AQ to British cells: Let the beheadings begin!

By Ed Morrissey, via Hot Air

Britain's latest success against radical Islamist terror may have heralded the beginning of a major offensive by al-Qaeda against the West. Cells in the UK have received instructions to start kidnapping victims, make tapes of them pleading for their lives, and behead them:

ISLAMIC terror cells in Britain have been instructed to carry out a series of kidnappings and beheadings of the kind allegedly planned by the nine terrorist suspects arrested in Birmingham last week.

The “strategic” assassination instruction was issued by Al-Qaeda’s leaders in Pakistan and Iraq to dozens of their followers in this country. It was uncovered by MI5 last autumn, senior security sources say.

As a result police are on standby for multiple attempts by terrorists to kidnap and then behead people across Britain. MI5 is conducting a counter-terrorism surveillance operation to prevent such an attack.

The alleged attempt to kidnap and behead a Muslim soldier or soldiers in Birmingham was just the first of a series of planned attacks, security sources say.

The revelation explains the recent deployment of a permanent SAS unit to London. The unit has been placed on 24-hour standby to respond to a terrorist attack in the capital. It would aim to carry out a hostage rescue mission within minutes of being alerted.

The British have not stood idly by while this message has filtered out to the terrorist cells with their nation. They have conducted special-ops drills since the fall, aiming to prepare for the Beslan scenario, in which terrorists gain control of a school or a public facility. The plots have marked similarities to the Toronto cell uncovered by Canadian authorities. That cell had planned to take over the Canadian Parliament and eventually behead PM Stephen Harper.

Radical Islamists have not conducted a major operation against a Coalition member since the London bombings in 2005. The kind of intelligence work demonstrated in this operation is one of the reasons why. The British may have gotten enough of a head start to foil these plots. Let's hope this turns out to be another AQ pipe(bomb) dream.