Us and Them
Ken Livingstone has given his views on the terrorist attack on London, describing it as ‘mass murder’ and ‘indiscriminate… slaughter’. Now, this I agree with. However, I want to make it as clear as possible that the bombing attacks that took place today are no different to the ’shock and awe’ bombing attacks that took place in Iraq. The only difference is our perception of the bloodshed. We will be informed by the media that the victims in London were innocent victims targeted by cold-blooded terrorists, yet any civilians deaths in Iraq are described to us by the media as purely ‘collateral damage’.
Mayor Livingstone stated that ‘this was not a terrorist attack against the mighty or the powerful… it was aimed at ordinary working-class Londoners’, similiar then to the NATO bombing of media centres in Yugoslavia and Iraq for example. What has to be realised is that statements like this have no value, if a terrorist could have wondered through Gleneagles dropping bombs or detonating himself killing the world leaders, then they would. However, the ‘mighty’ and ‘powerful’ are well protected, isolated by the realities of their actions, it is left to the civilian populace (as in all major conflicts) to bare the brunt of violence. London is an easy target, any public place is, as they are surprisingly, public.
It was a message to the rich and powerful, delivered in the only way possible to them. Tony Blair promises security, whilst stirring up hatred across the world with his actions, and until this changes then the UK populace will be a target, as they are the only accessible option.
July 8th, 2005 at 9:22 am
I thinnk ID cards are an excellent idea…think the government should pay for them but thats a different issue.
It is impossible to stop terrorism, but it is possible to limit the extent, which is what ID cards could achieve. Police would be able to stop as a matter of routine, people and ask for ID
This would undoubtably make it harder for people involved in criminal activity
to operate, be it on the level of terrorism or anti-social behaviour.
And if you have nothing to hide, what is the problem? German citizens
carry ID, a scheme that has been operated succesfully.
On a different note, London would have been a terrorist target before Iraq. The inevitable has happened,and whatever has happened in Iraq, yesterday’s events were beyond any reasoning or qualification. To say that attacking the British public is ‘the only option’
facing terrorist’s is frankly nuts..
July 8th, 2005 at 11:34 am
But this implies that all terrorists involved in the attacks were illegal aliens, what if they were citizens of the UK, once ID cards are brought in they would have one just the same as anyone else.
So they could produce an ID card the same as anyone else.
If we go around bombing other countries - like we have for the last 50 years - then of course London was a target before Iraq. As far as options are concerned, what options do they have then? The war in Iraq was ILLEGAL, but to whom could they appeal? The UN security council perhaps? Or would that be a bit pointless as the UK and US have permanent seats and could easily veto any action.
Like I said, terrorists have very little ability to attack our leaders, so they simply take the easy option. Just like we did in Iraq, the shock and Awe caimpaign was designed not to simply stop the Iraq army, but to destroy the infrastructure of civilian life in order to force the nation as a whole to surrender.
I wonder what options those in Iraq really have apart from acts like this? I would really like to hear some suggestions as to what they could possibly do. As the US and UK laugh at the very idea that they might in fact be terrorists themselves, and have already asserted their own sense of moral superiority by claiming to be spreading democracy to such ‘uncivilised people’ essentially closing any room for debate or reflection - I would be interested to see how they have any options.
Like I said, the UK and US act in complete disregard of international law, so how could anybody bring them to account for their actions?
July 8th, 2005 at 2:49 pm
George - just to let you know that Madrid had ID cards - and look what happened there. And touching on what the editor has said, the war did not start with 9/11. If anything, Iraq has given al-Qaida even more reasons to hate us. So to hear the “politicians” exponding drivel
such as “they hate our freedoms” is to nip in the bud
any spirit of enquiry about why this is happening.
I used to live in London and had I still been there I
certainly would have been caught up in the events of
yesterday as it occured on the route I took to work.
Many of my friends are still there but I know one thing,
they all say this is due to the Blair’s stupidity
in following that baboon in the White House.
July 9th, 2005 at 12:28 pm
ID cards alone cannot alone stop terrorism, it is nigh on impossible to stop
a nutcase with a bomb getting on a bus or a tube.
However, they should be part of a collective response to terrorism, a response
that can not eliminate terrorism but can reduce the extent, alongside increased
police presence etc..
On the level of anti-social behaviour, ID cards would be highly effective.
Why do ID cards suggest suspects are foreign? Finally, the bastards who let off
those bombs are not representative of Iraqi citizens as a whole, opinions on the
invasion are mixed in Iraq, and few reasonable human beings would advocate
killing innocent London residents on mass. Are you saying the terrorists were
justified?! “they had no alternative”?
July 9th, 2005 at 3:30 pm
Terrorism can never be justified, but to combat terrorism we need to actually look at why people are prepared to put a bus on a bomb, sometimes with themselves attached during detonation. George you state that these people are ‘nuts’, well this is very convienient for politicians, who are trying to dismiss such attacks as attacks on our ‘freedoms’ and ‘values’, by people who are ‘mad’, and against the way that all of live our lives.
This is an extremely blinkered and ignorant view, as is ‘combat is impossible to stop, but increased security is vital’ etc etc, as already pointed out, increased security will not stop someone blowing up a bus, nothing can. What we need to do is assess exactly why they feel the need to pursue acts of terror, in this case the root cause of terrorism is illegal wars waged by the West particularly during the last 50 years (primarily the UK and US) in the Middle East with the sole intent on maintaining a dominant military presence in oil rich nations. Let us not forget that protecting economic and oil interests is what led us putting Saddam Hussain into power in the first place.
The UK and US have pursued consistant regime change across the world in order to protect the interests of an elite and unelected few for the last 50 years. A lot of the very worst countries to live, due to horrific repression, and extremely deprived public resources etc, are solely due to regime changed pursued then supported by money and arms from the UK and the US.
