Here's a rum thing. According to a piece in yesterday's Figaro, the Direction Centrale des Renseignments Generaux, or French special branch, were aware of a significant al-Qaeda plot threat shortly before 7 July.
Le Figaro publishes extracts from a classified DCRG report, written at the end of June, focusing on the threat from jihadist elements in France's Pakistani community.
Britain remains threatened by plots decided at the highest level of al-Qaeda ... They will be put into action by operatives drawing on jihadist sympathies at the heart of the substantial Pakistani community in the UK.
As the Guardian points out, our own Joint Terrorist Analysis Centre had concluded around the same time that
there is not a group with the current intent and the capability to attack the UK.
It sounds a bit as if we could learn a thing or two about spying from our Gallic cousins. For all the orange boiler suit talk that's been flying around post-7/7 it remains the case that only good intelligence would have prevented the London terror attacks. But then politicians love the sound of stable doors slamming shut, regardless of how many horses have bolted.
What's that you say? The Saudis also knew about an imminent terror threat to the UK?
Where's 007 when you need him? Oh, of course, I forgot. He's a macho superhero fantasy we indulge in to ease our wounded pride at having diminished power in the world.
