War on Terrorism

Well, right now we (well the UK, US, AUS, Poland and a few others) have a WAR ON TERRORISM right now.

As you might have noticed, Spain suffered a bombing 911 days after the 911 thing, which killed 200 people. The worst terrorist attrocity to hit Europe (outside of Guernica), or anywhere else in Europe (except for the Lockerbie bombing).

Now, the exciting thing is, Spain has REMOVED itself from the war on terrorism by voting in a new socialist government, which was totally against the war in Iraq. Al Quaida thought it would take about 3 or 4 big attacks to make Spain 'submit' like this, but through 'good' timing they did it in one strike. Spain is out of the deal in terms of the 'coalition of the willing' now, and its government detests what went on in Iraq.

So us mighty nations in the 'coalition of the willing' against the 'war on terror' have lost a member now. If Spain sufferes another major attack now I'll give each and every one of you $100, its not going to happen now.

So, the general question really is, what is the War On Terror achieving? I mean, the 911 attacks were fucking horrendous and shocking, however they only killed about 1/5th of the number of people killed in auto accidents in the US each year. What would have happened instead if the US had just gone "Oh well, it happens, lets play it down because in terms of deaths it isn't actually that big". Imagine if we didn't have a 'war on terror'. Imagine if we'd ignored the whole thing, no one had heard of Osama, and Saddam was still a dictator in some backwater nation we don't really give a fuck about. Would you feel safer then? Do you think we'd still have the insanely large numbers of psycho-muslims volunteering to blow themselves up? do you think we'd still have the same number of people even willing to plant bombs to kill civilians, if the terrorists hadn't already achieved infinite notriety?

Do YOU feel safer now that we have a 'war on terror'? The same shit was going on before, it just happened that they got lucky with the 911 thing, it was really a 1000 to one chance that it would work 'as well' as it did. But it happened. But as well as mobilizing the west's resources, it did about 10x as well in mobilizing the psycho-nutcase resources. Now they have seen how 'well' they can do, and the fucking nutcases are all about recreating it.

So Americans, Brits, Poles, Spanish 2 weeks ago, Aussies etc. are you glad the way the War On Terror is progressing? or do you, in retrospect, sleep less safely than you did on the 12 september 2002?

-tharun


ps. I have no answers or solutions, I'm just depressed about the world today, in almost every way. I don't wan to live in a muslim country. I don't want to live in a christian country. I think a nice 3rd world non-muslim non-christian backwater would suit me very well right now thank you =)

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Originally posted by tharun
Do you think we'd still have the insanely large numbers of psycho-muslims volunteering to blow themselves up? do you think we'd still have the same number of people even willing to plant bombs to kill civilians, if the terrorists hadn't already achieved infinite notriety?

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In a word, yes.

Radical islamists don't care if you downplay their attacks. Their ultimate goal is the destruction of western way of life, and if we kneel down and assume position like the Spanish did, all the better. Now that the attacks in Spain have caused such magnificent results from the terrorists' perspective, I fully expect more pre-election bombings to be carried out in other European countries, in the hopes of getting them to buckle under. Case in point: France just received a terrorist threat, despite having gone to great lengths to save Saddam's arse. And the current Eurobureaucrat rhetoric about "negotiation" isn't helping.

In short, I am very disappointed in Europe right now.

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Originally posted by Solmyr
In a word, yes.

Radical islamists don't care if you downplay their attacks. Their ultimate goal is the destruction of western way of life, and if we kneel down and assume position like the Spanish did, all the better. Now that the attacks in Spain have caused such magnificent results from the terrorists' perspective, I fully expect more pre-election bombings to be carried out in other European countries, in the hopes of getting them to buckle under. Case in point: France just received a terrorist threat, despite having gone to great lengths to save Saddam's arse. And the current Eurobureaucrat rhetoric about "negotiation" isn't helping.

In short, I am very disappointed in Europe right now.

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I agree. By rewarding terrorism in such a craven way, Spain has placed every other Western Democracy in danger. I would anticipate Islamic Extremists will attempt to influence other elections in the same way. One can only hope that Spain will prove a cowardly aberration, and that the rest of us will NEVER reward terrorism again. I don't judge Spain too harshly, however. After all, it took the U.S. thirty years to come to our senses.

The Spanish Popular Party blamed ETA for the terrorist attacks in an attempt to keep government. They claimed that ETA was responsible even after they had evidence which suggested otherwise. They rallied governments to include specific reference to ETA in the UN resolution that condemned the attacks.

