CIA Deputy Director David S. Cohen said terrorists planned to kill “tens of thousands of people” at a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna, Austria. Swift canceled her concerts in the city in early August after police arrested a group of ISIS devotees for plotting an attack at the events. Mr. Cohen said US authorities helped police in Vienna by providing intelligence about the suspects and their nefarious plans.
Austrian authorities announced the arrest of three individuals who planned to target the Ernst Happel Stadium, which holds up to 30,000 people, with knives and explosives. The suspects are 17, 18, and 19 years old and had pledged allegiance to ISIS. At least one is an Iraqi citizen. A 15-year-old was also questioned, but none of their names were released due to Austrian privacy laws surrounding criminal suspects.
Taylor Swift later spoke out about the thwarted attacks and said they had brought a new “sense of fear” into her life. She thanked authorities, however, and said that while she felt guilty about canceling and disappointing her Austrian fans, she was also relieved that “we were grieving concerts and not lives.”
The Vienna shows were part of the American superstar’s record-breaking Eras world tour, and the next and final leg of the tour took place in the UK, where security was heightened and fans were subjected to searches and metal detectors. Security was beefed up in London partly because of events in Vienna and partly because the concerts were scheduled to take place just weeks after a knifeman killed three young girls at a Taylor Swift dance class in the northern English town of Southport.
Axel Muganwa Rudakubana was charged with murder after entering the Southport venue and stabbing people indiscriminately. Six-year-old Bebe King and seven-year-old Elsie Dot Stancombe died at the scene, and nine-year-old Alice da Silva Aguiar died later the same day in hospital. More than a dozen others were injured. At the final concert at Wembley Stadium in London, Swift invited survivors and bereaved family members to join her backstage, where she expressed her “shock and sorrow” at the tragedy.
