"jihadi ebola" Topic

Jonah Goldberg at NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE:

f I were in charge of overseas contingency operations at the Islamic State or al-Qaeda, I would send as many suicide-bomber types back to America (and France and Britain) with a new weapon: Ebola. Airport scanners don't pick it up. The incubation period is long enough to get the human biological weapons past screeners without detection. I'd tell them: Take as many connections as you can on the flight home. Help people with their luggage whenever possible. Leave a mess in the plane bathroom and a paper trail of your travels that will foment panic when ultimately revealed.
And, if you do get stopped by security officials en route, so be it. There's lots of gloveless manhandling of suspected jihadis, which brings ample opportunities to infect interrogators, guards, FBI agents, etc. And every one of those infected Americans or Westerners furthers the cause.

But assuming you make it to Cleveland or Spokane or Washington, D.C., the only order of the day is: Have fun for as long as you can and maybe share your spit, sweat, and other stuff in as many creative ways as you can. See a show. Go to a water park and just hang out in the lazy river all day. Eat at a nice restaurant, leave a messy napkin. Don't bother to wash your hands — and never flush (or if you do, make sure the toilet overflows!). Why, we'll even give you all the fatwas and cash you need to hit the strip clubs and see a hooker or two. It's all for the greater good. And when, alas, you start to feel really, really sick and you are at your most infectious, it'd be great if you could blow yourself up at a mall, or at least pass out at a McDonald's or maybe in the middle of the F-train. If you opt for blowing yourself up, great. If not, try to tell the EMS team that you have something other than Ebola. The aim here is to keep the responders from treating you and the scene as a biohazard for as long as possible. And if you blow yourself up, don't worry too much about killing a lot of bystanders, just make sure it's really messy and there's a lot of splatter.

Now, I don't think this is a likely scenario, but I don't think it's an impossible one either. Regardless, that would be real terrorism, far more terrifying than blowing up a plane. Even one remotely successful effort along these lines would send America into a tailspin.

In a perverse way, America has been very lucky that our enemies have a childlike obsession with planes. There are lots of reasons why al-Qaeda likes blowing up aircraft. Planes inhabit a special place in the Western psyche. Stopping air traffic has huge economic ripple effects. Blowing up a plane demonstrates an ability to get past our best security efforts. Etc. On the flipside, blowing up planes is hard, as we've seen. But, if you send enough Ebola (or some other disease) through the friendly skies, that would shut down the airlines even more effectively than any bomb.

I hope and pray that our enemies remain uncreative. But it'd be foolish to plan on it.

paranoid fantasy IMO

"army of the twelve monkeys" screenplay remake ?
or is that an asymetrical "manathan project" return of payment he does envision there ?

I guess that Jonah Goldberg, if he is really the one writting that , needs to go hospital to get intensive post-traumatic mental health cares. ( best part in this delirium being : "I hope and pray that our enemies remain uncreative" )

"Paranoid fantasy," is pretty dismissive.

Hope the powers-that-be are not as dismissive. Like the OP, not saying it is likely, or anyone need to go all-out to prepare for this, but it is yet another idea.

Not paranoid at all, this sort of thing is being planned by ISIS or is it ISIL or IS!

Security services are picking up chatter about it and have apparently found laptop/s in Iraq with such plans on them!

And it is in America already:

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So do we WANT our security services to be paranoid? I think I do.

As the king said, "I know I am paranoid . . . but am I paranoid ENOUGH?"

To the first two respondents who dismissed it, perhaps you would undertake to explain WHY it is fantasy delirium? What part of Goldberg's scenario is impossible? Play the game, why don't you, instead of dismissing it.

I live in TX and if you check into the story about the guy who brought ebola here, it is one massive screw-up after another. The whole "security" plan relies on the person being truthful and not showing signs of infection. They finally put armed guards at their apt to enforce the quarantine (the mother sent the kids to school after they had been exposed). A hazmat company has been hired to clean the apt, but as of yesterday morning had no where to dispose of the materials. This is a potential national emergency, but the CDC's idea of a plan is to CYA and deny the issue.

doc mcb's story has some conspiracy theory in it, but it would work which is scary.

Look at it this way, the Germans didn't expect that old destroyer at St Nazaire to be full to the gunwales with TNT. You are not paranoid if they really are after you.

Look at it this way, the Germans didn't expect that old destroyer at St Nazaire to be full to the gunwales with TNT. You are not paranoid if they really are after you. I agree with Doc, If there are people in a room with a lot of coffee and imagination saying "what about….", I just hope they are OUR people.

Now wait a minute. There's a whole other agenda for using Ebola.

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Funny that the bottom end of Africa is most probably safer from this than the States and most western nations.
Its all to do with the immigration laws and th PC way the world now apples equality to all.

Well apparently it emerged in 1976?