It is not surprising that there are a lot of angry people across the world who want revenge, and as I pointed out, due to the pointlessness of appealing to any international organisations for help, and the lack of viable military targets, innocent people will be the targets. This is not justified, nor can I condone it, but at least I am prepared to try to explain why people act as they do, rather than calling them ‘nuts’ and continuing the problems by supporting yet more illegal military action from our governments.
Lets not forget that Al Qaeda were never even properly pursued after 9/11, and in the days following 9/11 Bush had already made it clear that Iraq would be blamed and invaded for 9/11. I despise Tony Blair, but to his credit in this instance he pursuaded Bush to actually pursue those responsible, but had to agree to support an Iraqi invasion as soon as Afghanistan was finished. Afghanistan was another case of ‘precision’ bombing, high civilian death rate, and the people responsible slipped away due to the lack of interest the American government actually had in catching them.
We need to realise that the priorities of our governments are not in stopping terrorism, else how can they justify their lack of action in chasing Osama Bin Laden - look into it, no-one really tried to catch him. The governments prioty is to justify securing traditional goals, oil supplies, wealth and strategic power in the Middle East and anywhere else. Since the end of the Cold War the main justification for invading other countries has dissapeared, and they needed a new reason to justify wars to the public, now they have one: the ‘war’ on terror.
With each new conflict traditional goals of the US and the UK are completed, with the effect of increasing the number of terrorists, thus new attacks will take place, on civilians, the government will cry outrage, say ‘our spirit will not be broken’ etc and use the attack to further justify more military action.
The government do not care about protecting citizens, if they did they might be addressing the real causes of terrorism. In the world of statistics the government considers about 1000 people injured and around 50 dead a price worth paying to secure oil and influence, after all to the government 50 dead is nothing to pay when a nation is at war.This is the reality behind the war on terror, and the reality of why innocent people will continue to die.
July 10th, 2005 at 12:44 pm
Somebody who kills a large number of innocent people, who incidently
spanned a huge variety of nations and religions, is mad. Most people would agree.
I do not advocate western history in occupying and manipulating oil rich regions,
But there is no justification for terrorism..which is what this website is doing.
You should also pay some attention to the mass graves discovered in Iraq..and consider that a number of Iraqi’s were in favour of removing Saddam…the problem is not resolving the aftermath.
Please dont call me ignorant and blinkered..its a tad rude.
July 10th, 2005 at 1:12 pm
Its funny that the mass graves were filled when the Western world had no interest in what Saddam got up to, indeed the chemical attacks on the Kurdish in Iraq were only possible thanks to the R&D asssistance given to the Iraqi’s when we were best of friends. I don’t recall any moral outrage at the time from the US and the UK, just stony silence and ‘oh well, at least he suits our interests’ etc.
I’m not saying the removal of Saddam was not a good thing, but the lack of attention paid to how we put him into power in the first place, supported his killings of the Kurds and his repression of his population whilst he was obeying our orders and interest, is what is really wrong. Likewise the sanctions that we put in place in Iraq killing around 500,000 children during the period after the first Gulf war before the second, perhaps we should have looked into this a bit, I mean if we really care about Iraqi’s enough to invade the country we should have looked at other ways we could have helped them.
The website does not aim to justify terrorism, merely to look at why it happens, something the government would never do, as to do so would be to realise our own terrorism. State terrorism has been perpetrated by Britain and America as a matter of policy for years, yet we don’t hear that condemned. Instead we justify it, the media are implicit in condoning goverment terrorism as are we all.
I apologise for the ignorant remark, it was meant as a general statement on how ill-informed we are as a nation. The British conscience is living in a fantasy world whereby we seem to beleive that we are usually doing the right thing, and any mistakes are through the execution of policy, rather than the policy itself. (for instance you criticise the way that the Iraq war was handled, implying the policy was right, but the execution poor).
We have no problems justifying our state terrorism, yet we always state unequivicolly that terrorism can NEVER be justified. So what is it to be then? If we choose to justify our own terrorism, then we must be able to justify all terrorism. Or if we choose to state that terrorism is completely unjustifiable, then we must condemn the terrorism of the Western governments, rather than condoning it as we do now.
Or have we reached the crux of the argument, it is always one rule for us, another rule for ‘them’.
That is the point I am trying to make, terrorism is simply a viewpoint, we like to call it war, dress it up as exporting ‘democracy’ or human rights, but really it is the use of force to bring nations into line with our way of thinking. That is terrorism, the use of force to pursue policy, that is why we have nuclear weapons, that is why we don’t want anyone else to have them, as it lessens our power to pursue goals through the threat of violence.
July 11th, 2005 at 2:39 pm
Another point I’d like to raise with you George - to say that opinions on the invasion and occupation of Iraq are mixed is very inaccurate - recent polls suggest that the majority of Iraqi view the US/UK forces as occupiers and also advocate attacks against them. You may also find it worthwhile to see what a recent edition of the Daily Mail reported (I think it was in Friday or Saturday’s edition - 8th/9th July) on the Iraqi view of the London attack. sentiments such as “What you suffered is a pinprick compared to what we go through every day as a result of your
terror” or another one-a school teacher who lost a niece
-who said she hoped the British suffered like the Iraqis
July 11th, 2005 at 4:52 pm
The Daily Mail!!?? Nuf said..
Some digby people were on one of the tubes that got hit..do you remember Doug?
the really big ginger guy..he was on the King’s Cross tube, got out without being seriously hurt though.
Part of Leeds city centre was shut off last night..think some bloke left his bag
laying about and lost some of his possessions to a controlled explosion in the end.
Only a matter of time before I do something similar I guess!
July 11th, 2005 at 5:48 pm
Cardiff train station and surrounding area was closed on Thursday.