Pirate's Cove

During the Era Of Obama, we were told time and time again that any attack by hardcore Islamic extremists, also known as Islamists, were lone wolf attacks. Even though virtually all of them pledged allegiance to ISIS, we were told that there were no links, and, of course, the requisite “it has nothing to do with Islam!!!!!!!!!”

Well, now it’s the Era Of Trump, so….

Not ‘Lone Wolves’ After All: How ISIS Guides Plots by Remote Control

(Starts out with a long story about how one recruit was guided in India, providing support, materials, weapons, intelligence, and coaching)

As officials around the world have faced a confusing barrage of attacks dedicated to the Islamic State, cases like Mr. Yazdani’s offer troubling examples of what counterterrorism experts are calling enabled or remote-controlled attacks: violence conceived and guided by operatives in areas controlled by the Islamic State whose only connection to the would-be attacker is the internet.

In the most basic enabled attacks, Islamic State handlers acted as confidants and coaches, coaxing recruits to embrace violence. In the Hyderabad plot, among the most involved found so far, the terrorist group reached deep into a country with strict gun laws in order to arrange for pistols and ammunition to be left to be left in a bag swinging from the branches of a tree

For the most part, the operatives who are conceiving and guiding such attacks are doing so from behind a wall of anonymity. When the Hyderabad plotters were arrested last summer, they could not so much as confirm the nationality of their interlocutors inside the Islamic State, let alone describe what they looked like. Because the recruits are instructed to use encrypted messaging applications, the guiding role played by the terrorist group often remains obscured.

As a result, any remotely guided plots in Europe, Asia and the United States in recent years, including the attack on a community center in Garland, Tex., were initially labeled the work of “lone wolves,” with no operational ties to the Islamic State, and only later was direct communication with the group discovered.

Huh. How about that. If only we had had a strong, independent news media to investigate and tell us these things previously

While the trail of many of these plots led back to planners living in Syria, the very nature of the group’s method of remote plotting means there is little dependence on its maintaining a safe haven there or in Iraq. And visa restrictions and airport security mean little to attackers who strike where they live and no longer have to travel abroad for training.

Hooray, a swipe at Trump. Of course, if we don’t allow those who come from these areas in to the nation……

Close examination of both successful and unsuccessful plots carried out in the Islamic State’s name over the past three years indicates that such enabled attacks are making up a growing share of the operations of the group, which is also known as ISIS, ISIL or Daesh.

“They are virtual coaches who are providing guidance and encouragement throughout the process — from radicalization to recruitment into a specific plot,” said Nathaniel Barr, a terrorism analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, who along with Daveed Gartenstein-Ross wrote one of the first articles discussing the virtual plotters.

That article is from July of 2016. Weird how it wasn’t talked up when that other guy was in charge.

The article is long long long, detailing all the connections, relying on the intelligence, to show just how ISIS pulls the strings. That attack with an axe on a train in Germany? Yup. No so lone wolf. The murder of a priest in France? Yup. A planned attack that was foiled in France? Yup. Attacks both planned, foiled, and botched (like one blowing himself up prematurely), so many have direct communication with ISIS.

The JV team has grown so much.

Crossed at Right Wing News.