The Security Conundrum.

I see that a number of western embassies are to close next week because US intelligence services say they’ve intercepted messages from Al Qaeda threatening an attack.

There’s a problem here. Intelligence services are, by the very nature of what they do, untrustworthy. They play mind games, and one of their tools is misinformation. So how can anyone be sure that this isn’t just a trick to bolster their credibility in the wake of the rows over their covert spying on both the American people and America’s European allies?

It’s a ploy in which the political machine would have to be complicit, of course. But then, the political machine is also untrustworthy. It’s one of the ironies of a nominally democratic system. Democratic governments have to do their dirty work covertly, where a dictator or totalitarian government would just do it. And nobody believes, surely, that there isn’t dirty work being done.

So maybe they have intercepted such messages, and maybe the precautionary measure really is designed to save lives. But how can you know? You can’t.