mail (required)
(You must give an email address, but it will not be displayed to the public.)
Website
(You may give your website, and it will be displayed to the public.)

Comments:

This is not a way of contacting the Prime Minister. If you would like to contact the Prime Minister, go to the 10 Downing Street official site.

Privacy note: Shortly after posting, your name and comment will be displayed on the site. This means that people searching for your name on the Internet will be able to find and read your comment.

Original PMOS briefings are © Crown Copyright. Crown Copyright material is reproduced with the permission of the Controller of HMSO and the Queen's Printer for Scotland. Click-use licence number C02W0004089. Material is reproduced from the original 10 Downing Street source, but may not be the most up-to-date version of the briefings, which might be revised at the original source. Users should check with the original source in case of revisions. Comments are © Copyright contributors. Everything else is © Copyright Downing Street Says.