This strikes me as you simply needing to blame the Fedayeen, for some reason.
You are claiming that al Qaida could not possibly have known that the UN rebuilding team (with or without Sergio Vieira de Mello) was in the hotel that was occupied expressly by the UN and to which all the UN administrative staff went to work each day? You know for a fact that they could not have simply read the press releases that indicate the days on which Vieira de Mello would make public statements or meet with specific delegations from the Iraqi and international community? How much effort do you think that takes?
How much effort do you think a truck bomb requires? No one has provided serious evidence that it took any more than McVeigh and one accomplice in Oklahoma City.
And the notion that damaging the Jordan embassy is cutting the Iraqi people off from help is ludicrous. Jordan’s sole value as a target is, as Publius noted, its association with the U.S. Jordan, itself, is neither capable of nor desirous of providing any serious assistance (beyond giving Hussein’s daughters refuge–a point that would argue against making them a Fedayeen target).
It may turn out that some rogue Fedayeen were responsible, but the embassy bobmings make no sense in terms of resisting the U.S. occupation. They may make the UN leave, but they will not cause the U.S. to give up.
you seem to forget that embassies are among al Qaida’s most favored targets. (And you describe “flashy random acts,” but I do not recall al Qaida actually taking public credit for any of its attacks.)
I tend to agree that this looks like al-Qaida, whereas the infrastructure attacks look more like Fedayeen.
Frankly, this looks like the start of a major escalation, not just in Iraq, but throughout the world. We’ve had major attacks in Afghanistan, Jordan, Iraq, and Israel.
al-Qaida is also claiming responsibility for the blackout, although that looks to me to be just opportunist posturing. It also looks like there is a new sniper on the loose, although probably unrelated (or could be a lone person responding to the call for jihad). In any event, this has been a week of tremendous instability and violence.
I don’t believe the Ba’athists to be sadists. I don’t believe that they seek to inflict suffering upon the Iraqi people merely for the sake of inflicting suffering. I believe that they have targeted national infrastructure and elements of the CPA-I with the specific intent of expelling the CPA-I from the country.
I don’t see how attacks on the United Nations and Jordan will help them accomplish this. Indeed, I believe it would make their job even more difficult: at the moment, the Ba’athists can plausibly paint the occupation of Iraq as an example of bilaterial imperialism by the United States and Britain. It stands to reason, in my view, that Iraqis at large are much more likely to oppose the occupation if they believe it to be such imperialism than if they believe it to be an international effort to genuinely help rebuild Iraq - particularly if that effort includes Muslim nations like Jordan and definitively non-colonialist entities like the UN.
On the other hand, by targeting a broad spectrum of targets that includes an apostate Muslim government and the UN, al-Qaida may hope to accomplish its goal of fostering a larger clash between the West and Islam.
Actually, I note a certain similarity to the execution of the April 2002 attack on a synagogue on the Tunisian island of Djerba. The choice of target, of course, is reminiscent of a 1995 al-Qaida plot to attack the United Nations complex in New York with a truck bomb.
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I am sorry, but I cannot take this seriously. To say that al-Qaida is “on the run in a different country with most of their leaders captured or killed” completely ignores the global, decentralized nature of the terrorist movement. Have you forgotten the kind of organization that al-Qaida and its affiliates are capable of in Tunisia, Indonesia (including Bali), Morocco, Kenya, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan, and [elsewhere](www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/08/ 14/attack/main568328.shtml) around the world?
Of course, terrorists are going to kill civilians, be they in the World Trade Centers, an Israeli bus, or a Bali night club. Of course they will blow up American servicemen when and wherever they can.
But the UN? Those animals! :rolleyes:
Not to point the finger soley at *Eva Luna, but I have heard the same sentiment expressed by various talking heads today. How fucking clueless can you be? You are just now figuring out that we are fighting among the most evil and maniacal animals ever? That people who would kill civilians at the drop of a dime are going to give two shits about whether or not they are in the UN?
Sad. But hopefully, some peoples eyes were opened to the actual depth of the threat. I doubt it, but here’s to hoping…
tomn, I agree with both of your posts overall, but I’d like offer a different conclusion.
I think what we’re increasingly seing over the past few days – from the mortar attacks on the prison, to the water main, pipelines, Jordan Embassy and now, this – is a something of a shift in resistance tactics from hard to soft targets. And I wouldn’t be totally surprised to learn that there’s some degree of coordination between the different factions.
After all, even if they are pursuing different ends, a possible return of the Ba’ath party on one side, a theocratic State on the other, there’s a common enemy that takes precedent at this point. Get rid of the invaders first, deal with their differences afterwards.