Explain why the Spanish people should not be offended that a government who opposed their will in the first place, would use the deaths of 200 people in conscious lies to keep power.

Perhaps if the Popular Party had not tried to hide what it knew, in a filthy attempt to capitalize on slaughter, then they might not have been punished at the polls.

The Spanish People overwhelmingly wanted their troops out of Iraq.
The Spanish Population overwhelmingly opposed the war in the first place.
The Popular Party ignored the will of Spain’s people, and then lied keep power.

As far as I am concerned, this election result is not a reward for terrorism, though I admit it will be interpreted that way, it is a punishment against a Government who acted without mandate and lied to protect itself.

Perhaps if the media concentrated more on the fact that the Spanish People opposed the war in the first place AND that the election outcome was a result of a Government which ignored its people’s will - AND WAS NOT a craven response to the murderous attacks, then the terrorists might realize that they were irrelevant to the process.

Unfortunately elections might well become prime targets, especially in countries that WILL punish their Governments for involvement in a war that many opposed (Australia springs to mind). Because the argument that Spain is rewarding Terrorism by voting out the Pro Iraq War government, suggests that ANY Country which votes out the Pro Iraq War government is aiding Terrorism.

The Spanish people reacted with dignity and sadness and anger to a horrendous attack that killed so many people. That people are labeling them craven cowards is so incredibly appalling, so outrageously ignorant, that I am all but lost for words. I don’t know whether to denounce you as vile and inhuman creature or laugh at you with the contempt you deserve.

My heart goes out to the people of Spain, just as it went out to the people of Bali, Turkey and New York. And when I watched the extraordinary efforts that ordinary Spanish people went to as they helped the maimed and dying, and I watched the way they rose in massive crowds to mourn and seek answers and express their rage, I was proud to come from the same world that they did.

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Originally posted by Malacasta
The Spanish Popular Party blamed ETA for the terrorist attacks in an attempt to keep government. They claimed that ETA was responsible even after they had evidence which suggested otherwise. They rallied governments to include specific reference to ETA in the UN resolution that condemned the attacks.

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That's false.

The Spanish government called a press conference on the evening of the day of the attack to announce that a van containing detonators and an audio tape of Koranic verses had been found. They sent the country's Interior Minister, Angel Acebes, out to give the details. Quote from here: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...n_tape_found_9

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The van, found in Alcala de Henares, 15 miles outside Madrid, was stolen from the city Feb. 28. On the front seat, police found seven detonators and the tape, Acebes told a news conference. "Because of this, I have just given instructions to the security forces not to rule out any line of investigation," Acebes said.
The armed Basque group ETA remained the "main line of investigation" in the blasts, he said. With the van find "all kinds of lines investigation open up," Acebes said.

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Another quote:

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T]here simply was no cover-up. After Thursday, the Interior Ministry mounted press conferences with unprecedented frequency trying to pass on the facts as they became known, something unheard-of in any other democracy. Among these was the discovery of the white van with seven detonators and an audiotape with verses from the Qur’an. The retiring Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar at no time ruled out Al-Qaeda involvement. Against this the Socialist party mounted manipulative demonstrations outside the Popular Party offices claiming that the government was seeking to conceal Al-Qaeda evidence because it feared voters would punish it for backing the Bush invasion of Iraq and committing 1,300troops to the Coalition occupation. It is a sign of the still immature nature of Spain’s democracy that the voters bought this pernicious nonsense and voted with emotion rather than common sense.

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Guess where that second quote is from.

The Arab News, that beacon of honesty and impartiality:
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=7&sect...tegory=Opinion

This has to be some kind of first. Arab News fact checks the western media.

In other words, if the Spaniards were so angry with Aznar, how come every poll before the election predicted a victory for him?
No, given the available evidence, there is no other conclusion to make except that the attack squarely influenced the elections.

And at the very least, that will be the impression that terrorists now have, which means they will do it again.

Edit: Here is an article that illustrates what we are facing:

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au...5E7583,00.html

Is it false? A google news search found a lot of hits from newspapers that back my arguments. Maybe there are counter arguments, but mine aren’t just “false”. I’m not going to go through each and every one to prove my point, but seven hours ago this appeared in the Australian press.

http://www.news.com.au/common/story_...5E1702,00.html

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Spanish public opinion turned against Aznar's government after it appeared to rush to judgement in blaming ETA for the attacks, when evidence pointed to the involvement of Islamic extremists intent on revenge for Spain's support for the US-led war in Iraq.