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If you think someone is after you, you are either paranoid or right.

And as they used to tell me in another life……Just because your paranoid, doesn't mean their not after you lol.

The "chatter" being picked up is probably this "discussion"
! read a few articles about the Ebola Bomb theory while in the US this week including one in the otherwise usually rational New York Times.
Paranoid Fantasy was and remains my opinion. Simply put, if Islamic Fundamentalists should find themselves in the US with a bomb then I believe they have more than enough options for mayhem without the added complication of potentially crippling their operatives with a rapidly debilitating illness.
I really don't want to discuss it further (and probably should not have bothered even with this) as it will just encourage this silliness and deflects attention from what should be the real focus on how to help with a medical disaster in a dreadfully poor and blighted part of the world.

Hmmm… Now lets see… Is Jonah Goldberg an MD? or a specialist in infectious diseases? or epidemiology? No, he isn't. What he is, is another columnists with no background in the area he is writing about. There are so many errors his piece as to make it laughable.

For all the chicken littles and paranoids: If ebola was so virulent, the death toll would FAR higher than it is. And don't you think that somebody has already looked into weaponizing the thing (it has only been around since the '70s). And if you were going to pull that kind of attack, then there are far nasty bugs that are far easier to use (even a 1st year med student knows that).

Just more grossly uninformed BS.

So specify the errors, please; it will comfort me to know that such a scenario is impossible.

But you do not comfort me by saying that there are more virulent diseases out there that can be weaponized. I suppose an enemy state could manage that. But our main threat at present, or one of them, seems to be from people who live in caves. But who do understand the psychology of terror. Making use of a disease that is ready to hand, and about which many Americans are already quite fearful, seems to me to be plausible.

So I'd be glad of further instruction, if you can control your snark.

Perhaps the 'courage' to withstand the cries of 'racism' and impose quarantines on travelers from infected areas.

Eve better to set up facilities in the countries of origin and quarantine them before they get on airplanes full of other travelers.

As to fatality, I would tend to believe that if the percentage of the population infected gets high enough that the mortality rate will go up. Having sufficient providers to maintain care keeps people from dying from secondary effects.

It is easier to convince someone to blow themselves up than it is to suffer through ebola.

Sorry, Doc, I'm not rising to your bait. Believe the paranoid ravings or not; your choice. Do your own research. Me, I'm done with this subject.

Okay, coastal, but I don't understand why you bother to post about something you are not interested in discussing.

McWong73 nails it.

Doc, pause and spend all of 30 seconds thinking about this. It's patently stupid.

You have to infect your jihadist on a schedule, know they're infected before they show symptoms. Get them into the U.S. during that window. Then, the have 3 or 4 days when they become infectious but are still mobile to essentially throw up on people in public, unnoticed, in the hope of spreading the contagion, after which they will be so incapacitated they will be immobile themselves. You're doing all this in a Western country with good hygiene, trained medical staff, lots of bleach and latex gloves, a relatively healthy populace, etc. In other words in a place that is anathema to the conditions necessary to spread the virus with a population likely to have a considerably higher survival rate than those previously exposed when infected. Plus, rumors are flying among your compatriots that the West already has a vaccine and/or a cure because, once again, Westerners seem to survive once moved to the U.S. for treatment (forget experimental drugs, there seems to be really efficacy to supportive care).

No, the National Review is not to be taken seriously. This is an article written by a fool with an agenda for other fools susceptible to that agenda.

I hope you are correct. You are surely correct about the vast differences between western and African hygiene and medical care (although the recent Dallas experience isn't that encouraging -- but they will learn quickly).

But doesn't a simple bloodtest reveal the presence of the virus? Why wouldn't a terrorist organization in a place where ebola is already widespread, and from which airplanes fly to western countries, be able to get a suicidal volunteer whom they know to be infected onto a flight? If screening is as ineffective as it appears to have been?

If the goal is to create terror, it seems to me your optimistic view of western public health -- with which I do not disagree -- is largely irrelevant. It only takes a little bit of real damage to create the fear of much more.

it. Not worth getting DHed over since we all know which side of the argument gets locked up

A polite argument, in which no one calls names or attributes nefarious motives to opponents, does not, in my experience, result in DH.

A question of terminology:

The common element to both paranoia and panic is fear, but the resulting behavior is very different.

Excessive caution in security might be termed paranoia, though I'm not sure how one defines what is excessive in unknown circumstances. Would it have been paranoid to prohibit box cutters on flights, pre-9/11?

But it seems to me that panic is almost the opposite of paranoia. Panic is intrinsically irrational: "if you are in fear and doubt, run around and scream and shout!" Paranoia is surely a process of calculation.

If your definitions are imprecise, so must be your thinking.

I don't think the Africans we are worried about are the leonines.

