I’ve been wracking my brain trying to figure out the motives behind the WTC/Pentagon attacks.
My idea of terrorists are usually people with an agenda. Take the IRA for instance. They have a defined political goal in mind and carry out their attacks to try and motivate other governments into some concessions that the terrorists want. Towards this end the IRA usually steps right up to take credit for a terror attack.
In this case, however, every group on the planet that can conceivably be linked with this atrocity is backpeddaling away from it as fast as possible. To name two Yassir Arafat immediately denounced the attack and Osama bin Laden has denied responsibility (placing blame on homegrown terrorists ala the Oklahoma City bombing). Saddam Hussein is the only head-of-state I know of that is publicly shouting ‘Hooray’.
To achieve an attack like this and not take credit for it reduces the cause they are fighting for to nothing more than your plain old garden variety murderers (albeit on a grand scale). Beyond the deaths of several thousand people nothing has been achieved.
[ul]
[li] Terror? Maybe for a moment but how many of you are walking around in terror right now? How many of you are just pissed off?[/li][li] Bring down the United States? Not close by a long shot.[/li][li] Economic strife? Maybe but to ephemeral to be counted on as a realistic goal.[/li][/ul]
It is for these reasons I wonder if the attacks were simply too successful. I have no proof for any of this of course but I suspect the complete destruction of three buildings in the WTC complex probably exceeded the attackers wildest dreams. They may have also laid in four attacks assuming a few would probably go wrong somehow and not achieve their goals. Instead they got a 75% success rate (the one plane that crashed in Pennsylvania be counted as a ‘failure’ for purposes of this thread since it didn’t reach a target).
The only thing that makes me feel better in this bleak time is thinking about how the people who perpetrated this crime are feeling right now. I assume that at first they were jubilant. After they watched the towers crash down I wonder how long it took for them to stop dancing and start to realize the shit they just placed themselves in. Whoever did this has to know a world of hurt lies in their future. At the very least they’ll spend the rest of their lives running as fast as they can.
SOURCE: Reuters
So, were these attacks too successful or were they meant to be nothing more than mass murder with no purpose beyond that from the attackers?
Upon reflection, yesterday’s events seem to me to represent the mindset of organizations such as the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), whose objective was the establishment of an Islamic state in Algeria, and which was active in numerous terrorist actions there and in France throughout the '90’s.
While the GIA did pursue military targets, many of their actions featured the apparent random slaughter of civilians. In Algeria this included the kidnapping and murder of numerous foreigners, and night terror raids on villages deemed to harbor enemies of the organization. In France, a major bombing campaign was conducted with the sole end of killing or maiming as many civilians as possible.
Most notable in light of yesterday’s events, was the 1994 hijacking of an Air France flight to Algiers, with the apparent aim of crashing the plane into the Eiffel Tower. French security forces stormed the plane on the ground (in Marseille if I remember correctly) before this could be accomplished. It seems highly likely to me that the persons that carried out yesterday’s acts used this failed action as a model to refine their planning.
Note that I am not suggesting that the GIA, or even Algerians specifically, were directly responsible for the attacks in DC and New York. I AM suggesting, however that the general philosophies are similar, i.e. a xenophobic desire to eliminate anyone and anything that may be perceived as threat to their interpretation of Islam, and an emphasis on maximum casualties.
It’s not the killing of civilians I am questioning. That some terrorist groups favor military or police targets and others favor civilians (and some a mix of the two) is without doubt. However, in the example you cite about the GIA I assume they were always up front about their actions. Everytime they did something they made sure everyone knew who did it. The GIA had an agenda they wished to see achieved and made a point of letting people know when they were responsible for an attack in the hopes that a tired populace would pressure their government to concede to their demands.
In this case however we have a massacre and no one saying, “That was us…we did it and if you don’t want to see it happen again you will comply with our demands.”
This way desires results from the attack and implies future attacks if those results aren’t meant. Now you have terror. Everyone knows another attack is coming and can be scared of it and pressure their government to maybe accede to some demands to get the bad guys off of our backs.
