House Intel Chair: US ‘Knew Something Big Was Coming’ Before Algeria Siege

Militants Were Trying to Find a 'Western Target'

by Jason Ditz, January 22, 2013

The House Intelligence Committee chairman Rep. Mike Rogers (R – MI) says that the US had several reports that told them “something big was coming” before last week’s siege at an Algerian gas plant, which killed scores of hostages.

“Just like the Benghazi event, we had lots of threat streams,” Rep. Rogers insisted, saying that the indications were that militants wanted to attack a “western target” but that they hadn’t specifically known the Algerian site was to be hit.

Algerian officials have produced several distinct theories about the attack on the BP gas plant, saying it was orchestrated by Canadian attackers yesterday and today claiming it was linked to the Benghazi strike and was “the result of the Arab Spring.”

So many different reports have made it difficult to figure out what the truth behind the hostage crisis really was, but Rep. Rogers made clear, as so many other US officials have, that whatever the case the US will use it as justification to get more involved militarily in Northern Africa, insisting it is a “growing threat.”

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