Extracted from:
http://news.asiaone.com/News/AsiaOne...709-17619.html
LONDON (AP) -- Britain's new security chief has warned that the country's battle against terrorism could take up to 15 years, while Prime Minister Gordon Brown says he wants an expanded European system to share information on potential threats.
"I want the system that we are trying to expand between Europe -- a system whereby we know who are potential terrorist suspects," Brown told Sky News television Sunday. "It is very important that we tighten this up and it is something we are looking at as a matter of urgency."
New questions arose over British security measures after authorities acknowledged no armed police were on duty at Glasgow airport June 30 when two men crashed a Jeep Cherokee laden with gas cylinders and gasoline into the main terminal of Scotland's busiest airport.
"Armed officers are only deployed to the airport when the national threat level requires it," a Strathclyde police spokesman said on condition of anonymity in line with force policy.
Britain's terrorism threat level was "severe" at the time of the attack -- the second-highest level which means an attack is highly likely -- and it remains at that level.
It is up to individual police forces to decide how to deal with the threat level, a Home Office spokeswoman said on condition of anonymity in line with department policy.
Most police throughout Britain do not carry firearms out of the philosophy that arming police makes criminals feel justified in carrying weapons. However, all forces have specially-trained firearms teams ready for rapid deployment.
The two men arrested following the Glasgow attack were overpowered by an unarmed officer, an off-duty policeman and members of the public. Armed police have been on duty at the airport since the attack.
Adm. Sir Alan West, the former navy chief who was recently named Brown's security minister, said the level of the threat Britain faced was unprecedented and a new approach was critical.
One of those approaches included challenges to the British psyche, he said.
"Britishness does not normally involve snitching or talking about someone," he was quoted as saying in an interview with The Sunday Telegraph. "I'm afraid, in this situation, anyone who's got any information should say something because the people we are talking about are trying to destroy our entire way of life."
He said prevention and dealing with the radicalization of young Muslims, was his top priority.
"This is not a quick thing," he said. "I believe it will take 10 to 15 years. But I think it can be done as long as we as a nation apply ourselves to it and it's done across the board."
West also said it was wrong to talk of "the Muslim community" as if they were separate from the rest of the population. He said Muslims see themselves as British and that terrorists have hurt them as well.
"I think they have severely damaged one of the world's great religions -- the one they purport to support," West said.
Bilal Abdullah, a 27-year-old doctor born in Britain and raised in Iraq, appeared in court Saturday as the first suspect to face charges over a plot to bomb London's entertainment district and Glasgow's main airport.
Seven other people are in custody in connection with the attacks, but have not been charged -- six in Britain and one in Australia. Most of the suspects worked for Britain's health service and come from countries in the Middle East and India.
Two cars packed with gas cylinders and nails were discovered June 29 in the busy heart of London's West End -- one outside a crowded nightclub, the other near Trafalgar Square. The next day, a Jeep Cherokee smashed in flames into the security barriers at Glasgow airport.
Prosecutors suspect Abdullah and Kafeel Ahmed, believed to be the driver of the Jeep, carried out the attempted bombings in London before returning to Scotland -- where Abdullah worked at a Glasgow-area hospital -- and attacking the airport.
Ahmed is hospitalized in critical condition in Scotland with severe burns from the attack on the airport.
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Well to me, the fight against terrorism is always ongoing, and 15 yrs may be just a very conservative figure
It will take 15 years to fight Islamic terrorism 
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