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Quote: from Dungheap on 4:20 pm on July 21, 2005[br]steve:-
THESE BOMBERS BOMBED BALI AND THE TWIN TOWERS BEFORE THE INVASION OF IRAQ.
<br>
Keep going back Minitser Blair. In 1953 the CIA / British intlegence Led a military coup against the democratically elected prime minister Mohammed Mossedeq after he attempted to nationalise Irans oil fields…………………………….
Yes there is a history to the middle east/Europe / USA Minister Blair but it goes much further back than your current " they bombed us for no reason on 9/11 " argument
Well the origins of a christianity versus muslim conflicts certainly go back beyond the middle ages.
SteveDG:- No lets not change my comment, my words are want I want to say, your words are what as you put it are "la la la I’m not listening" because if you read my comments, I have said "I would have preffered that the invasion of Iraq had not happened." furthermore the aims of these bombers have little to do with Iraq as has been said by me and others, this conflict started before Iraq.
So we now have what would have been a second wave of bombings on the day, London was supporting its dead. So these people (and some of you) can find justification for that? We have armed police on the street, with a kill first policy can you find justification in their actions for that? Unfortunatly (which incidentally I deplore) some people are targeting mosques and Asians, can you find justifications in their actions for that?.<br>These people are from our country, most it seems born and bred here, in this country our system is to lobby, stand for parliment, raise issues not bomb and blow your point across, all they will do is strengthen national resolve against their causes, no matter how laudable or stupid their causes are. If they win then reasoned arguement can never win. Because these bombers have left no reasons why they did it, many of them their family did not know of their feelings, yet they feel that blowing people up indescriminantly for their cause is justified. these people are beyond talk. Their dream are Talibanesque countries where any other religeon, equal rights or the freedom of speech and election are not even considered. Sorry i am just not interested.
Many of you here disagree with our actions on Iraq, in fact you seem so focused on that issue, that the broader canvas passes you by. Furthermore, the same people seem obsessed by their dislike (and it seems hatred of Blair), as I have said I would have preffered Iraq had not happened, not do I personally like Blair, but I will not be blinkered by those thoughts. Our voting system which has worked for many years now has elected him and again I will say that, it is history that will show wether he was right or wrong.
The problem is of course Dungheap, those that blow up innocent people on trains in London and those that drop cluster bombs on innocent people in the desert are all equally evil murderers. To put one set of murderers above another is a form of insanity.
Dungheap
No lets not change my comment, my words are want I want to say
Your words may be what you want to say, but you didn’t<br>actually mean them.
The words were very principled and righteous. However, there were caveats which you left out which change their meaning completely.
And I knew these caveats were there in the background because I was listening.
furthermore the aims of these bombers have little to do with Iraq as has been said by me and others, this conflict started before Iraq
By the same logic, the attack on Afghanistan in 2001 had "little to do" with 9/11 because the US had bombed that country just a few years earlier.
What about the Madrid bombing? Anything to do with Iraq? Or was it just coincidence that it was a country that supported the Iraq invasion?
in this country our system is to lobby, stand for parliment, raise issues not bomb and blow your point across
That’s how we treat each other, with respect for the law and the rights of each other.
However, it’s not how we treated the people of Iraq (or Serbia).
We failed to make the case in the UN but went ahead and bombed anyway.
Double standards.
Because these bombers have left no reasons why they did it,
Why do we need to hear from these 4 people?
They’re what’s being called "Islamists". We know that the major grievances of Islamists revolve around the west’s conduct in the middle east.
yet they feel that blowing people up indescriminantly for their cause is justified
So, just like Bush, Blair and Clinton.
these people are beyond talk.
Could that be how muslims feel about the US & UK? That there’s no dialogue? That communication is "bow before us or be destroyed"?
Where could the Palestinians go to be heard? Where could they go to find protection or to reinstate the land rights the UN has said are rightly theirs?
raise issues not bomb and blow your point across, all they will do is strengthen national resolve against their causes
Could this be something that goes both ways?
