"We are all Londoners today."
Charles Paul Freund | July 7, 2005, 1:00pm
Britain's Guardian is collecting what it calls "Messages of Resolve" from its online readers. There are comments from all over, though the page seems to be dominated by messages from the U.S. and Spain.
The newspaper is also providing frequently updated blog coverage of the bombing aftermath here: "Explosions plunge London into chaos."
[Blog link via The Command Post.]
Erik | July 7, 2005, 4:50pm | #
I find it interesting that a vocal few blame this on "civilian casualties" during the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. A couple bits of misinformation need to be exploded (forgive the bad pun).
-Unless you wear a uniform, your a civilian or considered a spy by the Geneva Convention. Kind of hard to tell the difference when the Coalition forces haven't shot at anybody in a uniform for over 2 years.
-The Coalition doesn't use car bombs or suicde bombers. They aren't efficient enough and don't cost enough money.
-Islamic ideologues used the same tactics on their neighbors and enemies before one American boot set foot on "Arabic" soil.
-They want the destruction of the Western traditions of democracy and tolerance of minority views. They will not settle for withdrawl of troops, as they have already set upon their own countrymen. This is a fight to the death; no surrender, no retreat, no appeasement. OBL threw a rock at our hornet's nest, and we threw one at his. Life is going to suck for quite a while as a result, but we don't have the luxury of being able to call it off.
Surely, we armchair generals and politicians could do a better job in a number of areas. Our job (since we can't directly control the action) is to watch over our freedoms and protect the innocent until proven guilty. We've got a hell of a lot of work to do. But we must constantly remind ourselves that this isn't a war against our government--it is a war against our identity. Sun Tzu would call this desperate ground.
As Londoners endured years of bombing during WWII, so must we soldier on. I'm sure they thought that it might be a good idea to call the whole thing off on more than one occasion. This pinprick against their magnificent city doesn't hold a candle to history.
So I guess we soldier on and on and on. If we are to be made into combatants, then we must fight with the weapons we have available, and those are our traditions of liberty and democracy. Sadly, some of our enemies appear to be internal (I'm looking at you Mr. Rumsfeld and Mr. Gonzales). The nice thing is, we get to question orders and don't have to pull triggers.
Dave | July 8, 2005, 4:12am | #
Hey The Lord-
Yeah, Saddam would NEVER have associated with Islamists to fight their common enemy, the US. I mean he fought the Ayotollah in Iran in an extremely bloody war for ten years right? And they would NEVER be able to get over that. Except immediately afterwards, when they let Iraq hide it's fighter aircraft in Iran to avoid destruction by the US during the first Gulf war. And these were Shia extremists, by the way. If he would do that, he sure as hell would work with Sunnis.
And the Baathists are secular. They would NEVER work together with the Islamists. Uhh, except that we see their cooperative handiwork on TV every day. Yup, I'm a retard allright. But of course you just KNOW that wouldn't have happened had we let them be. I'm sure sad we lost Saddam as our greatest ally in the Terror War. Would this be the same Saddam who sheltered Abu Nidal, paid for suicide bombings, and had a terrorist training camp (complete with airliner) at Salman Pak? We ought to let him go and re-install him as leader of Iraq! The terrorists would surely give up then!
The Saudis are my new best friends? Wow, wish I knew that. How 'bout you don't make up stuff out of the blue that was neither said nor implied nor had anything to do with my point (I didn't think Saudi Arabia was in the EU, but like you said, I'm a retard). Your post is a ridiculous straw man from that point on. You'd think I'd written some flowering praise of the Saudis, when in fact I never mentioned them and take a similarly dim view of the kingdom as you do. But to suggest we should have partnered up with Saddam Hussein to invade them....I don't know whether to laugh or cry. You think we have an "insurgent" problem now? And there are other concerns here. Unless you live naked in the rain forest and like to watch your kids die from infected stubbed toes and mosquito bites, you probably don't want to risk eliminating the world's major source of oil.
Sorry Hakluyt, I shouldn't have said France "vetoed" our proposals at the UN. They opposed them outright from the start so that there never was a point in bringing them to a vote. Such a major difference. And they didn't "See through the WMD charade". French intel agreed he posed a WMD threat; their government chose not to act because a lot of important men were on Saddam's payroll. Remember that whole "Biggest financial scandal in world history" thing? The one that makes Enron look like the time the bully stole your lunch money?
As far as the other things I said being "silly", please explain. Enlightenment culture is NOT superior to the Taliban way? Other countries approaches to the terror war are better? Well let's see, there's the American style of trying to bring democracy to the Middle East (in other words working on all those "root causes" we were lectured about since Sept 12, there's the EU/UN style of infinite empty warnings that apparently works really well if you want North Korea and Iran to build nukes unhampered, and there's the Spanish version of the war on terror where you turn your entire nation into a prison with the Islamists as the warden. They say jump, you say how high. After all, fighting terrorism is the cause of terrorism!
The Lord God Almighty | July 8, 2005, 2:03pm | #
Dear Dave,
While Saddam has certainly been involved with terrorism in the past, it would be wrong to claim, as you have been doing, that he is an ally of the Islamist movement.