If the people who attacked the US yesterday had no agenda all we have here is murder…plain and simple. Not warriors fighting the good fight against the evil empire but plain old garden variety thugs. Worse…even thugs usually want something (like your wallet) and will then leave you alone. More appropriately we have here your basic sociopath and all talk of a noble cause is just flim-flam.
Either that or they did have an agenda, realized that perhaps this one went a bit too far and in fear of reprisals went to ground.
I hear what you’re saying, Mole. I’ve been thinking the same thing myself. I do have a different view of one thing you said:
That’s the bitch of it. The deaths of all the people on the jet is considered a failure. On any other day, it would be considered a tremendous act of terrorism (by itself, one of the worst in American history). But this week, the Pennsylvania crash gets bumped to the bottom of the news. Hell, the plane crashing into the Pentagon (the Pentagon!) is second-tier news because most of it is still standing.
But I agree with your thesis. Many have compared this attack to Pearl Harbor. While that was a very successful raid, ultimtely Japan lost the war. The Pearl Harbor attack failed to neutralize the U.S. Navy, and merely ticked everybody off.
I’ll go on to say that, if we want to pursue the war analogy (as the president insists on doing), we should be prepared to fight that war where the enemy wants it: in our own back yards. Frankly, I’d prefer a different analogy.
The GIA generally did announce responsibility for most of the attacks within Algeria; IIRC, however, no responsibility for the bombing campaign in France was ever admitted by that organization. That the GIA was involved was only confirmed after the fact, based on evidence recovered by French security services.
I currently believe:
a) that the persons responsible for yesterday’s acts couldn’t care less whether we understand the nature of their campaign or not, as they are not responding to a particular grievance but trying to make an entire culture go away
b) we are dealing with persons who do not consider themselves part of a specific political organization but holy soldiers in a righteous cause that needs no explanation to right-thinking people.
Perhaps the thinking of the persons who carried out these attacks is something like this: you don’t stop to tell the roaches why you’re stomping on them.
In effect, there are no demands, because what is really being demanded is that we disappear.
I couldn’t agree more. I felt funny when writing that because I saw the irony (hence the stipulation about ‘for the purposes of this thread’).
I’m sure this is true. I’d like them to disappear as well.
While I agree with the notion that religious fanatics have their own peculiar way of thinking that generally doesn’t lend itself to reason how can they possibly believe that acts such as this will make us disappear? As painful as it was it hardly scratches the surface when considering the US as a whole. They’d have to carry this out a thousand more times and still they’d be a long way from finished. If nothing else we simply don’t have that many buildings the size of the WTC to conveniently knock-off several thousand people at a go.
Except for pure malevolent glee I can’t see how bin Laden (or whoever) planned to gain from this. Without demands he just succeeded in murdering several thousand people to no effect. The United States is no less strong than it was on Monday. Indeed, if anything, the US will probably strengthen itself furhter in response to this provocation and will likely to its damndest to take down some terrorist groups a notch or two.
As a result I can’t help but go back to the title of this thread and assume that while the terrorists were certainly looking for a big, impressive blow against the US this one got away from them. They may have bit off more than they can chew this time…I hope.
I first want to state I find the acts of September 11th a horrible evil and unforgivable act terror. I by no means agree support or condone terrorist activities.
I personally think they were not successful enough.
The destruction caused was large enough to evoke ALL of America and the nations who are members of NATO full attention and desire to see an end to the formations of these terrorist organizations.
The damage to human life, property and the nations emotional sense of well being while great. It was not enough. America, will mourn those lost and will recover quickly and life will continue close to what it once was.
Had the Bastard invested 20 more individuals and had also employed car bombs at various additional locations in cities all over the country, we would be much closer to a national state of panic and chaos.
Americans thru out the country have rose to the occasion and have taken strides to support the rescue efforts in NYC and Washington and Given a vote of confidence in your elected leaders to find those responsible, those who harbor them, and those who would seek to do the same and punish them.