You guys are very funny. Unless, of course, you work for Homeland Security.

taking a step back, there is a far more realistic scenario if the disease was smallpox. As a bio weapon, Ebola is more bark than bite.

We in the west are doing even greater damage to ourselves through obesityand diabetes anyway.

Me too. But you guys continue to miss the point, which is the psychology of terror. Perception trumps reality. Or bark trumps bite.

Because this began with reason and restraint?

"Eat at a nice restaurant, leave a messy napkin. Don't bother to wash your hands — and never flush (or if you do, make sure the toilet overflows!). Why, we'll even give you all the fatwas and cash you need to hit the strip clubs and see a hooker or two."

"And if you blow yourself up, don't worry too much about killing a lot of bystanders, just make sure it's really messy and there's a lot of splatter."

Was there even a minimal attempt to evaluate Ebola, its mode of transmission and the conditions under which it spreads or the success of jihadist in actually entering the United States or how much more complicated that becomes when they first need to be infected and pass through even the slight additional screening in place? Because none of that analysis is even hard. We actually know a lot about Ebola. We actually have tools to deal with it--isolating and quarantining those who come into contacted with a symptomatic victim is 100% effective. Even someone intentionally trying to spread the disease would barely be more effective than someone who was unaware that they were spreading it because those he came in contact with would be isolated during the incubation period and not allowed to infect anyone else. The CDC can and will stop every case that enters the United States before the 3rd generation of infection. Because, like it or not, that's a job Big Government can actually do well and is prepared to do.

Since this is obvious, well-known, empirically established what then is the agenda of the NRO using zombie apocalypse movies as the basis of their analysis? Why would you believe anyone would take your post serious or as a legitimate opening for and actual discussion? Do you seriously believe it's worthy?

I am LOL you guys… Are too much McWong that ISIS pic was way funny I can just picture it.
Now sober thoughts remember this disease is killing people and it needs to be eradicated. And that's it full stop the baddies would most likely get it al wrong and end up giving it to their mates anyway. Remember terrorism is in the end not a very bright strategy with a short shelf life although it is bloody stubborn as a disease.
Cheers all also +1 to Weasels comments too :)

My goodness.

I've known folks that one could not speak with about controversial matters, because they would become very agitated. Now it seems I know some more.

So Goldberg wants to cause panic, abetted by McBride? to what end? What would our motivation be in such an endeavor? I fear you are seeing threats where none exist!

And I certainly have complete confidence in the competence of our Federal agencies to secure our safety. I'm sure we'll all be as safe from any and all threats as the president is, behind the shield of the Secret Service.

Irrational fear and panic can be even more virulent than ebola. At least with ebola, the people suffering from it aren't trying to spread it around. People that suffer from irrational fear are constantly trying to pass it onto others.

Conservatives are often critical of Republicans.

We're off the front page now so I doubt anyone is reading this but us. So I see little point in continuing. But coastal, if you think YOU have no agenda, I suggest a little more self-reflection is indicated.

And therefore also through Carter.

On confidence:

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Of course, the headline writer may have an agenda himself. The results are

11% very worried (they must have all read the NATIONAL REVIEW piece!?!)

21% somewhat worried

37% not too worried

30% not at all worried.

I could just as legitimately summarize that at "70% say they worry about ebola."

Of course, if it is not a threat, any worry at all is unwarranted. But then nobody really knows.

I myself would join the37% who are not too worried. But I think the 30% who are not at all worried are perhaps lacking in historical imagination.

Considering the limited range of options, it looks more like 67% are really not worried and 32% haven't educated themselves on it and/or have poor sources of information.

3% of the population suffers from anxiety disorder.

This is a fun page:
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Where's ebola on this list?
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Of course, it's not a matter of if ebola gets to the US. It's a matter of how the US deals with it.
Unlike the unfortunate people in Africa, first world nations have methods of dealing with the disease.
Ebola has been known for 40 years and have yet to see any nightmare scenarios in the States.
We've been preparing for biological/chemical warfare and terrorism for at least 100 years.

None of this matters to those with irrational fear, but let's confront this fear because, as I've written, people that suffer from it will try to spread it.

"At least with ebola, the people suffering from it aren't trying to spread it around"

Unfortunately many of the sufferers and their relatives are denying the existence of Ebola (right up until it kills them!) and are not complying with movement and hygene restrictions (note, attempts to remove relatives from hospitals by force/mob rule.)

The general ignorance of the populace in the region is making things worse.

The UK is busy training/briefing a military field hospital to go to Sierra Leone to help. Hopefully more countries could do this too.

I think what we need is a 'fire break' to isolate this in the region, however unsavoury that may sound.

Yeah, part of the problem in Africa is the social response. People are afraid, they are uneducated about it, they don't trust the government and aid workers trying to help them, they are prone to superstition, they are governed by fear and panic.

Let's not follow that example elsewhere.