Skepticism About Alleged Gas Attack Plot on NYC's Subway System

I haven't written anything yet about the allegations in Ron Suskind's new book, The One Percent Doctrine, which apparently outlines an al Qaeda plot to use cyanide gas in the NYC subway because I wasn't quite sure what to make of it. Not that I doubt Suskind's integrity, I just wasn't sure how much credibility such a claim might have. Ever the skeptic.

Time magazine offers an excerpt from the book online.

According to clammyc at Daily Kos, former counterrorism chief Richard Clarke has his doubts as well which he expressed on ABC this morning:

"There's reason to be skeptical," said ABC News consultant Richard Clarke, who is the former chief of White House counterterrorism. "Just because something is labeled in an intelligence report does not mean every word it is true."

He says the information describing the plot would have been just one of the hundreds of threats that would have been collected in 2003.

Furthermore, the specificity of the report is suspect, he said.

"Whenever you get reports that are this specific, they are usually made up," he said.
ABC link

So, who really knows the truth of the situation?

Regardless, it's another one of those infamous 'wake up calls' that the public gets every now and then. The question then is whether it will be as ignored, as some of the 9/11 lessons were, by an administration that still refuses to properly protect Americans.