Because I think it’s hard to argue with the end result of recent events. More and more it looks like the US has lost control – if indeed it ever really had any – of the country and that it is plunging into complete anarchy. Whether that’ll be enough to force an American departure, hard to say – too many variables involved. But I doubt anyone’s arguing, other than your Clueless Leader and the Usual Suspects[sup]®[/sup] that is, that things are going well in Iraq.
Simply the worst possible news all around.
Beyond that, I don’t think I’ve seen anyone mention in this thread that the UN had just signed a resolution (#1500 I believe) recognizing Iraq’s puppet Government, and it was none other than Viera de Mello that handed the official letter of recognition to Iraqi reps just two or three days ago. That alone, could have made him (and the UN) a “legitimate” target in the eyes of some.
Excuse me. Just exactly which Ba’athist party in Iraq have you been following? It cant be the same Ba’athist party that routinely murders and imprisons not just the people suspected of being disloyal to the party but their families as well. It can not be the same Ba’athist party that is responsible for the disappearance of tens of thousands of Iraqi citizens. It doesnt form a resemblance to that same party that had killed a whole village of Kurds with nerve gas. This cant be the same party that invaded Kuwait, then set their oil fields aflame as a sign of defiance to a coalition nations that included Arab states. How can it be the same party that denied religious freedom to the Shiites who make up the majority of the population of Iraq? and it certainly cannot be that exact same Ba’athist party that spawned the Fedayeen, that dress in civilian clothes and fire upon an overwhelming force of american troops merely to disappear into a crowd of innocents.
If the Iraqi Ba’athist party are not sadist, they certainly give little or no concern for the wellbeing of any iraqi who is not murderously and fanatically loyal to Saddam.
Saddam is the only benefactor to the terror and chaos that is being perpetrated on Iraq. In this anarchy, no new govt can form and with no democratically elected govt, there is no one to stop him except the US whom he paints as the evil occupier of Iraq.
Perhaps I should have qualified my statement a bit better; I meant that the Ba’athists were not sadists merely for the sake of being sadists. They did not, in my view, take pleasure from others’ suffering merely because others were suffering; or at least, I do not believe that this was not their primary motivation in inflicting suffering. I believe that they took pleasure from others’ suffering primarily because that suffering served as a direct means to the maintenance of their power in Iraq.
As I have outlined above, I do not believe that the attacks on the Jordanian Embassy and the UN site mesh with the way in which the Ba’athists have attempted to restore this power before. Of course, it is certainly possible that is the Ba’athists behind both attacks, and that they merely seem to be acting a bit out of character, but at the moment I’m putting my money on al-Qaida and company for reasons discussed above.
I would also challenge the assertion that Saddam is the only man who stands to benefit from continued chaos in Iraq. The Shi’a leader Moqtada Sadr, for one, seems to be profiting far more handsomely from the current state of affairs than any Ba’athist. Al-Qaida, meanwhile, has been blessed with an entirely new theater in which to combat the United States and attract new converts - exactly the sort of revitalization that its jihad needed after the punishment it took post-September 11.
To hear the anti-“Bushistas” say it, there are no links to Al Qaeda in Iraq. There was no proven terrorist training camps, no secret nogatiations and deals with Saddam and any know leader of the decentralized leadership of Al Qaeda. This mythical terrorist link was part of the same faulty, exagerated intelligence that Bush used to lie to the people of the world in order to justify an invasion into Iraq.
And yet you are here to tell us that not only is Al Qaeda present in Iraq, it is so pervasive and highly organized as to have a complex secret network of safehouses throughout northern and western Iraq with which thousands of non-Iraqi combatants are able to insert themselves into the population without being detected by Kurds, Turks and Americans who are actively looking for them. While these Al Qaeda leaders and operatives are non-iraqi, they are completely trusted by the former leadership of Iraq to carry out missions that the Fedayeen themselves cannot accomplish. Iraqi citizens allow these “foreigners” to destroy their water source, blow up fellow arabs and Iraqis, destroy iraqi resources and undermine the formation of a govt made up of Iraqi citizens.
You got a choice here now. Either Al Qaeda were there all along as intelligence reports have said (because a network like this can not be formed in a few months by non-iraqis) in which case even without WMD, it is a powerful arguement for justifying removing Saddam from power by all means available
OR
There never were any Al Qaeda there. The intelligence reports about terrorists in Iraq was just as bogus as WMDs buried in the sand just outside Bahgdad. No training camps, no terrorist links. In which case, the terrorist responsible for the UN bombing were not Al Qaeda.
Please, this false dichotomy is rather unbecoming. I seem to recall that al-Qaida was established enough in this country several years back to do considerably more than blow up a hotel, and yet one could hardly make a reasonable argument that the United States supports al-Qaida.
