The Cheerleaders

I ran the following story here on the IBA some time back, and we have an update. The Cheerleaders (also known as the Fighting Cocks) have a MySpace page:

The Fighting Cocks

And they have a fan group on FaceBook:

Cheerleadered!

Here's what they did that brought them to our attention in the first place:

A few months ago, I got an email from a person named Charlie who said, "Last night, my group took out IslamBase, the main UK jihadist website. So rah for us!"

I looked up IslamBase, and there were lots of results for the search on Google, and the two main ones were out.

I just checked again, and they're still off line:

http://islambase.co.uk is not even there.

http://www.muslimtents.com/islambase says their site is "under construction."

I asked Charlie how they did it. He said,

It's a group of us — we're called P2OG, or by the nickname The Cheerleaders. Basically we track and disrupt violent extremists, mostly Islamic extremists, based in the UK.

Islambase is the main website and forum for UK jihadis.

Using various methods we've identified who the top people are on Islambase and by warning them that we're going to put their names on posters all over London, we got the site disrupted. If it goes up again, we'll post their names on the site itself. And so it goes on!

Any info worth sending on, we send on to relevant agencies, i.e. SO15 (the Counter-Terrorist Command in London) or the Home Office.

I looked up P2OG and found out it stood for "Proactive Preemptive Operations Group." The Defense Science Board (DSB) conducted a 2002 "DSB Summer Study on Special Operations and Joint Forces in Support of Countering Terrorism." They DSB recommend the creation of a super-Intelligence Support Activity, an organization it dubbed the Proactive, Preemptive Operations Group (P2OG), to bring together CIA and military covert action, information warfare, intelligence and cover and deception. For example, the Pentagon and CIA would work together to increase human intelligence, forward/operational presence and to deploy new clandestine technical capabilities.

I asked Charlie if that's what P2OG stands for, and if so, is that who The Cheerleaders are. He said:

It does indeed stand for that. When we realized that the DSB study wouldn't lead to the Pentagon setting up the original unit, we took the name. That way, if any jihadis search for us, they just get a load of conspiracy theories!

In real life, we're me, some ex-army intel people, some hackers, and a bunch of girls with funny-colored hair!

However, the theory behind the original plan still stands — we get in there and proactively stir things up.

Violent jihad is spreading around the world because Jihadis are effectively using the internet. The Cheerleaders are making their task much more difficult, and doubtless saving the lives of innumerable non-Muslims. They are heroes.