And the case of Abu Nidal is a perfect example of this. Saddam was willing to support Nidal as long as the United States didn't apply pressure to do otherwise. Whenever the U.S. applied serious pressure to Saddam to limit his support of Nidal, Saddam complied, first in 1983 when he kicked Nidal out of the country and again in 2002 when Iraqi intelligence played a central role in his death (either by forcing him to commit suicide or by assassinating him). Saddam's support of terrorists has always been opportunistic and not driven by ideology, which makes him qualitatively different than other state sponsors of terrorism. He's precisely the kind of guy the U.S. needs right now because he has good information, and he has proven himself to be susceptible to both carrot and stick.
And, Dave, the proof is in the pudding. While you and your anti-EU ilk criticize the Europeans for opposing the Iraq war, it increasingly looks like they were right and you were wrong. Sure, the U.S. got Saddam out of power, but the only question worth answering at this point is, Will the current state of affairs in the Middle East increase or decrease terrorism?
As the Lord, I am privy to these kinds of things, so I'll give you a little hint as to what will happen. American politicians will begin the Great Puss-Out fairly soon, before the mid-term elections. They'll start calling for the Iraqis to "take over their own affairs" which is really just code for "get us the hell out of that quagmire." The Commander-in-chief will dutifully respond by lowering troop levels and before long, they'll be pulled out. Shortly thereafter, the country will sink into civil war. Iran, Turkey, and Syria will all get involved and jockey for their own "spheres of influence." The Iraqi people will become radicalized along religious and ethnic lines. Incipient democratic tendencies will be quashed; multiple insurgencies will proliferate; rage and terror will prevail. It'll be Afghanistan all over again. The irony is that this is exactly what the Europeans said would happen! Of course, the U.S. will be too gun shy to stop any of it and will spend the better part of the next decade licking its wounds and wondering where it all went wrong. So, in the end, the U.S. fucked it all up, simply because people like you were so hungry for blood that they didn't bother making sure that they pinned the blame on the right guy.
And, Dave, while you said nothing about the Saudis, your support of them is implied. In fact, your position -- that we should eagerly wage war against the Islamists -- cannot be imagined without Saudi support, because as you correctly point out, the U.S. could not wage its war without a reliable supply of oil. But this doesn't change the fact that Saudi Arabia -- and not Saddam Hussein -- is the central problem in Middle Eastern terrorism. The Saudi government screws over its own people, which creates dissent, which inspires ideological and material support for terrorists. If you want to stop terrorism, you have to deal with the Saudi problem. It should have been priority number one.
In your post, you attack "the people who bow to the demands of the terrorists in the hope that it will buy them some protection from attacks, until the next set of demands comes along." What you don't seem to realize is that the Saudis are the terrorists, and you're the guy who's bowing to their demands! But you're not tough enough to take this one on, are you? No, because you're scared about oil and insurgents. Which is why the so-called war on terror is doomed to fail, because the terrorists quite literally have you over a barrel.
The only substantive difference in your position from the one you criticize is that you apparently would rather take a Saudi lover than a French one. Either way, you're standing spread eagle as your shit gets pushed in.
Thus saith the Lord.
Hakluyt | July 8, 2005, 2:27pm | #
Shannon Love,
The press rapidly figured out it was being played (and losing ad revenue) and they stopped covering the events.
Here you are using an example which is not analagous. "Fake" events v. real events.
In a similar fashion, the press will not publish the rantings of a serial killer unless the police think it will help catch him.
This is at best a speculative example; the press has on a number of occasions published the writings of serial killers, terrorists, etc. despite the wishes of the police and the like.
More information is usually better but in the case of terrorism people are being murdered for no other reason other than to get you to look at a particular piece of information!
More information is always better, no matter what the motives of the perpetrator of a crime.
By consuming that information you become an enabler of the murders.
This is a fallacious stance. Sorry, gaining information about a subject does not implicate an individual in how that information came into being.
As a practical matter the press at least needs to acknowledge that they are being actively manipulated and that they could significantly alter the dynamics of terrorism by changing their ethical code of conduct.
Actually, if the press were to ignore some aspects of terrorism, terrorists would merely enhance the aspects that they do report on. Of course the fact that terrorism existed prior to the moden press should give you an idea as to the merits of your argument. What terrorists was rely on the word of mouth; that's how the Mongol armies captured many areas they invaded. A frightened populace and government, filled with bloodthirsty tales of Mongol slaughter, often handed the keys to the city to the Mongols without a fight. Your willingness to make the population similarly ignorant would lead us down the same path. No, the benefits of knowledge far outweigh whatever costs it includes.
We will destroy terrorism as means of conflict only when we make it the path to political extinction.
And here we have an equally silly comment. Terrorism will never be destroyed as long as human beings exist. Its a bit like arguing that one will get rid of murder. Honestly, this reminds me of Bush's arrogant silliness following 9/11.
No political movement in America will resort to terrorism because it will mean their instant marginalization.
You don't pay attention to American terrorist groups apparently. I mean come on, ELF, ALF, Christian nutters groups, etc. commonly commit acts of terrorism in the U.S. Indeed, with regard to eco-terrorist groups like ELF, the attacks have only increased in frequency since 9/11 and their support has grown rapidly. One of these days their acts of arson, bombing, etc. is going to escalate to killing people.