It is irrelevant whether or not the deposed Ba’athist party Enjoys would enjoy their sadistic strategies. The fact is that they are sadistic in nature and they are more than willing to impliment any sadistic tactic that would further their goals.
You dont see these attacks as being in character with the way they have done things before. There is a reason for that. Before, the Ba’athist party was the most powerful force in Iraq. Their sadistic methods were used to maintain that power. No one person or group was powerful enuf to challenge them. Anyone who had even the potential of doing that was imprisoned or put to death. This rule even applied to Saddam’s sons. This went on for decades.
Now along comes the US military. They speed into Bahgdad in weeks what other armies in history took years to accomplish. They bomb palaces and strategic sites with complete impunity. They overrun even the best of the Republican guards with astoundingly little cost to themselves. The Ba’athists are resoundingly and utterly beaten.
Before the Ba’sthist party did things to win, to gain power, to take what they want and destroy all opposition.
When the US came, they became impotent. They have no hope of taking power from the US military. They are hoplessly outmatched in firepower. Their new tactic is now not to lose.
If Saddam cant have Iraq, then nobody will. He has demonstrated the willingness to use that tactic over and over before.
and yet after 9-11, Al Qaeda is unable to function in the US in the same capacity you give them credit for in Iraq. It took them years to plot a new attack on the towers. Yet youre saying they can set up shop in mere months in Iraq under the very noses of the entire US military, who have specially trained operatives there whose sole mission is to find Al Qaeda operatives.
And you are badly mistaken to compare the US with Iraq. Al Qaeda operated in the US under the benefit of freedom set forth in our constitution. Iraq was a totalitarian regime. Nothing operates in Iraq without the knowledge and/or permission of Saddam. Al Qaeda believes in Theocratic rule, something that Saddams secular govt is totally opposed to. Saddam is not so naive or foolish as to suppress the religious freedoms of Shiites but have their militant foreign versions run around in his country unchecked.
Totally false choice. There is no proof Saddam Hussein supported Al Qaeda. None. There is proof that Al Qaeda has now moved into Iraq because it is occupied by Americans. This is in today’s News: Analysts: Iraq a ‘magnet’ for al Qaeda The evidence indicates it was the US invasion and occupation which have stirred up a hornets nest.
Eva, you’re starting with the false premise that we’re dealing with Nice People.
We aren’t.
We’re dealing with Nasty People.
Although I suspect Al Qaeda (or however you spell the damn name) to be involved, in a certain sense it doesn’t matter WHO triggered the destruction, only that it happened. And it happened for the same reason that, every time it looks like the Palestinians and the Isrealis just might make some progress towards peace someone blows up a buss or a shopping mall or some such.
Sad to say, there are some people in this world who do NOT want peace. Oh, no. They thrive on chaos and terror. When any form of progress towards greater peace and order happens in a hot spot like the Middle East or Indonesia or Chechnya or the Balkans they have to stir the pot again.
It’s not even a matter of “Muslim” vs. “the West”. These people want to obliterate anyone who is NOT just like them. They have no compunction about killing Muslims because, really, Islam is not what motivates them. Power motivates them. Power to destory, power to control other people. That’s it.
And it’s NOT just Al Qaeda. There are a number of groups out there. If they do cooperate against a common enemy don’t let it fool you - once the common enemy is gone they’ll fall to fighting each other. Then you’ll see what we saw in Afganistan - groups fighting an endless civil war until one crowd is on top and the country is in ruins. And even then, it didn’t stop the killing. They kept defining “acceptable” by terms more and more narrow until they were executing people by the hundreds (if not thousands) in the name of eliminating any deviance from their “norm”.
How can you negotiate with folks like this? They want the total destruction of those they regard as enemies. How can you negotiate with that? You can’t.
I don’t like Bush - anyone who reads my posts on a regular basis knows I have a great deal of contempt for him - but when he calls these people “the enemies of civilization” he is, for once, correct. The barbarians are at the gates of Rome again. This isn’t really a war about religion (although religion plays a part) or between “West” and “non-West”, it’s a war over who controls the world. It’s not a war like other big wars that have been fought before - the US military is too powerful for these guys to take on directly, and whatever they are, they aren’t total fools. They’re striking where and when they can, trying to do enough damage so the edifice of government collapses from an infrastructure riddled with holes and a society torn by distrust.
