"Only God Knows"

"My son wanted to serve in the military and we even went to a recruiting centre on Yonge Street. And it turned out that he went into a special division, but to the mujahedeen [holy warriors]. The thing is that William, when he started to believe in Islam, he became very quiet and inside himself and he didn't communicate with us. He didn't tell us about friends.
"Maybe they were in contact or communicated online. He didn't report to me or tell me about his contacts. It's not that I want to distance myself from Tsarnaev. It's just that I do my analysis myself And indeed only God knows.
"Looking back, I regret that I didn't sit down and ask him for information. I didn't pay attention to that. I thought, it's like a usual thing, like a person got baptized. So a person became Muslim, what's wrong? In a horrible dream I wouldn't even think to see that, that my son, who I didn't see even killing a fly, that he could take a gun and kill people."
Vitaly Plotnikov, Toronto

William Plotnikov, his father said, converted to Islam in 2009, A 'radical' Toronto cleric had inducted him into Islam, and had introduced him to jihad. His parents had no idea of the depth of the commitment their son had taken on. While they were away in Florida their son departed Canada for Moscow where he stayed with a family friend. That family friend became alarmed at what he heard from William.

The family friend relayed his serious misgivings to Vitaly Plotnikov. And he in turn made contact with Russian authorities and advised them of his fearful concerns. They responded by taking William into their custody for questioning, before advising him to return home to Canada. During the questioning William was said by the Russian authorities to have named among other contacts they were interested in, Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

It was this identification that spurred Russian intelligence to contact the FBI and then later the CIA, asking them to investigate the activities of Tsarnaev mother and son. By the time that Tamerlan Tsarnaev travelled to Dagestan, William was already there, living in a remote mountainous village area. And it was there that he was killed by a bullet to the head when he and his group of Islamist fighters battled with Russian forces.

To their great grief, the Plotnikov family mourns their son, and his dedication to a path in life so far removed from his familial experience and their undeniable social values. But Mr. Plotnikov isn't convinced there was any connection between Tsarnaev and his son; they were too personally unalike, other than their mutual commitment to jihad; but then ideologies do often make strange bedfellows.

His argument is that his son was already living in the mountains with the rebels. "I don't think that William went into the mountains and informed Tsarnaev, 'I am here and you can find me there'. There's no logic there. This is my opinion", he said quietly, through an interpreter. In fact, a Time reporter visiting Utamysh where William is now buried, showed villagers a photo of Tsarnaev, but none recognized him.

Canadian authorities, the intelligence and security community, Mr. Plotnikov firmly believes, are not doing enough to ensure that terrorists do not gain  entry to, or make inroads in the country, to prey on vulnerable young men looking for a just cause that they can fashion their futures around. The authorities in Russia by comparison, he said, use informant networks, including within mosques.

"And here in Canada more informers are needed at these places of gathering."