"The Terrorism Files"
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"It'd have to be a, some sort of f......, sudden f......, because what it'll do, it'll come down on the thinking of the people, they'll think it's al Qaeda ... It's gotta be sudden and it's gotta be brutal."
Other suspect says: "Don't piss around with cities or doing the bush thing ... just go to Parliament."
Two suspects in bugged vehicle, August 17, 2007.This could be interpreted as suspect 2 suggesting that instead of acts of violence suspect 1 should become an MP.
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Why didn't they go in on the 12-13th? and catch them "red handed" and get real evidence of military training? rather than going in 2 days later and photographing women and children going about their rightful everyday lives.
That's an interesting question, and for evidential reasons, obviously that would have been better, but maybe they already had photos of an earlier camp.
However for everyone's safety, I can imagine why they did it two days later. You go into a training camp where people are practicing using firearms and possibly other weapons, then there's an increased risk of a firefight. One person out of the dozen decides to pick up their weapon when the police say "hands up" and who knows what's going to happen.
You go in at dawn two days later, weapons are not close to hand, the group is no longer together so they're isolated and less likely to react with violence. The police would have been minimising the risk for everyone, including themselves.
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Does it occur to you that as you pour scorn on police evidence you're reserving the right to just make shit up for yourself?
That's it! I was trying to say the same thing to someone the other day but couldn't distill it as nicely as that.
"Oi, you know that conversation we had last Friday, well forget what I said and replace with..."
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If a group of off-duty policemen were shown to have discussed killing people for practice (let alone having secretly acquired and trained with weapons) I would expect them at the very least to be thrown out of the force.
I have no idea what the National Front talk about on their get togethers, but police officers don't talk about assassinating Prime Ministers on or off duty.
Well - in the UK, a BBC team infiltrated a police training course. One officer was recorded saying that they would kill an Asian person "if I could get away with it". An officer was filmed dressing up in a Ku Klux Klan hood. Another said that murdered black teenager Stephen Lawrence "deserved to die".
I'd say that this is on a par with anything in the alleged transcripts (unless you believe that Prime Ministers have a stronger right to life than ordinary black kids). Several of the policeman exposed by the programme resigned, but to my knowledge none were prosecuted. (The police did at one stage arrest the journalist).
Now you could argue that that was the UK and our police are better than that. I somewhat doubt it. They do have the means to evade surveillance and prosecution very effectively through everything from knowledge of operational techniques to active frustration of investigations, so any such behaviour is highly unlikely to come to public notice.
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This could be interpreted as suspect 2 suggesting that instead of acts of violence suspect 1 should become an MP.
Most ambitious rationalisation so far! But keep trying, folks ...
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This could be interpreted as suspect 2 suggesting that instead of acts of violence suspect 1 should become an MP.
Here's a conversation I didn't have the other day:
Grant Robertson (future MP for Wgtn Central!): "It'd have to be a, some sort of f......, sudden f......, because what it'll do, it'll come down on the thinking of the people, they'll think it's al Qaeda ... It's gotta be sudden and it's gotta be brutal."
Kyle Matthews: "Don't piss around with cities or doing the bush thing ... just go to Parliament."Your interpretation Steve, is simply apologist, and a bit sad. Don't hurt your groins stretching that far to make it.
(sorry to pick you on Grant, just recent events...).
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Rich, this is still completely beside the point. It's not about what some group of hypothetical off-duty cops or NF supporters might say, but what was said here.
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Why didn't they go in on the 12-13th? and catch them "red handed" and get real evidence of military training?
Maybe, just maybe, because that's when the boys were allegedly playing with SMGs and live rounds in the bush and a shoot out would have been likely and people might have been killed.
Did you listen to the SG talking about this being wrapped up without a shot being fired? Of course, it might have been much clearer cut if we had body bags to count but I suspect the "police brutality" and "racism" cries would have been much louder and more justified. Then the question would have been, "why didn't they wait a couple of days and avoid the bloodshed?"...
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What a group of NF nutters or off-duty cops might or might not say is totally beside the point here.
The point is that mouthing off, however offensively, doesn't amount to terrorism.
These people clearly (assuming they aren't being taken out of context - it's not impossible that the conversations don't include an undercover cop egging them on) aren't very nice. That doesn't make them terrorists or "traitors".
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One person out of the dozen decides to pick up their weapon when the police say "hands up" and who knows what's going to happen.
Well. We wouldn't now be talking about whether they were terrorists or not. We would be talking about the heroic police pre-empting a terrorist action, or would we? I think, maybe, there are some in the police that would have preferred this scenario but I may be wrong, it has happened before, honest. (me being wrong that is)
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I guess I must be a terrorist, cause I've heard shit like this many time in person. I await a round of condemnation for the horrifying company I keep, and how it's my job to patronize people about what they're allowed to talk about in private.
