The latest ‘bomb plot’ will inevitably be used to justify greater Western intervention around the world – most notably in Yemen, but also on-going intervention in Afghanistan and Pakistan. It will also be used to justify powers held by governments and budgets by security agencies in the West.

We may never truly know the origin of this plot: whether it is some act of disgruntled resistance against murderous policies by the US and its allies who use the rest of the world as their chessboard; or whether it is a fabricated episode to justify more hostile policies.

The global western media has given immense coverage to the discovery of these two bombs on airlines in the UK and Dubai reporting that they allegedly originated in Yemen.

The enormous speculation about the origins of these explosives contrasts with the lack of critical questioning of the security services and governments who brief the media. Instead, it is all reported as fact.

Yet it is well known that these same government’s and their security services – CIA, MI5 and others – manufactured a false case against Iraq; and people in Iraq and Pakistan believe that these western governments have been complicit in terror attacks on civilians with the intention of sowing discord, raising threat levels and furthering their own agendas.

What is clear are two matters:

1. The public in the West are becoming increasingly wary of the perennial terror threat. This was most evident when the British Airways chairman Martin Broughton criticised the United States for ratcheting up security regulations with “redundant” checks.

2. Yemen is a crucial and strategic region historically strongly under British influence, with the United States trying to gain more influence in recent years. It borders Saudia Arabia, a notoriously vulnerable region with the world’s largest oil supply. It also borders the Gulf of Aden through which 20,000 ships, 7% of the world’s oil and millions of tons of grains, commodities and other goods pass annually.

People should critically examine what is happening, rather than blindly accepting what they are told by media, governments and security agencies. The perpetual feeling of threat is the oldest way for autocratic governments to maintain their powers. Democratic ones are just better at the deception.