Could the US, by reducing Falluja to rubble, create generations of people who will hate the US forever for detroying their city?
Will some of those people dream of revenge? Of reducing New York or LA or London to rubble?
There are people on this thread who feel that the most effective and principled course would be for the West to take a long look in the mirror and accept that much of our foreign policy has been oppressive and lopsided.
We’ve been willing to support hideous regimes. We’ve turned a blind eye to the crimes of our allies (eg Turkey, Israel, Saudi Arabia) but kicked the s**t
out of other countries for lesser crimes.And the guiding principle behind our actions seems to be our own self-interest, rather than morality or international law.
What I would like to see is:
(1) for us to stop playing master of the universe and hand over the right to arbitrate to an independent international tribunal. <br>(2) An even handed approach to the Palestine-Israel conflict. <br>(3) For the West to create a charter of human rights and to stop giving military support to any country who fails to live up to this.
Then, if the muslim world has a grievance with the West (or Israel), they’d have the opportunity to make their case and, where appropriate, get an enforcable resolution.
I believe these steps would move us towards a safer, fairer world.
That’s my proposal.
What’s yours?
Steve<br>
SteveDg<br>I did mean what was posted simple as that. there were no caveats left out.
By the same logic in Egypt yesterday the attack was aimed at whom exactly?
I have said on here steve that I disagreed with american and british actions in palestine. but by and large the Jewish nation has been given leeway for the atrocities committed against it during WWII. I believe that is slowly coming to an end.
The mandate of non conformation was never rescinded by the UN Hussein had not complied with it.
You are obviously fixated with Iraq and Blair/Bush and as I said you do not look at the broader canvas.
The wests conduct in the middle east, has never in my view been near perfect, and a lot of the problems come from the cold war with USSR. Where the USSR and the USA fought over countries like two dogs over a bone. If there are failings it was not allowing these countries to self determine post cold war. The problem then arises how to let them change over a period time. Just pull out, let anarchy reign as it has in Iran and afghanistan? There is no simple answer, by you, me or the Leaders of the western world.
They may feel that, they have no way of speaking, but do you support their methods of killing innocent non Military people?. The IRA in most cases gave warnings to raise their cause by terrorism. Not these people. <br>there is no way on earth I nor any sensible person can find support for their actions in any way, I can possibly sympathise with their objectives. But they will not even listen, because quite simply, they have no morals IMO with regard to human life, please do not give me the Iraq guff again, as we minimised non military targets as far as was possible whether or not it was an agreeable or disagreeable action.
Steve I do not and will not condone action of this kind by anyone for any reason whatsoever. If you find you can thats your call and if that is so IMO misguided.
Your points whilst excellent are fundementally flawed, to whit democracy is not democracy until religeon is taken out of the equation. And who will pay for the subsequent policing.
My proposal is quite simple, if both sides come and talk, but like yours the problem is that the current terrorists are not interested in free democracy but as I said Talibanesque prohibitive states. So until they are stopped or decide they are not getting anywhere the fight will go on.
There is no simplistic answer to all of this, each continet in turn has or will sort(ed) out its mastery. Until a one world government exists the these things will happen, even if a new world police force is created.
IMHO the answer to "London bombings – why did they happen?" is not to be found in debating geo-political issues.
A number of posters on this thread seek to answer the question by basically going down the path that there are no enemies, just friends whose grievances we haven’t yet accommodated, and then launch into bashing Bush/Blair/Sharon. ÂÂÂ
Well, in this case IMHO there are real enemies and that kind of approach doesn’t work.
First, there is no equation of force as exercised by a state and force as exercised by an individual.  The essence of a society is that force is reserved to the state (imperfect though it may be, the state  has a democratic mandate for its international as well as its national activities), and individuals can’t go around making individual decisions to injure and kill based on their individual mind state. ÂÂÂ
Second, seems to me the immediate questions are:<br>a.   who are these disaffected youths around the UK?<br>b.   what end are they trying to achieve?<br>c.   who or what makes them think they’re justified in using violence to achieve it?<br>d.   what pushes them into a suicidal tendency in using that violence?
