RAF Fairford incident: five men bailed after no explosives found in vans
Five men arrested near RAF Fairford were released on bail after police found no explosives — only petrol — in their vehicles. The investigation continues.
RAF Fairford: from 'suspected bomb plot' to police bail, with questions still unanswered
Five men arrested in the early hours of Sunday near RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire have been released on police bail after counter-terrorism detectives confirmed no explosives were found in their three vans — only petrol, described as an "accelerant", according to bbc.com.
The arrests followed a large-scale police operation that began before sunrise in the village of Whelford, which sits adjacent to the US Air Force-used base. Residents were woken and told to evacuate. One villager photographed five men sitting on the ground, stripped to the waist, handcuffed and under armed guard. They were initially arrested for offences under the Explosives Act.
Political reaction from Washington
US President Donald Trump stated that the men had been trying to do "big damage" to the base, adding: "We had them under view for a long time, and we got them." US Secretary of State Marco Rubio described the situation as "very serious", saying it "clearly involved the hands of a foreign actor".
The head of Counter Terrorism Policing in the UK, Laurence Taylor, offered a pointed response, saying the public's anxiety had been "heightened by the international commentary" — a thinly veiled reference to those remarks from Washington. Taylor also defended the decision to grant police bail with "very strict conditions", calling it "an investigative decision and one which is grounded in experience and strategy". Trump had publicly criticised the bail decision.
Why bail, not continued detention?
The men — all in their 20s and from London — were held under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) rather than the Terrorism Act (TACT). That distinction matters: under PACE, detectives could offer conditional bail but could not detain the men for up to 14 days, as would have been possible under TACT.
Once military remote-controlled robots swept the vans and found no explosives, the evidential basis for extended detention weakened significantly. What remained was five individuals found parked near an air base in the middle of the night, in suspicious circumstances, with petrol — but no other usable concrete evidence. Persuading a senior officer or magistrate to extend their custody without something more definite would have been difficult.
Taylor indicated the bail decision may also carry a tactical dimension, suggesting there were strategic reasons for releasing the men — potentially to encourage cooperation.
Was there prior intelligence?
For a period, it remained unclear whether the men were already under undercover surveillance when villagers spotted them, or whether those 999 calls were the first alert police received. Taylor has since said the Sunday morning response was "due to a range of information that we received", implying some prior intelligence was in play.
That reading is supported by the visible security build-up at RAF Fairford in the days preceding the incident. Elite firearms officers responded rapidly to the villagers' calls, suggesting readiness rather than surprise.
Where the investigation now stands
Both counter-terrorism and military sources have told bbc.com that this story is "still quite near the beginning". Detectives are understood to be investigating whether there is a "controlling hand" behind the suspects' presence in Whelford that night.
Investigators are now examining mobile phones and computers, tracking vehicles, searching addresses, and drawing on the covert capabilities of MI5, GCHQ and US intelligence agencies to build a fuller picture.
The outcome of that work will determine whether further arrests are made, whether the five men on bail are charged, and whether the full account of what happened at RAF Fairford ever becomes public.
Source: Google News MT