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| Norway could have prevented Breivik massacre: commission | ||
| 2012-08-14 | ||
Intelligence services could have learned about Breivik’s plans months before the attack made him the worst mass killer in Norway’s peacetime history, the commission’s report said. The government building he bombed should have been better protected and he should have been stopped before he gunned down dozens of victims, mostly teenagers, on an island as police struggled to find a working helicopter and a suitable boat. “All in all, July 22 revealed serious shortfalls in society’s emergency preparedness and ability to avert threats,” the commission said. “The challenges turned out to be ascribable to leadership and communication to a far greater extent than to the lack of response personnel."
Authorities had become aware of his suspicious activities months before when he purchased items that could be used to make bombs but intelligence service failures meant he was not put on a watch list, the commission said in the 482-page report. The government building should have been much better protected as it had been identified as a security risk years before. But government squabbling over minor details of the security measures needed meant little was done. Once the bombing took place, a witness’s description of Breivik, which was phoned into police, was not passed on to officers in the field for 20 minutes. Police should have automatically activated drills meant to guard against multiple attacks but weak leadership and disorganization led to delays, the report said. The military was not immediately informed, police could not find the helicopter, and its boat, intended to transport special forces to the island, could not carry the necessary load. “The authorities’ ability to protect the people on Utoeya island failed. A more rapid police operation was a realistic possibility. The perpetrator could have been stopped earlier on 22 July,” the commission said. The commission’s finding are a major embarrassment for security forces but the justice minister and security chief at the time have both resigned since the attack while many of the senior police personnel involved have also been replaced. Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said on Monday he took ultimate responsibility for the intelligence and police failures, after the publication of the report. “It took too long to apprehend the perpetrator and the police should have been on Utoeya earlier. This is something I regret,” he said. | ||
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #3 Simple. Nothing like that had ever happened in Norway. Makes it tough to get a 'crat to put some of his budget into preventing that which has never happened and therefore never will. You can't even get somebody to alternate pilot vacations, or keep an eye on the keys to the boat, or even where it is, or supposed to be, if they haven't been doing it already, to prevent that which has never happened and therefore never will. You can't even get a procedure changed for intel to call the cops or vice versa. Not even a little not taped to the phone. Never happened, not gonna happen, what's the big dea.? |
| Posted by: Richard Aubrey 2012-08-14 14:39 |
| #2 Always some asshole who pope up and says "You could have stopped this". OK asshole, if it COULD be stopped, WHY WASN'T IT. |
| Posted by: Redneck Jim 2012-08-14 11:36 |
| #1 Intelligence services could have learned about BreivikÂ’s plans months before the attack Here comes "big brother". |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2012-08-14 01:40 |