As I said, these groups (there are several) want the total destruction of those they declare to be their enemies, no matter how small or large. And they are not afraid to die. Some even volunteer to die in the cause. Even if the US disappeared off the face of the planet tomorrow, they’d still be around, and they’d attack the next “Great Satan” on their list. Don’t be fooled into thinking this is the US vs. Al Qaeda - or haven’t you noticed that most of the terror attacks post 9/11 have been outside the US? Or just stick your head in the sand after all - it’s so much easier to believe it’s somebody else’s problem, that the Americans “had it coming” due to our arrogance and wealth or whatever excuse is popular this week. Just ignore what’s also happened in Bali and Moscow and Saudi Arabia and other places.
I have no idea who carried out these particular attacks ( nor, in some respects, do I care - while al Qaeda involvement would be interesting, it would not be shocking and frankly I consider it near-inevitable they’d get involved eventually in some capacity, anyway - it’s too tempting an opportunity to sow chaos ), but I will note that the above scenario is completely unnecessary for al Qaeda to have been involved in the UN hit. As a “soft” target it was highly vulnerable and it would seem likely even a small team of reasonably trained and dedicated personnel could pull it off. That’s one of the reasons suicide attacks are such a threat.
I also see no reason why they would need to coordinate with any local opposition, though there certainly could be advantage to doing so.
However, no reason to jump the gun. While this does seem to be a shift in tactics to those more characteristic of al Qaeda, the UN bombing could indeed just be a more-than-usually addled ex-fedayeen attack. It would not a be a very sensible move politically, but the counter-argument that such resistance groups aren’t always sensible, is a valid one.
Who the fuck murders innocent men, women and children riding on a city bus?
In both cases, the murderers are probably Islamic Arabs who have been taught to hate Western culture. They were supported by terrorist organizations. These organizations attack high-profile targets they are able to get at. Busses and hotels are common targets. Recall the Passover suicide bombing at the Park Hotel in Netanya on 27-Mar-2002,
Most Westerners have believed that they were not involved in the conflict between Israel and middle east terorrist groups. They saw themselves as bystanders. Many Westerners have chosen to be neutral in the struggle between Israel and Islamic terrorists. Some even favor the Islamic terrorist side.
Yesterday’s two horrendous attacks demonstrated that Israel’s battle is the West’s battle. If you live in the West, Israel’s enemies are your enemies.
This is naïve. It’s not fucking difficult to be a terrorist. That’s the problem. Sure, the WTC and Pentagon attacks were incredibly complex, but how hard is it to fill a car with semtex and blow it up, especially ? The IRA and other Northern Irish terror groups managed to whack people in the UK and Northern Ireland for nearly 30 years while the British intelligence and military infrastructure dominating the entire place, dedicated solely to rooting out terrorists. Now compare the number and coverage of US/UK forces and the size of Iraq to the problem in NI and you realise it’s a really difficult task.
Find me one. And I mean the “terrorist side”, not the cause that the terrorists happened to be espousing. Otherwise you’re misrepresenting the issue.
:rolleyes: You’re accepting the conflation of the various issues, just like Al Q and Saddam tried to do.
I am too pissed off now to think straight, either about the state of the world in general, or about the OP.
But it disgusts me further that some of you cannot seem to take off your little ideological binders.
december, you know, some world events actually have nothing whatsoever to do with the Palestinians. Really.
**Brutus, ** you call me “fucking clueless.” You may think I’m wearing rose-colored glasses (I’m not, by the way. Am I not allowed to experience different degrees of shock and disgust? Yes, if that’s possible, I do think it’s more disgusting to murder someone who is trying to be part of the fucking solution than someone who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time). You, sir, are wearing blinders.
Do you not understand a simple fucking rant when you see one? You know, sometimes people have different opinions and expectations that you, and it’s not because they’ve missed something. Yes, maybe the hotel should have had tighter security. Yes, being a peacekeeper is a dangerous job. No, I’ve never been in a combat zone, but that doesn’t mean I’m a naive idiot. You might try directing your anger where it belongs, i.e. at the people who think cold-blooded murder is a rational solution, not at the people who are trying to make sense of it all.
We just got word from my firm’s NY office that Arthur Helton, Senior Fellow for Refugee Studies and Preventative Action with the Council on Foreign Relations, was meeting with Sergio Vieira de Mello at the U.N. building in Baghdad at the time of the bombing yesterday. Obviously, he’s dead, too. I haven’t seen this reported anywhere else yet, so I htought I’d share.
(**Brutus, ** do I have your ever-so-well-informed permission to be pissed off at this turn of events, too? Or am I only allowed to be pissed off about those civilians who didn’t have a choice about putting themselves in harm’s way?)
Exactly! That’s what I meant in my own rant. This ain’t the GD forum and maybe those who want to debate the intricacies of this should go there and start their own thread. This is a thread to vent about an event that is going to screw over the Iraqi people even more.
Eva Luna, that’s terrible. So many good people lost yesterday.