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| Trial bares world of amateur US |
| Trial bares world of amateur US terrorists
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| UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
, 19-April-2012
3:46:41 AM |
| A taxi driver, doorman and former coffee cart vendor, the three typical Americans went to school, prayed and played basketball together. Then they tried to go to war together - against America.
A trial underway in New York against a man accused in a 2009 suicide bomb attempt is exploring what the government calls one of the most serious terrorist plots on US soil since September 11, 2001.
But the case against Adis Medunjanin, 28, has also bared the wider world of homegrown US terrorism, a world of fanatical, bumbling Al Qaeda wannabes, and a law enforcement machine so tight that those jihad dreams rarely get put into action.
Ninety six attempted terrorist plots have been hatched on US soil since 9/11, experts say. Of these, only 11 can "generously" be classified as feasible, said Brian Jenkins, at the Rand Corporation.
"American jihadists bark, brag, sniff at edges, but are skittish and more closely resemble stray dogs than lone wolves," Mr Jenkins said.
The unprofessionalism, however, is also what makes them so hard to identify, resulting in a "more diffused threat," Mr Jenkins added.
Medunjanin and his two Flushing High School friends fitted that description perfectly.
Almost stereotypical working class New Yorkers, they came from immigrant families, were sports mad, strived to get an education, and worked classic entry-level jobs.
Medunjanin, now facing life in prison if convicted on all counts, came to New York as a child when his Muslim family fled Bosnia during the war against the Serbs in the early 1990s. Pudgy, but sporty, intelligent and said to possess natural leadership skills, he was on a good trajectory.
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