The View From North Central Idaho - Australia foils major attack

Monday, November 07, 2005

Australian authorities believe they have foiled a major terrorist attack, arresting 15 people on Tuesday during raids in the country's two biggest cities of Sydney and Melbourne.

The arrests come less than a week after Prime Minster John Howard said Australia received intelligence about a "terrorist threat".

Other sources include:

Assuming they arrested people about to carry out a terrorist attack, BRAVO!

The most interesting portion to me is the email I received a two weeks ago that I didn't report publicly at the time:

From: XXXXX@optusnet.com.au
Sent: Monday, October 24, 2005 1:02 AM
To: joeh@boomershoot.org
Subject: HELP!!!!

hello, i was just on ur website and me and a friend want a bomb big enough to blow up a car or anything along those lines of how big the thing is we want to blow up can u please help us? if u can can u please send me what i will need and how i go about making the bomb? thnx from grim.

I didn't reply. But I did respond:

From: Joe Huffman [mailto:joeh@boomershoot.org]
Sent: Monday, October 24, 2005 7:23 AM
To: 'webteam@mfbb.vic.gov.au'
Subject: I need contact info for the Melbourne Australia police.

I received the following email and need to forward it on to the appropriate people. The IP address of the sender indicates they are in Melbourne. Can you help?

Joe Huffman
Moscow, Idaho, USA
Voice: 208-301-4254

[snip]

On 10/24/05, osac@joehuffman.org <osac@joehuffman.org> wrote:
The following message was sent from http://www.ds-osac.org on 24 Oct 2005

I received the following email and need to forward it on to the
appropriate people. The IP address of the sender indicates they are
in Melbourne Australia. Can you help?

Joe Huffman
Moscow, Idaho
Email: osac@joehuffman.org
Voice: 208-301-4254

[snip]

I received replies:

From: OSAC Feedback
Sent: Monday, October 24, 2005 9:24 AM
To: XXXX@joehuffman.org
Subject: Re: I need contact info for the Melbourne Australia police.

Dear Mr. Huffman:

Thank you for your interest in the U.S. Department of State's Overseas Security Advisory Council (OSAC).

In response to your e-mail message, the information has been forwarded to the appropriate authorites.

Thank you for your concerns.
Sincerely,
Marsha Thurman
Overseas Security Advisory Council
Bureau of Diplomatic Security
U.S. Department of State

From: PANTAZI, Angelique
Sent: Monday, October 24, 2005 6:41 PM
To: Joe Huffman
Subject: RE: I need contact info for the Melbourne Australia police.

Hello Joe

Thank you for sending through this email. I have forwarded it to our Commander of Emergency Management.

Kind regards

Angie

Angie Pantazi
PR/Events Co-ordinator
Metropolitan Fire Brigade
456 Albert St
EAST MELBOURNE VIC 3002

Tel: (03) 9665 4394
Mob: 0400 919 778
Email: [deleted]
www.mfb.org.au