Were the London Oil Depot Explosions a Terror Attack?

This entry will be updated as new evidence is uncovered.

'Massive' Explosions Strike Oil Depot Near London Airport

Although it is certainly possible that today's London explosions were accidental, as police are already claiming, it is not likely. And ludicrous statements to that effect are already being made, such as:

The cause of the explosion is not yet known but no third party - a plane or a terrorist - was involved.''

How exactly is it known that "no third party" was involved if the cause is a mystery and if if the blasts devastated the entire area?

Authorities have "cried sheep" so many times, they have lost their credibility. Here is a story that details many such examples.

While there is no confirmed evidence to indicate terror, logic indicates that terror should be the prime suspect in this case. It certainly should not be ruled out at this point.

Although they have been downplayed by the media, there have been many unsuccessful Islamist plans uncovered and plots foiled seeking to accomplish precisely what occured today--set off a chain reaction of massive explosions at oil installations. This would serve a number of important purposes:

1. Create a massive terror attack by leveraging preexisting infrastructure as terror weapons. An obvious example of this was using jets and towers on 9/11.

2. Implement the al-Qaeda strategy of inflicting economic wounds as articulated by bin Laden.

3. Drive up the price of oil to increase Jihad funding while causing further economic damage. The funding of the Global Jihad is primarily from Middle Eastern oil producers, particularly Saudi Arabia. Hurricane Katrina demonstrated the short-term price effects of a local oil infrastructure collapse, given the precariousness position American leftists have succeeded in placing the energy supply. Environmentalists have served as de facto terror allies by derailing nearly many energy infrastructure projects that would make Western nations less vulnerable to Middle Eastern oil dependency. Examples: blocking new oil refineries, electric power plants, wind farms, nuclear plants and oil drilling sites.

4. Cause death.

It is facile to present accident as a likely possibility. Laypeople do not understand how business quality initiatives like Six Sigma and ISO 9000 have been used to ameliorate large numbers of predictable risks at sites like these.

Islamists have operated openly in London and English authorities have been famously lax in cracking down.

Approximately half of Muslims surveyed in England have expressed willingness to be suicide bombers. Of course, they have said this regarding Israel because anti-Semitism is politically correct throughout the Muslim world, but there is ample evidence that anti-Semitism is a fungible disfunction.

Three former terrorists spoke out at Princeton this week, credibly charging that "extreme Islam" is actually mainstream. One of them, born and raised in Dearborn Michigan who later became a PLO terrorist, claimed that there is no substantive difference between Muslim attitudes in Michigan and in the West Bank. This opinion is understandably suppressed given the unprecedented death threat that dissidents such as these face.

Not only has there been a pattern of wrongly initially downplaying terror as a possible cause, this pattern has held true with foiled attacks, questionable attacks and actual attacks as well.

The most newsworthy foiled attack, for example, is nearly unknown. This was a chemical weapons attack that Jordanian officials estimated would have killed 20,000 if successful. The chemicals originated in Syria, the leading suspect on the whereabouts of Saddam's missing WMD stockpiles.

The evidence of terror behind the Iraq stampede was similarly ignored, making the apparently second-deadliest terror attack in history virtually unknown.

Likewise, the overwhelming evidence of Islamism and Muslim separatism fueling the French Intifada was ludicrously denied by most of the mainstream media.

Update: I was right to call the initial, widely reported police claims ruling out terrorism "ludicrous" because it may be impossible to determine the cause given that "the blasts devastated the entire area." According to the lead investigator, "the flames may have destroyed all clues to the cause." Additionally, anti-terrorist police are now investigating.

Update 2 (Dec. 15) The oil depot blast "occurred four days after an al-Qaeda videotape on the Internet called for attacks on facilities carrying oil."