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… an apology from Aznar's Popular Party to the UN Security Council, which had been persuaded to blame ETA.

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Seriously...

Why is that Guardian cites to straight articles get attacked for being communist propaganda, but op-eds from the likes of townhall.com, the telegraph, coulter, and worldnewsdaily (off the top of my head) are passed off as legit and unbiased?

In irritation.
Mala

Firstly, thank you Malacasta for starting this thread. I am Spanish and I listen to the Spanish news every day, plus I read most of the papers every day, plus I talk to people in Spain so I can say what has happened there.

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The Spanish government called a press conference on the evening of the day of the attack to announce that a van containing detonators and an audio tape of Koranic verses had been found. They sent the country's Interior Minister, Angel Acebes, out to give the details. Quote from here: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tm...in_tape_found_9

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90% of the population of Spain disagreed with the war in Irak . When the marches against the occupation, 1 million people were in the street in Madrid, plus 1 and a half millions in Barcelona, plus thousands in other cities. The government didn't listen to the population as it should do in a democracy. So when the bombs happened in Madrid in March 11, if they proved that Al Qaeida was involved in the attacks and that Spain was a target for our involvement in the Irak war then the government was screwed. So they tried to cover this information. Solmyr in that interview you talk from yahoo, Acebes also says:

The armed Basque group ETA remained the "main line of investigation" in the blasts, he said. With the van find "all kinds of lines investigation open up," Acebes said.

And later at the same time Aznar said that it was ETA. They had crossed information. The public televisions were accussing ETA (although they said they hadn't done it) the days after the attacks. So clearly the government was lying and tried to use the people's anger to get votes because the polls were giving them a very short margin in the elections.

When you talk about Spain submitting to what the terrorist want... WRONG AGAIN. As I said 90% of the people opposed the war but we had a totalitarian government with absolute majority and they did whatever they wanted. Zapatero (the elected president) had promised in his campaign to bring the troops out if the UN didn't get hte power by June, 30 . That was the reason why they got voted. That was the reason why the Spanish put all the trust on him. The old government party (PP) got more or less the same votes than in the last elections, however there was a 10% more participation in this elections. Votes from young people who usually do not care. People who wants the troops out of Irak and Aznar and his cabinet of fascist's grandsons out of our government.

Zapatero is only doing what most of the Spanish population want and what he promised in his campaign.

Salimar

I'm not usually a very political person. However, for whatever reason, the way people are reacting to the election in Spain has caught my eye. Rather than just letting some article give me my opinion on it, I decided to go get some facts on the election results. So, I googled for spain election results and got this page http://electionresources.org/es/index_en.html . It gives election results for Spain going back to 1977.

Anyways, I took a look at the 1993, 1996, 2000, and 2004 elections, feeling that looking at those results would give me an idea of how the Spanish people had been voting recently, and if this had suddenly changed in this election.

In 1993, 76.4% of registered electors voted. The PSOE won that election, taking 38.8% of the vote. The PP took 34.8%.

In 1996, 77.4% of registered electors voted. The PP won that election, taking 38.8% of the vote. The PSOE was very close behind with 37.6%

In 2000, only 68.7% of registered voters voted. The PP won that election by quite a margin, taking 44.5% of the vote compared to the PSOE at 34.2%.

In 2004, the amount of voters was back up to 77.2%. The PSOE won with 42.6% of the vote, compared to the PP at 37.6%.

Looking at these statistics, I don't see where the idea that the Spanish are cowards is coming from. It seems to me that about 5-7% of the vote passes back and forth between these two parties and the third largest party(IU). I don't know alot about politics, but I assume that a 5-7% shift in voters is actually pretty common.

This time that 5-7% went to the PSOE. How does 7% of the voters voting a particular way make an entire country a bunch of cravens? Even if every single voter that made up that 5-7% voted that way because of the terrorist attack, the other 93-95% seem to have voted the way they always do. What were they supposed to do? Vote to reelect someone they didn't want for another 4 years just to say fuck you to the terrorists?

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Originally posted by leira
What were they supposed to do? Vote to reelect someone they didn't want for another 4 years just to say fuck you to the terrorists?

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I can't stand George Bush. In fact, I can think of only a handful of people in the world I detest more then him. HOWEVER, were terrorists to attack a U.S. target similar to what Spain had happen to them shortly before the Presidential Election, I almost certainly would change my plans and vote for George Bush. Not so much to say "Fuck You" to the terrorists, but because a change in leadership directly after such an attack sends a dangerous message that terrorists will take heart from, and use before every election in Western Democracies from now on.