These horrible acts have caused Americans to unite in the face of adversity. I am filled with pride knowing that all over the country I hear of blood banks with 2 hour waiting periods for donations. I am glad to say I have given blood and donated my Tax refund check I received in the mail Monday to the Red Cross.
The acts of terror brought Americans together, they did not bring America to it’s knees.
Yes, but I don’t think the GIA would have the logistic means to conduct such an operation. Especially since their activity have been drastically reduced over the recent years, in particular a lot of activists have surrendered.
In Algeria, there are strong evidences that some amongst the most dreadful operations have actually been conducted by the algerian security services themselves, or at the very least that they “allowed” these massacres to take place, in order to rally the population against the islamists and in favor of the government.
Personnaly, I’m still not convinced that the terrorist bombings in Paris have not been actually conducted by the algerian services, in order to obtain a greater support and involvment from french authorities. All the terrorists who were arrested “little fishes”, and they could have been misleded by the algerian secret services. Contrarily to the massacres in Algeria I was refering to above, I don’t believe that the algerian services were guilty, but I won’t be surprised if we learnt they were, either…
Quite possibly. Especially since there are certainly strong ties between the GIA and other islamist groups. But the idea of hijacking a plane to crash it on a city could pop up in someone else mind. And even if they were inspired by the Air France plane hijack, it doesn’t mean it was the same people who were responsible. After all, even a group with a political goal totally different from the GIA could think “well, these guys had a grea idea. Let’s do the same”
In other words terrorists. My opinion is it was a way to say : “you aren’t safe. We’ll be able to make you pay for what we consider as attacks from your part on us”. I’m not convinced that the ultimate goal was per se to kill people. I’m not sure what positive result they could have expected, though and I’m sure they have thought about it a lot and had some good (in their mind) reason to act that way. I don’t believe they’re plain idiots. Though you could be right, and they could consider that as plainly an act of war, a war they consider they are fighting against the US (and the US against them).
Well, just to emphasize once again, I am in no way suggesting that the GIA had any direct involvement in this, just that there was a similarity in tactics that I believe is representative of a certain viewpoint.
This is the equivalent of the Mafia killing a cop. They always had that little rule about trying not to do that because they knew it would bring down all kinds of hell on them.
Here, not only did they destroy the WTC, in and of itself enough to cross the line into actual war, the fact that we now know that the Pentagon plane was actually an attempt on the White House means they were truly after causing us to descend into chaos.
4000 FBI agents are working on this. I’m sure as I write this that the military is preparing an “appropriate” response, which given the magnitude of this, is something Osama bin Laden, who they are now 99% certain was behind this, is not even a little bit prepared for. Neither is the Taliban. I don’t think either of them have any real idea what they’re in for.
NATO has taken an unprecedented step by invoking Article Five of its charter, which states that any armed attack against one of its members is considered an attack against all of them. (Full story)
As one official put it: “A hit for one is a hit for all.”
I’d guess the aim of the terrorists is to produce an indiscriminate response from the US and its allies. It remains to be seen whether they will succeed.
I heard something about this from a commentator on NPR (I don’t know who; they all started to blend together). He said the terrorists might not take responsibility because “their audience was God.” The PLO and IRA in the 70s were counting on some measure of sympathy from other nations. These folks seem simply to want to scare the hell out of us.
I guess now we’re asking the right questions. Now WHAT happened, HOW it happened, or WHO did it - but rather, WHY? If we don’t figure out the WHY we won’t be able to wipe this out.
I suggest you login to http://www.lewrockwell.com and read the articles posted there. You may not like what’s posted, but at least it should get us thinking. It SHOULD.
Good cite lightkeeper, but I’m going to answer the mole as if I didn’t read it.
I remember my last, Halloween. I was too old to be begging and so were my friends. We stopped at one house and they gave us oranges. At the next house the people weren't home so we threw the oranges against the side of the house. Well all but me, mine went thru a window. That caused the people to ask their neighbors, who remembered our group and we were caught. That is how bin Laden may have felt yesterday. Everyone says that he couldn't have carried this out all by himself, but I don't see why not. He has plenty of money to support 20 men for 9 months even if all of them trained to be pilots. He picks two airlines (by their names) and plans for one plane from each to target the WTC and one each for the Pentagon. First off out of the 12 men they probably figured it was possible 1 or 2 would not make it thru the check points. Second it was probably figured that one or two planes would get lost or be shot down (look at flight path of second WTC). So the best they hoped for was 2 planes to hit their targets and prayed at least one would.
