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Intelligence and Security Committee (Annual Report)

I saw that coming. I was explaining all the elements that make the terrorist’s unfettered intention of mass destruction more difficult too cope with than ever before. One essential element of threat is intention. To match that unfettered destructive intent, modern science has, tragically, also offered a potential for almost unlimited destructive capability, the other essential element of threat. The means of mass destruction have been around for quite a while, but when they are linked with unfettered intention, unconstrained by conventional legality and morality, and with unlimited destructive capacity, we begin to see the size of the new threat that we face. We do not face that threat alone, of course: attacks in places as far apart as Bali, New York, Egypt, east Africa, Madrid and—only this afternoon—Mumbai show, if any illustration is needed, that no community or city is immune. The director general of the Security Service, speaking to her counterparts in the Netherlands last year, pointed out that, as the threat is global, protecting our friends is also a way of protecting ourselves. That is, I think, the point made by the hon. Member for Bosworth (David Tredinnick). We must, and do, work closely with other countries, and with their intelligence and law enforcement agencies, in combating the terrorist threat. It is essential for us to think globally as well as acting locally. The plain fact is that a snippet of intelligence, whether it is gathered in Kirkuk or Kabul, can lead directly to action here on our streets to prevent an atrocity. That is the nature and extent of global terrorism, and that is the global response that we need.