<br>They seem to be mainly second/third generation immigrants who are Muslims.  They seem to be in a far greater generation gap than the indigenous population. The parents want them to stick by the old ways, language and dress, and eventually to return to their ancestral homelands, from which they were forced rather than chose to move.  The kids on the other hand hanker after the freedoms of other children around them.   Take the youngest suicide bomber Hasib Hussain – 18 years old and deeply religious (twice visited Mecca) but had also been arrested for shoplifting and liked to get high on marijuana.  They end up with a double life, strangers both to their parents and the country they live in.  ÂÂÂ
They stay away from their local mosque but are attracted by radical groups like Hizb ut-Tahrir – banned in Germany and Holland but the largest extremist group in the UK.  From Shiv Malik in the New Statesman:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><br>Unlike Britain’s mainstream Muslim clerics, most of whom are foreign born and obsessed with getting you to rote-learn the Koran, groups like Hizb are in touch with the young: they don’t insist on dress codes, long beards and prayers five times a day…..most important, they offer an intense sense of purposeful belonging.
They cultivate the idea that Muslims all belong to one community – the Umma – with one clear (if totally unrealistic) political goal: the triumph of the caliphate (an Islamic super-state, covering not only the Middle east but also large parts of Europe.).  "Work for the caliphate", Hizb tells its recruits. "The caliphate will restore honour to your mothers and sisters"<br> <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
Sure, its easier for these groups to operate if they can point to British or US soldiers "killing your brothers in the Umma", but realistically (and I base this comment on my own ongoing conversations over years with Saudis, Egyptians, Jordanians, Iranians, Lebanese, Iraqis) the reality is that most Muslims do not actually see a single Umma, rather their own tribe/ nation first. None of them hold with anything that involves the taking of human life.
From the Guardian:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
….according to Anne Marie Oliver, a leading expert on the suicide bomb phenomenon, in the end its psychological factors that turn an angry youth into a suicide bomber.  There is a sense of pride  at having been selected by an Al-Quaeda recruiter for such an honour.  Most importantly, there is the element of ecstatic camaraderie that keeps the group together….Look at the CCTV pictures and you see them smiling.  They look like a group of friends going on holiday.
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<br>  ÂÂÂ
The way to cure the UK suicide bomber threat would seem to be a mixture of reconnection between the generations in Muslim immigrant communities, and cracking down on the brainwashing extremists.   Not an easy or a quick process, but very necessary.
If the domestic threat is neutralized, the foreign-based threat will be easier to handle.
best regards
wit <br>
This is why..While invading Iraq did not help,the reason they have attacked now is the new laws on terrorism in Britian.The laws that allow people to be detained without trial…While you have this law, you are no longer a free democracy.With this law ANYONE can be held,no reason given…You are not at war with a soverign nation..Tyrants throughout history have used the pretext of "emergency powers" to suspend justice and democracy.I believe that is how the Germans lost their democracy in the 30’s..Fight for your civil liberties as goverments arent personaly affected by losing them ,they are happy to recind them.No MP or their familys will ever be held with no trial ,irrespectve of what they do..Its you the people who suffer and they dont help anything,they solve nothing.Your goverment can kill "terrorists" by the truckload but oppressed people have children,who will carry on the fight…There are two longterm options..One is genocide and the other is stop oppresing people.Chose your goverment carefully and keep them on the right track.Contary to popular opinion,goverments are not very smart.