Of course, Spain doesn't have to care... they just HAD their election, and so have a number of years to wait out, hoping the terrorist threat just goes away :rolleyes before their next national election. But where does that leave the rest of us? Here in the U.S. we have our own election just a few short months away, for example.

I'm sorry, but Spain's election results are selfish, craven, shortsighted and COWARDLY.

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Originally posted by Graeblyn

I'm sorry, but Spain's election results are selfish, craven, shortsighted and COWARDLY.

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I am proud of the Spanish population. They actually suprised me. The first question after the attacks wasn't WHO but actually WHY. Looking for the root of the problem. As I said before, loads of people from Spain didn't want to go to war and the government sended us.

I think, people like you who consider that the rest of the world should follow the U.S. in the line the U.S. wants are the ones who are selfish. Listen to me, the most of Spanish people did not want to go to war and consider this war is not legal and does not consider it as a fight against terrorism.

Shortsighted? how is this? we could see through the manouvres of our government.

About the cowardly remark. Clearly Bush said: "you are with us or against us". The U.S. is the strongest country in the world. How is to go against its desires coward? I have my doubts that Zapatero is going to be able to retrieve the troops. The international pressure is huge. Perhaps he will push another U.N. resolution what would return some power to the U.N.

Salimar

What's funny in all this is that the way the Left is talking, it's almost like the US was directly responsible for the Madrid attacks, rather than the terrorists.

Blame the US for everything. You'll never go wrong on that one. :rolleyes

That was a total troll Solmyr.
Two leftists have responded in this thread, and neither one has blamed America for the terrorist bombings.

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Originally posted by Graeblyn
I can't stand George Bush. In fact, I can think of only a handful of people in the world I detest more then him. HOWEVER, were terrorists to attack a U.S. target similar to what Spain had happen to them shortly before the Presidential Election, I almost certainly would change my plans and vote for George Bush. Not so much to say "Fuck You" to the terrorists, but because a change in leadership directly after such an attack sends a dangerous message that terrorists will take heart from, and use before every election in Western Democracies from now on.

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I'm sorry, I'm totally against the idea of letting a single terrorist attack dictate the next 4 years of a country's future. It doesn't matter whether you specifically vote for or against the terrorists' wishes, you are giving them a HUGE amount of power either way. Not to mention, you are quite possibly screwing your country over by putting someone in charge that you know isn't going to do a good job of it. I believe that 4 years of leadership by a poor leader could easily do far more damage than terrorists ever could.

Solmyr, you are trying to find some argument to involve the U.S. in this elections. I am sorry to tell you, this time the U.S. did not get involved. We only voted against an antidemocratic government who didn't listen to its population (not only about the war, the prestige, the unemployment, the public education, the housing price,etc.). These results did not develop only in 3 days as most of the international press seems to think and publish.

Again, the vote was against a bad government who didn't exhitate to use a terrorist attack to get more votes. Because as the elections got closer the polls were given them as possible losers. As you can see in the Leira post, the intention of vote to the right didn't change. The terrorist attack affected the number of voters, it increased, what is good for democracy. Also it made the real left to lose votes because comunist people voted socialist to kick the government out the power (so you should be happy about this one, the comunists in Spain are nearly disappeared after using their vote as "useful vote", they lost their independent parlamentarial group). So the only losers in the elections were the comunists:

- The right kept the same votes (but lost places in the congress because the percentage of votes decreased)
- Socialists won (gained votes and percentage of votes)
- Comunists lost 4 people in the congress.
(lost votes and percentage of votes).

In summary, Spain is a leftist kind of country. We were 40 years under a fascist government and this history is still very tender. So it is common that the socialist party win. They lost before because there were many cases of corruption. We'll keep an eye on them now.

Salimar

Superpower(s) can only go around pissing off the world for so long, until someone starts fighting back.

I think it's laughable that some feel that the US has done nothing on the global stage that would provoke an attack such as 911.
3000 deaths in one day, however isn't funny.

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False Prophets wrapping themselves up in the American flag, touting American virtues, all the while undermining them"

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Originally posted by kestra

I think it's laughable that some feel that the US has done nothing
on the global stage that would provoke an attack such as 911.

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What is not laughable (because it is repulsive) is that anyone would think we did anything to provoke such an attack.

Every country in the world works to do things in the best interests of its own populace. That is natural.

