TONY BLAIR will make a dramatic appeal to the nation tonight to show traditional British resolve in the face of possible suicide bombings or chemical attacks in the run-up to Christmas.

The Prime Minister will make his speech as extra police marksmen, including snipers, are being drafted in to create a 250-strong armed unit at Heathrow. The Government is also giving forces extra cash for armed patrols at other airports and aircraft maintenance depots.

Dozens of officers with firearms experience are being moved from other duties into the Yard’s protection squads as concern grows at the prospect of street assassinations. Scotland Yard has also reshuffled its senior anti-terrorist officers to focus on the fight against possible al-Qaeda attacks, and a recruitment drive has been launched to boost SO13, the anti-terror branch, which will grow fourfold to 628 officers.

As concern about a possible attack deepens, Mr Blair will talk frankly tonight about the balancing act he has to perform between alerting the country to potential atrocities and paralysing it with fear. The British people will be asked to show a renewed determination to thwart terror through heightened vigilance, particularly at large gatherings and transport hubs.

The Prime Minister wants his speech at the Lord Mayor’s Banquet, traditionally his major foreign affairs speech of the year, to start a debate on how best to cope with the disruption to civilian life after September 11 and Bali.

Mr Blair is expected to say that the Government is “trying to achieve a balance between vigilance and not letting the fear of terrorism hand victory to the terrorists”. He will say that public vigilance is just as important as it was in the worst days of IRA bombing campaigns, but the threat is even more unpredictable.

A senior source said: “The fact is we are dealing with terrorists who are fanatics. We are dealing with people who are prepared to kill themselves and to use weapons which the IRA would never contemplate.”

The response to growing tensions at home comes as the Government prepares to deploy up to 15,000 troops to Kuwait as a contribution to a potential American-led coalition against Iraq. Ministers are expected to delay any formal announcement about mobilisation until President Saddam Hussein has officially responded to the new UN Security Council resolution.

Mr Blair’s speech will point to the importance of Saddam co-operating with weapons inspectors and to the need for greater security throughout the Middle East.

Close to home, he will speak of the difficulty of weighing up the constant stream of intelligence information, particularly after the Bali bombing, when authorities were criticised for keeping back general warnings about Indonesia.

Without mentioning specific threats, Mr Blair will say that al-Qaeda has suffered reversals in Afghanistan but remains active across the globe. He will echo the words of Tom Ridge, the US Homeland Security Director, who said yesterday: “In democratic countries, we have to be right a thousand out of a thousand (times) and they only have to be right once out of a thousand and they can bring the kind of horror and destruction that we witnessed on September 11.”

Mr Ridge said that he believed there were al-Qaeda sleeper cells in the US and it was only a matter of time before there was another attempted attack.

David Blunkett admitted yesterday that Britain was in the front line of the War on Terror, and did not deny that there were suspected al-Qaeda sleeper cells here. He did, however, insist that every known suspect was under surveillance.

The Home Secretary told BBC One’s Breakfast with Frost: “There is always a danger, because we are in the front line. But we are in the front line because we are tackling the killers and the organised criminals behind them.

“We will do everything we can to protect Britain. We need the vigilance of everyone around us, particularly at major airports and particular gathering points where people know there is a risk, as there is today on Armistice Day. We will do everything we can, but we want everyone to be vigilant as well.”

In the light of the increased fears, David Veness, one of Scotland Yard’s assistant commissioners, is taking over full-time responsibility for protection and counter-terrorism measures. Detectives from regional forces are already on secondment to the SO13 anti-terror unit and more are expected to join them.

Armed officers are now routinely patrolling outside sensitive buildings in London such as the American Embassy, which is protected by a concrete barrier to prevent a car bomb attack. The national threat level stands at the second highest — the one below that where intelligence shows that an attack is imminent.

Scotland Yard is also maintaining contact with Israel on the latest suicide bomber tactics amid concerns that a big public area such as a shopping mall could become a target.

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