On another point about Iraq.Lets not forget this fight is the most censored in history..After the reporting in Vietnam turned public opinion ,the Americans have carefully decided on a strqategy to give out only news that makes them look good,ie in bed reporting..We have seen the us forces actually attack an independant source (aljazera) and kill reporters.It would follow that they have killed other reporters they dont approve of…We only get snippets of real news mostly online..American soldiers shoot out hospital windows where wounded arabs are being treated.Remember many,many civillians are caught up in this.The us soldiers assult the female staff and terrorise all the staff and doctors…One can only imagine the atrocities us soldiers have commited over there..Can you imagine a 7-7 every single day…Make no mistake america is a fascist state and they are commiting crimes against humanity and suppresing news about it..Did you relise everything we write is monitered by us millatary.These web exchanges ,your cell calls…Calling small groups terrorists regardless of their cause and exonarating every goverment regardless of how unjust and how horrible their attriocities is wrong .Its black propaganda…We need to think for ourselfs like never before…Violent goverments ,especially ones with demi-gog feelings are far more powerfull and dangerous than any freedom fighter/terrorist malitia.By a factor of one million to one…I am scared of the right wing american goverment and consider them to be an ecoligical damager of astonomical preportions and their aims and wars are often unjust..The information they suppress and false stories they give out distorts what they are doing and fools many decent people.If we knew everything america does we would be horrified and would unite to stop such insane carnage.
Dungheap
My proposal is quite simple, if both sides come and talk
I agree.
And I should point out that I’m not suggesting talking with Bin Laden and his men.
Instead I’d like to see a dialogue with people who represent the "average arab in the street".
I believe the average arab is angry about the treatment of the Arab world by the west (particularly Palestine but now also Iraq).
And I wouldn’t be surprised if, at some level, he felt that, on 9/11, the US got what it was "asking for".
If we deal with this legitimate anger we’ll go a long way towards cutting off the roots of terrorism.
We’d still have the Bin Laden types to deal with but, by taking away his "legitimacy" in the Muslim world, he’d have fewer recruits, less funding and fewer places to hide.
I believe the best way to deal with this legitimate anger in the long run is to replace the rule that "the 5 permanent UN Security Council members can do what they want without repercussion" with a proper, enforcable international law.
That way, there would be a place where all the people’s of the world could go to make their case and be heard.
(and, where appropriate, get action in their favour)
Steve
the problem is Steve, that regardeless of which political persuasion is in power, IMO we will be along with the USA for the forseeable future. So we will have to lump that. <br>It is not just an "arab" problem nor is it solely a straightforward "muslim" problem. There are other religeons to consider and two mainstream muslim groups (similar to protestants and catholics). In Iraq for instance the majority group actually welcomed the invasion. Africa and Asia (guess) probably have a larger muslim population than the middle east.
There are large muslim groups who feel its not how the west have dealt with the middle east and arabs, but feel aggrieved how the west has dealt with the Muslim faith. From the crudades onwards they have felt that we wish to opress and obliterate their faith.
In the UK, we had these stuggles in the middle ages and slowly we have realised that politics and beliefs do not mix. I respect anyones right to their beliefs, but not to have their beliefs thrust upon me.
The muslim belief is in god first then everything else, this unfortunatly means that until their peoples have evolved and realise that religeon will not further the world and themselves we reach an impasse.
So, we have to simply decide on either containment as we do now, or face the issues head on. The latter IMO has to happen eventually, but its type, time and outcome, I personally can not see, nor do I see it in my lifetime. <br>There is only one road out IMO and that is education (not just our ideas but a world mix) and open communication coupled with free trade. Because our world is founded on trade. Education will remove the nationalistic thoughts, communication will allow us to see how others think and act then allow us to understand. Trade over the years, has opened up the world, though it has caused conflicts but in the long run is IMO the best way forward.
In the short term IMO there is no answer to stop, what is happening, because we can not please all of the people all of the time.
I believe the best way to deal with this legitimate anger in the long run is to replace the rule that "the 5 permanent UN Security Council members can do what they want without repercussion" with a proper, enforcable international law.
I totally agree with, however IMO until we have a one world goverment it will never happen. Furthermore until the the security council themselves put people before the sale of arms it will never happen.
The Bin Ladens are always going to be with us, because if we please them someone else will be just as p####d off and will be blowing things or people up.
