# Damn! bombing in Madrid **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 11, 2004, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damn-bombing-in-madrid/233725 "2004-03-11T16:46:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Brutus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Brutus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brutus)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2004, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damn-bombing-in-madrid/233725/61 "2004-03-13T03:14:47Z")
> [@rjung](#): > > Considering that wasn’t what I wrote, I can only conclude your reading comprehension skills are as fucked up as you are. Stop trying to be cute, dipshit. You wrote: > [@](#): > > Of course, if it is the work of al Qaeda, then the bombing is also solid evidence that Bush’s “war on terror” has not been successful… _Bush’s_ war on terror is going swimmingly, no thanks to cretins such as yourself. But since when has _Bush’s_ ‘war on terror’ been responsible for the security of other nations, as you so fucking blatantly imply? Should the Department of Homeland Security, an object of so much ridicule to your kind, expand its duties to include Europe? The whole of the world? ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2004, 10:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damn-bombing-in-madrid/233725/62 "2004-03-13T10:56:44Z")
My take on **rjung** ’s comment is as follows: **If** it was Al Qaeda… Bin Laden precipitated the ‘War on Terror’. Iraq was thrown into the mix to opportunistically fulfil a regime change plan laid down by the PNAC in 1998, of whom several signatories are in the US administration. The Spanish government unwisely, and in the face of something like 90% opposition from its citizens, joined in the Iraq campaign - thus making Spain a target for So I disagree somewhat: it is not Bush’s fault; nor the responsibility of the US, despite the Iraq war. In fact by joining the war Aznar painted a huge target sign on his country. And I fear the UK won’t be far behind. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![rsa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/839c29/32.png) [@rsa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rsa)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2004, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damn-bombing-in-madrid/233725/63 "2004-03-13T19:38:37Z")
**Breaking news:** Spain is announcing the detention of five people in connection with the train bombings. Three Moroccans and two Spaniards of Indian descent. They got telephone numbers from the sim card in one the cell phones in one of the bombs which did not explode. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2004, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damn-bombing-in-madrid/233725/64 "2004-03-13T20:43:13Z")
[Link for arrests](http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1079177145537&call_pageid=968332188854&col=968705899037) ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Owes\_Bess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c37758/32.png) [@Alan\_Owes\_Bess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Owes_Bess)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2004, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damn-bombing-in-madrid/233725/65 "2004-03-14T01:07:33Z")
> [@](#): > > They got telephone numbers from the sim card in one the cell phones in one of the bombs which did not explode. I did not need to know this. The Spanish investigators were totally insane to have revealed this to the perps in waiting. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2004, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damn-bombing-in-madrid/233725/66 "2004-03-14T01:18:46Z")
> [@Alan Owes Bess](#): > > I did not need to know this. > > The Spanish investigators were totally insane to have revealed this to the perps in waiting. Not necessarily. With the sim card, they can pull up the _entire_ call history of the phone from the air time provider. If there’s hundreds of calls to hundreds of numbers (including cell phone numbers), the authorities have no way of knowing which calls were made to operatives and which were made to folks who knew nothing of the attacks. However, if the authorities put a watch on the folks who made calls to or recieved calls from that phone, then if any of them panic or attempt to leave the country after it’s announced that the authorities managed to track down some of the members of the group via a cell phone, they quickly eliminate innocient people from their investigation. Additionally, the claim of getting the info from the cell phone may be a bit of disinformation to cover up the means by which the authorities tracked the guys down, thus protecting the source and enabling them to (hopefully) use that source to nail the rest of the bastards responsible for this. ---
**Author:** ![Violet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/ebca7d/32.png) [@Violet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Violet)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2004, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damn-bombing-in-madrid/233725/67 "2004-03-14T02:16:32Z")
This made me _very_ angry. :mad: ---
**Author:** ![Violet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/ebca7d/32.png) [@Violet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Violet)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2004, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damn-bombing-in-madrid/233725/68 "2004-03-14T02:17:41Z")
> [@Violet](#): > > This made me _very_ angry. :mad: I guess I should qualify: the killing made me mad. Not other posts. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damn-bombing-in-madrid/233725.md?page=3)