The world changes so quickly
A fascist nail-bombing campaign which had London gripped with fear for weeks was launched exactly two decades ago today at 5.25pm in Brixton’s busy market.
The following Saturday, an Asian, local resident spotted an unattended holdall on Brick Lane, east London. He took it to the part-time police station there. But it was closed, so he put it in the boot of his car, where it went off just moments later as he was dialling 999. There were 13 injuries, though there would almost certainly have been fatalities had it not been for the driver’s actions. Each device of the campaign contained up to 1,500 four to six-inch nails.
I can’t remember exactly how the mainstream media got wind of the ‘White Wolves’ angle but things kicked off for Eastern Eye after that. Reporters from all the national papers descended on our office. A series of senior Asian journalists also came just to chat to me. Apparently, there was a lot of interest ‘back home’, in the Indian subcontinent. And I got invited to the Private Eye Editors’ Lunch.
I saw the funny side but it was a toxic atmosphere on the surrounding, desolate streets. Unattended ‘hoax’ bags were being left all around, presumably to scare the Bangladeshi community. I came across a few myself. And I was in a Burger King branch in nearby Aldgate when I spotted an unattended holdall. I instructed the staff to call the police but a few moments later, an Asian guy emerged from the toilets and said it was his. Idiot.
On the Thursday, I attended a press conference at New Scotland Yard, where the Met unveiled a specially-enhanced CCTV image of a suspect. I took the opportunity to ask about the closure of Brick Lane police station. But a correspondent from a certain national paper next to me sneered: ‘We’re not here for polemics.’Police contain the scene after the Admiral Duncan blast
Up to then, there had been little clue that homosexuals would be targeted, which meant it had become a fascist bombing campaign, as opposed to simply racially-motivated. On the night of the Soho bombing, David Copeland, then 22, was arrested at his home, a rented room in Cove, Hampshire, after being recognised in the CCTV image by an associate. He was a Neo-Nazi militant, a former member of the BNP and then the National Socialist Movement, thought to be the political wing of Combat 18.
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