The training and preparation for war these guys got up to sounds softcore in the extreme compared to being in the army. Which is probably why these guys are not in the army. They could not handle it. Becoming a killing machine is hard work, and usually involves total abdication of all rights to moral decision making.
Real paramilitary training does not involve intellectualizing your reasons for fighting. Far from it, you want people to think as little as possible about the context of what they are going to do. Only people who really have nothing to lose or have personally suffered shocking grievances can mix both of these incompatible activities. The more you intellectualize fighting the more stupid an idea it seems.
There never is and never will be any way to be sure whether people would have committed a crime. That is why conspiracy to commit a crime is so hard to prove. And it is why it should be so hard to prove. You can't start busting people on statistical probabilities that they will commit a crime. That's far more dangerous than letting the crimes happen.
Instead, you bust them for crimes they have actually committed. This doesn't mean waiting for the terrorist act itself. You can bust people for having an illegal firearm. Or possessing or making explosives. Or illegally discharging a firearm. Or stealing a car to get to the scene. Or carrying a concealed weapon. Or assault, if they actually threaten anyone. Or theft, or criminal damage etc etc etc.
Which is what has happened. It's disappointing to many, I'm sure, that these guys will only get fairly minor charges. To me it's excellent news, since this was a major police operation and that's all the shit they came up with. Which suggests to me that these 'terrorists' are mostly dickhead dreamers who should have joined the army when they were younger and found out firsthand what's fucked up about violence. They will receive punishment fitting to the crime and some of them will probably change their ways. Others will not and will forever be under police surveillance, rendering them almost useless as terrorists, basically defanging any chances they had of building their secret cell. Which IS stopping the crime before it happens. Waaay waaaay before, IMHO, but you can never know for sure.
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Actually, as long as we're going for ambitious rationalisations: knowing the temperament of certain people, perhaps they knew they were being monitored and delighted in saying outrageous things to tweak the listeners.
That's certainly what I'd say if I were them.
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Suppose for a moment that (some of) the 17 were aware that they were under surveillance.
Suppose also that they are intent on getting public attention on Tuhoe grievances.
What would be the most effective way of doing that?
a) actually carry out violent acts?
Counterproductive, hardens public opinion against your cause.b) carry out visible training exercises that stop short of terrorism under the law, in the hope of forcing a police (over)reaction that then gives you public sympathy and a media platform?
Certainly risky ...**WH:** those "training camps" must have come close to flipping the "planning" switches of the TSA
... but if the starting point is that you think you have nothing to lose, then hey, it might just work.
Of course, the plausibility of that interpretation depends on their perceived credibility (ability to plan, media awareness). If the public think they lack that, then the more likely analysis is
c) talk shit and play around with guns in the bush as displacement activity rather than doing anything productive.
Your call :-)
Graeme:
[from definition of treason) ﾒEvery one owing allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen in right of New Zealand commits treason who...ﾓ
-- of course, for (some, radical) Tuhoe, that is precisely the issue at stake: under what basis do they owe allegiance to the Queen? Hence a treason trial would provide an entirely suitable media platform.
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are they really any different from what would be heard if the Police bugged any one of the numerous gangs in NZ?
I'm sure the Police routinely bug some of the numerous gangs in NZ. And I bet that if they think they have enough evidence of criminal activities - such as planning a murder or firebombing - to press charges they break out the assault rifles and suit up in their ninja outfits to raid gang HQs too.
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Stephen: snap!
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Now you could argue that that was the UK and our police are better than that. I somewhat doubt it. They do have the means to evade surveillance and prosecution very effectively through everything from knowledge of operational techniques to active frustration of investigations, so any such behaviour is highly unlikely to come to public notice.
I repeat: Does it occur to you that as you pour scorn on police evidence you're reserving the right to just make shit up for yourself?
You don't really have an argument beyond saying that these people possibly were only as bad as a disgraced, racist ex-cop on the other side of the world who belonged to the National Front.
It is also worth noting that the five police officers forced out of the police in Britain had not been secretly obtaining and training with weapons, or discussing killing people for practice, or terrorist bombings. They'd have been facing something tougher than public disgrace if they had.
C'mon, Rich: can we hear you say that, assuming the surveillance and intercept evidence is not wholly fabricated, and that the police were telling the truth when they told a court that they also had photographic and video evidence of things like ambush training, that these people -- whether or not their actions warranted TSA prosecutions -- were bad?
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Sue,
Actually, as long as we're going for ambitious rationalisations: knowing the temperament of certain people, perhaps they knew they were being monitored and delighted in saying outrageous things to tweak the listeners.
that's what i figure with half of it , but well to me that's just being plain stupid.
how are the police to know when you are joking or not?
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One person out of the dozen decides to pick up their weapon when the police say "hands up" and who knows what's going to happen.
Jamie Lockett would be odds on for that role, he wants to die in a grand shootout with the Police.
