Al-Qaida tried to blow up plane by planting bombs inside of dogs

Not that you really needed additional evidence, but here's a reminder of the diabolical lengths al-Qaida operatives are willing to go to in order to kill Americans: Members of the terror group in Iraq once tried to blow up a plane by planting explosives inside live dogs.

The plot -- detailed in the French-language Paris newspaper Le Figaro and picked up by the New York Post -- involved surgically implanting explosives and detonators into the stomachs of two stray dogs the terrorists captured on the streets of Iraq two years ago. Many animal rescue groups had been taking in strays from Baghdad -- where strays are a bit of an epidemic -- in order to find homes for them in the United States.

But the botched surgeries caused the dogs to die in their kennels before they could be boarded on their flight to America, and U.S. soldiers soon discovered the bombs stitched inside of them. According to Le Figaro, American intelligence officials immediately alerted other spy agencies by passing along the necropsy photos of the dogs and the bombs. Word of the would-be attack method spread quickly, and thus far no international flights have succumbed to exploding canines.

Perhaps this explains why al-Qaida strategists have since moved on to planting bombs in printer cartridges.

(Photo: AP)