No Boom in London--This Time (UPDATED)

Terrorists try it again in the UK.

A car bomb left in London's West End would have caused "significant injury or loss of life" if it had not been defused by police.

The explosive device, consisting of gas cylinders and nails, was discovered at 2am outside a packed nightclub in The Haymarket, near Piccadilly Circus.

Police were alerted to a suspicious silver Mercedes car in the heart of theatreland by ambulance crew who noticed smoke inside it.

Scotland Yard's deputy assistant commissioner Peter Clarke said officers inspecting the car found significant quantities of petrol, a number of gas cylinders and containers holding nails inside.

More details and analysis:

This was most probably an attempted suicide car bombing. In a highly surveilled London area, there is more risk than reward for the larger group and cells in ‘other -than-martyrdom’ operations. The driver was not simply parking the car for the bomb to later detonate. He would have driven with more care to escape relatively unnoticed. The bomb, described in reports as “huge,” did not detonate when the driver expected outside the Tiger, Tiger night club. Instead, the detonator smoldered. Having already attracted the attention of multiple people on the street, the bomber needed to escape before the contents of his car were discovered in his presence. He could have driven the car off, but if the bomb was going to eventually perhaps detonate, it would then not be at its target. It is one thing to be in control of a suicide mission (psychologically speaking) and quite another to drive around without control or knowledge of when one’s bomb will explode. Furthermore, if smoke was filling the car, visually obscuring and perhaps even noxious, driving might have been determined difficult at best. So, the bomber fled and left the device to hopefully eventually detonate at its intended target, even if off schedule.

Fortunately, specialist officers were able to make the device safe preventing any damage or injury to people or property nearby.

I heard about this very early this morning before going to bed (yes, I’m a night owl). A news speculator suggested that the failed attack might have been meant to coincide with the British change in government. (The good Tony Blair has retired and has been succeeded by his fellow Labour Party member Gordon Brown.) If so--as the newsie surmised--Islamist tacticians (snort) could have been seeking a similar political outcome as that of the 2004 Madrid bombing, which resulted in the defeat of Spanish Prime Minister José María Aznar by José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero—who, upon his victory, promptly pulled Spanish troops out of Iraq.

But, somehow, I don’t think that most terrorists are that politically sophisticated in their thinking. Oh, some may say that they might have been seeking to “persuade” Prime Minister Brown to pull the UK out of its alliance with the Coalition of the Willing in Iraq, but I’m betting that they really couldn’t care less what most of the West does. Like their Father, they just want to steal, kill and destroy--whether a targeted population consists of Muslims or not, as has been demonstrated in Gaza recently.

And, before you ask, yes, I think that the driver is an Islamist. If that turns out to not be the case, look for a retraction.

(Thanks to Instapundit)

UPDATE: A second car containing explosive materials found:

A vehicle parked in an underground car park near Hyde Park has been found to contain a device.

An area stretching from Marble Arch to Hyde Park corner had been closed off since this afternoon and nearby buildings evacuated while officers examined the car.

The discovery of the device in the car park off Park Lane follows the discovery of a bomb which failed to detonate nearby in the West End early today

The second car was in the vehicle pound used by the local council to store those towed away for illegal parking.

According to CNN, the second car had originally been parked near Trafalgar Square.

But police refused to comment on reports that it had been towed there by parking officials who were unaware of its deadly contents.

An attempt at simultaneous explosions? An attempt on at least one symbolic target? Sounds familiar.