Wit wrote –
"They end up with a double life, strangers both to their parents and the country they live in"
I saw this first hand on a visit to England a few years back. I got talking to the young, English/Pakistani lad who was serving breakfast in the hotel.
He was a useful cricketer apparently and had toured Pakistan playing for the England schoolboys. That he had done this now seemed to him like an act of treachery against the country he now saw as his motherland.
Something had happened to this kid’s mindset in the years between the time he set off (no doubt proudly) to play for England against Pakistan and to how he now felt.
I had an interesting conversation with the chap. I felt he spoke to me more openly as an Irishman than he would speak to an English person. Maybe this was because of the past history between Ireland and England and he reckoned an Irish person would be more sympathetic to his views.
Anyway, while he was talking I realised I’d heard all of this before. Switch a few key proper nouns and I could’ve been talking to any kid from Ireland who was sympathetic to the views of the Provisional IRA.
The breeding ground for IRA volunteers over the past 30 years has been the youth from deprived, working class areas of the North (and sometimes the republic) where police harrassment, unemployment and all sorts of other social problems are concentrated.
If this kids feelings are widespread among the Asian community then there’ll be any number of volunteers ready to take the place of the suicide bombers killed in London.
"Work for the caliphate", Hizb tells its recruits. "The caliphate will restore honour to your mothers and sisters" "
The IRA message is similar "Work for us and we’ll restore honour to your motherland by kicking the Brits out"
My feeling as to what drives somebody to join a terrorist organisation is not the "high ideals" professed by that organisation but baser things. In the case of a young British Pakistani it could be one too many Bernard Manning Paki jokes, one too many racially motived beatings-up, one too many job refusals……<br>
Dungheap
regardeless of which political persuasion is in power, IMO we will be along with the USA for the forseeable future.
It’s obvious that this is going to be the case, as you say.
And I think it’s pretty obvious that we’re going to go down the road of "no dialogue" and continue to feed the underlying grievances of the muslim world rather than remove them.
So, a lot of what I’m talking about is "what we could do" to improve the situation rather than "what we will do".
From that perspective, I see no reason why we should continue to follow the Americans.
I think the world has hypnotised themselves over America and convinced themselves that, somehow, the US has become omnipotent and unchallengable.
It would seem to me that the US has limited resources both financially and in troop numbers and without the usual suspects (UK, Australia, Canada, some EU allies), they wouldn’t be able to sustain their current plans.
And I personally doubt that they would have been able to get public support for Iraq had the UK not been so strongly behind it.
I think we’ve been using the USA as an excuse for too long. I think it’s time we took back responsibility for our country’s actions in the world.
That’s why I’d like to see a UK government proposing an international law and court which we would bind ourself to.
Even without the USA, if we could get the EU countries plus Canada and Australia on board, the court would have a major say in the arbitration of world conflicts.
Then, if the US wanted to go against the judgement of the court, they’d be doing so obviously in the face of world opinion (particularly that of their traditional allies) and law.
That would make it difficult for their politicians to sell a war to their electorate.
However, the chances of this happening are zero.
ACR1
You and Wit have made good (and similar points).
There’s a particular character type who will be drawn to this type of group for a sense of validation or importance.
From what I know, it seems like Palestine is (was) the main hook to draw people into this.
It seems to start off with the "the media are telling you lies about palestine, here’s what’s really going on" and that’s used to stir up hurt about how their "brothers" are being abused and the West is bankrolling it (and turning a blind eye).
And, once this hurt is stirred up, the propagandists leverage it to get people to be more muslim than british.
Then it’s a case of how far the particlular person can be taken along the road.
Maybe only so far that the person is sympathetic to the Palestinian suicide bombers and hates Israel.
Maybe far enough that they might give money.
Maybe so far that the person will be willing to go to somewhere like Chechnya or Kosovo and fight or put a bomb on a train.