What are the Middle Eastern nations complaining about?

They tried to obliterate Israel from the planet, failed, lost territory in their failure, and now think Israel should just give it back?

Would they have given back Israel if they had conquered it successfully? Hell no.

They have in abundance one of the most valuable natural resources in the world. Do they use it to build infrastructure? Do they use it to further the education of their people? Do they use it to build industry in their country?

Do they emulate things like the Tennessee Valley Authority or other things modern nations do to benefit the entire country?

Nope. They use it so a few shieks can be mega-billionaires while 90%+ of the population are uneducated, unskilled, and abysmally poor.

They also completely subjugate half their population (women).

Then, because they don't want their people to see who is really to blame, they blame the "Evil Capitalist American Satan". Somehow we are responsible for the fact that these shieks cannot see fit to use their massive oil wealth to build modern countries? I think not.

If the western world could get off its ass and move away from using oil/gas (which would be exceptionally easy if we had the will to do so) the Middle East would be totally destroyed. They would be rendered totally irrelevant. Once they hit rock bottom, perhaps they could build a civilization that was something more worthwhile than a patchwork of dictatorships, kingdoms, and other assorted tyrannies.

The only reason the US gets "blamed" and hated is because these shieks find it absolutely necessary to fool their populaces into hating the wrong person.

It is popular to point to things like the Kyoto Treaty or the World Bank/IMF as why the US is hated. This is absurd. Is there no room in the free world for a difference of opinion? Is there no tolerance for different beliefs on how global problems can be solved?

The reason we are hated is plain and simple. It is jealousy and it is a tool of subjugation. It is basic human psychology to give people an enemy to hate in order to distract them from the real enemy.

yeah....America is just misunderstood.......riiight!!!
To suggest that America has no blood on its hands is laughable.

Wow. I just realized that Kestra is a Canadian. I was trying to figure out where this animosity was coming from. (not a jab at Canadians in general but I think it validates what Aristotle was saying)

With that being said.. The United States is:

The most powerful, the wealthiest, the most dominant country in the world that can impose its will with either military might or economic dominance. There are so many situations where the United States could totally dominate the situation with unilateral might, the few situations where America has has drawn fire while the times America (countless times) has gone through bilateral means goes relatively unnoticed.

Human nature seems to require the existence of a 'satan' or a 'bad guy'. People like to root for the underdog. With American most of the world has both in one convinient location sitting at the top of the ladder.

Before someone brings it up; Yes there are countries out there that are better than the US in certain areas. Some countries are better at health care for everyone, others produce less pollution, others provide outstanding elementary education. But when you look at the United States you have to remember that our population is around 280 million. No other country that is above us in any of the previously mentioned matters is above us on any international rating... *positive rating that is*

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Originally posted by tharun

So Americans, Brits, Poles, Spanish 2 weeks ago, Aussies etc. are you glad the way the War On Terror is progressing? or do you, in retrospect, sleep less safely than you did on the 12 september 2002?

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I'm very pleased with the progress of the War on Terrorism. It doesn't matter that we were targets before and they just happened to successfully pull off a major devastating attack (9/11). It is BECAUSE of the devastation of 9/11 that I think it was necessary to begin tightening down on our national security.

Part of this tightening down was forcing the UN resolutions to the point where if the Iraqis did not comply, we were going to strike, and we did. We gave the ultimatum. They didn't abide by the stipulations of the UN resolutions. We went in and bombed their asses. Done deal. What would anyone else expect? We should just say, "Okay, we were just playing..we didn't really mean that we wanted you to comply...just seeing if you would do it if we gave an ultimatum."

I believe what many conservatives believe and that is you can't negotiate with terrorists. The whole premise behind that mindset is that when you negotiate out of fear of losing innocent lives, you have just given in to the whole concept of terrorism because you are reinforcing their total belief system...that fear will gain their desired result. It would only serve to spread the practice further as it will be proven effective. I'd rather lose lives fighting against this practice rather than continually lose innocent lives because we failed to extinguish it.

We Americans have shown the world that fucked up attacks on us are not going to be downplayed. We don't negotiate with terrorists and for THAT I am proud. I am even more proud that we invaded Iraq and captured Saddam's sorry ass. Now he can be held accountable for all his heinous crimes.

I too feel bad for the innocent Muslim people who have been affected by this war and the families here in the US who have lost loved ones during the war, but change doesn't happen over night, and good, quality change doesn't happen without suffering and a lot of hard work and support from neighboring countries who care.