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Does it occur to you that as you pour scorn on police evidence you're reserving the right to just make shit up for yourself?
...yeah and your point being ???
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Didn't the police originally say the launched the raids because of an imminent threat? I couldn't work out from that timeline what the imminent threat was.
According to the Solicitor-General:
The fundamental problem is that the legislation focuses upon an entity that carries out a terrorist act, and if individuals are actually developing towards ... carrying out a terrorist act, they aren't yet an entity that is carrying out a terrorist act, and so there is a tautology in the legislation which is extremely difficult to unravel.
However, according to Graeme's summary of what's involved in terrorism charges, section 13(1)(b) states that a terrorist entity is '(b) an entity that carries out, or participates in the carrying out of, 1 or more terrorist acts'. And of course a terrorist act is:
An act is a terrorist act if it is intended to cause:
[you need one of these]
a) death or serious injury (other than to the terrorist);
b) serious risk to health or safety;
c) serious interference to an infrastructure facility likely to endanger human life;
d) destruction or serious damage to property of great value or importance, or major economic loss, or major environmental damage if likely to cause a, b, or c;
e) the release of a disease bearing organism if likely to devastate the economy; orand if it is carried out for the purpose of advancing:
[and you need one of these]
a) an ideological cause;
b) a political cause; or
c) a religious cause.and if it is intended to:
[and you need one of these]
a) induce terror in a civilian population; or
b) unduly compel or to force a government or an international organisation to do or abstain from doing any act.So, according to the DomPost, we have people stating that they want to advance their political cause by causing death to induce terror in a civilian population.
According to section 13(2), you participate in a terrorist group if you do anything 'to enhance the ability of any entity (being an entity of the kind referred to in subsection (1)(a) or (b)) to carry out, or to participate in the carrying out of, 1 or more terrorist acts', which I would imagine includes training to do these things.
Why then weren't they charged under the TSA? The argument I suppose is that section 13(1)(b) hadn't been satisfied, so there was no entity to enhance. But isn't training to do something 'intended' to do the thing you're training for? Graeme, help! I'm drowning.
Oh look! It's all disappeared from Stuff! I wonder why that could be? Bet paper sales will be good today.
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Actually, as long as we're going for ambitious rationalisations: knowing the temperament of certain people, perhaps they knew they were being monitored and delighted in saying outrageous things to tweak the listeners.
In that case they'd also better be fully willing to front up and apologise to the people of Ruatoki who had to sit through a completely predictable call-out to the Armed Offenders Squad and are seemingly rather unhappy about it.
That would make them just stupidly irresponsible morons who've hurt their people and their cause in the public eye, rather than stupidly irresponsible morons who were planning to hurt people.
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Believe me, I agree with you Finn.
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"Didn't the police originally say the launched the raids because of an imminent threat?"
Sure TSA not being passed
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...yeah and your point being ???
Probably that it's utterly idiotic and hypocritical. Of course, if you don't mind being a hypocritical idiot that probably doesn't bother you.
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A S,
There seem to be an awful lot of misconceptions about what goes on at gun clubs about the country. Would it hurt to let reality intrude on the making shit up session to point out that as you would quite rightly expect, gun clubs and gun ranges are very, very serious places because a) you're dealing with dangerous things, and b) most firearms license holders are very well aware that their sport and hobby is seen as odd or sinister by many, who know nothing about what they do aside from what they hear from various bodies with agendas to push.
This awareness means they collectively take great pains not to do anything that would give anyone reason to further restrict their sport. Perhaps we should stop quoting John Minto on the "nothing different to what you'd hear at any gunclub" BS. Based on his statements to date, he doesn't strike me as the type to let fact or reality stand in the way of a gross generalisation.
Isn't it standard practise in their training to be shown and discuss how to kill people ? So maybe a few of them get together in the weekends get on the piss and get their boy toys out. Would you reall expect them to get shunted from the force ?
Perhaps it would be useful to note here that the Police do not have carte blanche to carry guns wherever they like. They may only draw firearms in the course of their duty, as their legal ability to use them relates only to police duty. Any police officer wishing to use firearms outside their course of duty must hold a firearms license just like anybody else.
So lets recap:
Nutbars threatening to kill people, with illegal guns, grenade launchers and improvised explosive devices - bad and illegal;
People who own firearms, who obey the law and get misrepresented frequently - possibly not to your taste, but legal and who appear to have a much greater respect for the law than the activist community by the looks of it; and
Police outside of duty cannot legally play with 'boytoys' unless they are licensed just like anyone else to do so. And if they were saying things that can only be described at its most charitable as moronic, then quite frankly I would be demanding they were sacked and charged AS WOULD the vast majority of NZers.
Lets try not to make too much shit up to pander to our pre-conceived state - bad, freedom fighter - good preferences shall we.
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