(as far as I know, we don’t know if the 7/7 bombers realised they were going to die)
That’s my understanding from what I’ve heard and from working with someone a few year ago who, while not willing to fight himself, admired those who trained in Afghanistan and did fight in places like Bosnia or Kosovo and probably donated some money to these causes.
It’s all pretty standard brain-washing stuff and is the same basic process that was used by the North Koreans to get American POW’s to collaborate 50 years ago.
That’s why I believe, if we admitted that we’ve not been acting fairly and start to heal the wounds in Palestine and Iraq, there wouldn’t be a hook for the agitators to get these young people into the notion of a "muslim war with the west".
The alternative, which is to use our military might to "shock and awe" is likely to give easier ways for the recruiters.
Particularly if the escalation of this conflict leads to violence against British muslims.
Steve
Excellent thread all round<br> some of my old favourites have done emself proud<br> my views have largely been covered<br> so I have little to say…
but a small point was missed….
If you put your finger in your mouth<br> and touch your two front teeth<br> done that !
Now travel east or west<br> to the next tooth<br> a smallish roundish one<br> <br> now<br> move on to the next<br> sharp isn’t it ?<br> yep !<br> Think about it.
__________________________________________
<br> I see the thin man has been causing <br> causing trouble again<br> what changes ? :angry:
As for me I have been<br> acting with similar impropriety<br> on another forum<br> possibly summer madness from me<br> but I regret little<br> just superficial scratches<br> but it bodes time for a rest
Flatcap buries me<br> later tonight<br> I wont go under without <br> a good moan
Now pray<br> please continue ;) <br> ÂÂÂ
I thought John pilger wrote an interesting article in the New Statesman. Not hysterical like much of his work.
http://www.newstatesman.com/nscoverstory.htm
Part of it says:
"Before the invasion, Blair was warned by the Joint Intelligence Committee that "by far the greatest terrorist threat" to this country would be "heightened by military action against Iraq". He was warned by 79 per cent of Londoners who, according to a YouGov survey in February 2003, believed that a British attack on Iraq "would make a terrorist attack on London more likely". A month ago, a leaked, classified CIA report revealed that the invasion had turned Iraq into a focal point of terrorism. Before the invasion, said the CIA, Iraq "exported no terrorist threat to its neighbours" because Saddam Hussein was "implacably hostile to al-Qaeda".
Now, a report by the Chatham House organisation, a "think-tank" deep within the British establishment, may well beckon Blair’s coup de grace. Published on 18 July, it says there is "no doubt" the invasion of Iraq has "given a boost to the al-Qaeda network" in "propaganda, recruitment and fundraising" while providing an ideal targeting and training area for terrorists."
…………
In the news today:
"Blair said: "I am very pleased that the cross-party consensus on the way forward is continuing. I think when the main political parties present a united front, then you send an important signal to the terrorists.""
What’s that signal?
"We’re still not listening, you better bomb us again?"
Steve
Well, that’s the first bet I’ve won all week – I bet my wife a tenner there’d be arrests in Tooting before the end of July!
Mind you that kebab house has been killing me for years.
When I first posted on here, in the immediate aftermath of the original bombings, it was to say that my over-riding feeling was strangely one of being somehow lucky.
I can’t say I feel that any longer. The first moment for me was the realisation that it was a Primary School teacher who wanted to kill me.
Now it’s come even closer to home – seemingly the smiling chaps in my favourite Doner Kebab shop also want to kill me.
London was already sitting on a powder keg of unresolved tension, fuelled by the Daily Mail and not helped by the likes of Maxwell, Saskia, and our own Lolly’s Mate.
Far from standing strong together as Ken (and I) would have us, I fear we may be heading to hell in a handcart.
Paul Brady, an Irish folk-singer, sings a brilliant and seething polemic about being an Irishman in London in the seventies/eighties. It includes the line:
"In their eyes,<br>We’re nothing but a bunch of murderers".
And still Tony Blair stokes the flames with his face-saving idiocy.
Difficult days…
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