Instead what happened was both planes hit the WTC and one hit the Pentagon. Then building 1 and building 2 crumbled, which wasn't planned. I'm not totally convinced that the planes being full of gas was for a big explosion. It could have been more to do with making sure they could stay up long enough to find some type of target, if they couldn't find their prime target (as happened with the plane that passed Cleveland before turning back).
When it was all done bin Laden got the same feeling in his stomach that I did when that orange went thru the window. But that is only one of the possibilities.
the goal could have been the destruction itself, striking a mighty blow against the most powerful nation in the world, and damn the consequences…This is akin to saying “I don’t care if you kill me, my family, and all that I believe in…I made you BLEED!!”
They believed their own rhetoric 1, that we are a paper tiger…we may seem strong and powerful, but we are weak of spirit and a good stiff blow will break us…
They believed their own rhetoric 2, that the rest of the world hates the US, and was just waiting for an openning to eradicate us…“even your friends hate you, and they will help us destroy you!”
They had every intention of fessing up, and saying “That was for such-as-such, and we did in the name of Palestine/Irag/Whatever”, someone with more sense realized that relating this to a cause would destroy that cause, and forbade the usual gloating…
Personally, I think it was that they thought somehow that the world had granted them the moral authority to wage war on the USA…that they could pretty much do what they wanted, because the international community would protect them, and the US wouldn’t defy that community…It probably took 5 minutes for them to learn that that wasn’t going happen, and that even other Islamic Regimes were going to distance themselves from them…I believe they were told by whatever government is protecting them not to claim responsibility, and probably to get the hell out, because he has just brought retribution to his people…
I’m willing to bet that a lot of Middle Eastern leaders are wondering if their nations will still exist in a year’s time, and some of them might not, at least as they do today…
After all, the Romans razed Carthage to the ground for less…
Well, we can speculate all we want, but let’s admit this - we know NOTHING about them. We don’t know them, let alone understand them.
On the other hand, they know EVERYTHING about us. They read our books, log in to our websites, read our newspapers, use our products, watch our movies.
It’s scary because it gives them a huge advantage over us, while we’re sitting here speculating and guessing and trying to make sense out of all of this.
I don’t know if they were TOO successful, but I do know this: they meant to cause more damage than they did. The information now says that they intended to attack The White House instead of The Pentagon, and that they also planned to attack Air Force One. This is from several media sources, it seems, so I’m inclined to believe it.
If you look back over Bin Laden’s plans in the past, he doesn’t seem to have ever had one conducted flawlessly. Something always seems to go wrong…over half of them, if I remember correctly, failed completely. The bombing of the WTC in '93 was meant to kill roughly 250,000 people originally…but it didn’t work as well as it was supposed to. It was meant to take both towers down, and instead, neither fell.
Bin Laden, despite all the destruction he’s caused, fails quite often. He even had plans to assassinate The Pope, and Bill Clinton. I was shocked to learn that. This guy needs to be taken care of.
You have answered the question in my mind.
I had been going over and over this question since the bombing.
What is the motivation? What is to be gained?
Escalation makes sense to me. I could see where a fanatic could get himself discouraged by his small army, and convince himself that if he could get things going, then the entire Muslim world would unite and Allah would make sure they ended up ruling the world.
He isn’t concerned about us coming for him, in fact he wants us to undertake a massive offensive against as many Islamic countries as possible so that he can make the case that this is a religous war with the Christians and Jews on one side, and Muslims on the other.
If this is the motivation, then I would place my bets on the second phase going as well as the first. All that remains to be seen is if the Muslim world will unite, and if they do who will win in the end.
I have no idea how this country will handle a sustained terrorist campaign.