Britain's Labour Party chairman, Dr John Reid, said today that the nature of the terrorist threat to London was on the scale of the September 11 attacks in the US.
Asked if the deployment of troops at the UK's largest airport, Heathrow, was an over-the-top reaction as a war against Iraq loomed, Dr Reid angrily replied: "This is not a game. This is about a threat of the nature that massacred thousands of people in New York.
"I am not even going to take seriously those people who suggest this is part of some sort of game."
Home Secretary David Blunkett said that British government ministers considered shutting Heathrow Airport following the recent terror alert.
As the massive police operation at the busy airport entered its second day, Mr Blunkett said closing the airport would have been a victory for terrorists and "catastrophic" for Britain's trade and economy.
PA