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"People who probably never did anything wrong to you, almost certainly never met you before, you cut their lives off."
are you talking about victims of dubya/ head/Repug's bogus war-for-oil ?
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE70N2TQ20110124
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110124/..._airport_blast
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/0..._n_813075.html
Russian officials are calling it a terrorist attack.
Pretty sad situation. It's Russia's busiest airport. You have to be incredibly cowardly to walk into a group of people and set the bomb off knowing you'll never have to live to face punishment for killing dozens of people. People who probably never did anything wrong to you, almost certainly never met you before, you cut their lives off in an instant just to scare others.
"People who probably never did anything wrong to you, almost certainly never met you before, you cut their lives off."
are you talking about victims of dubya/ head/Repug's bogus war-for-oil ?
boutons, youre a lonely lonely man.
I wonder what Sarah Palin said to cause the attack.
have they find out which group or race did it?
the only clowns i see russia havin problems with over the years are chechyans right???
so they found the head of the bomber, but it could be anyone, how are they sure if his the bomber? just cause his arab?
they are still hunting 2 more....
Probably somebody upset about the U.S. health care law.
You Can't Handle The Truth.
Wow, now you're supporting terrorism? What the is wrong with you?
What are you saying, boutons? Don't ask questions in response, it's passive-aggressive. Be a man. Say what you mean.
Russia's brutal involvement in Chechnya has made it a target for such attacks.http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE70N2TQ20110124
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110124/..._airport_blast
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/0..._n_813075.html
Russian officials are calling it a terrorist attack.
Pretty sad situation. It's Russia's busiest airport. You have to be incredibly cowardly to walk into a group of people and set the bomb off knowing you'll never have to live to face punishment for killing dozens of people. People who probably never did anything wrong to you, almost certainly never met you before, you cut their lives off in an instant just to scare others.
Oddly enough it shows how corruption can kill as well, because previously, two suicide bombers flew out of that airport using illegal tickets purchased from corrupt airport officials. They detonated themselves mid-air and killed 90 people.
To be clear: I think such attacks are horrible.
Understanding the context is key though. What the Russians have done in its breakaway state has been... nasty.
any violent act against your own is called terrorism.
How many countries in the world don't have similar blood on their hands? Seriously, if terrorists were to target every country who had questionable dealing, bombs would explode in every country on Earth on a daily basis. It's ridiculous to say that, "Well, there have been questionable/bad decisions made by country X, so that's why..."
Every country, if held to standards of, "You aren't allowed to up or kill people ever" would fail and fail miserably. Every. Single. Nation. That does not excuse what Russia has been doing, it is merely a fact that humanity is deeply flawed, and most governments are unfit to govern from such a perspective, because they will always start wars, kill people, etc.
You're such a ing moron.
Ok so whats your point CH? RG made the right point that when you undertake actions as Russia has there are consequences and terrorism isn't exactly a new one. You're right that a lot of countries have similar blood on their hands and there are a lot of of countries under attack by terrorists.
Suicide terrorism is by large part a very effective strategy. Thats something you never hear about unless you actually read some of the research behind the actions which is sad because its by far the biggest indicator of why these attacks are used. A book called Dying to Win is one of the best books on terrorism that I've read and it talks about that very fact quite a bit.
Its pretty easy to sit back from our lives and question what these people do and look at it as horrific. But then again, you've never had to pick up the pieces of an atrocity committed by a government against you and had no recourse to act out.
I obviously would prefer a world with no terrorism, but that doesn't mean we should look at the acts in black and white. On one hand introspection and reaction to terrorism would seem to encourage the acts but when you realize that they're already incredibly effective at getting change then I think we should be pragmatic and realize the motivations for these actions aren't borne in a vac .
And somehow, some way this relates to Bush and Republicans.
Indeed, every country has blood on its hands.
The difference today is that Russia's is a bit more recent, than say, the Netherland's occupation of certain islands in the Pacific.
I was only providing what I thought was relevant background material.
Nope.
Terrorism is wrong because it's mostly "civilians" that pay the highest price. But this kind of reasoning isn't true. I would venture to say that all countries that have committed acts of violence against other nations/ethnic/religious groups (and yes there are case where those acts were justified) have experienced terrorist attacks against them.
Last edited by Slomo; 01-24-2011 at 04:31 PM.
I'm not sure about suicide bombers being an "effective" strategy.
Generally such kinds of violence tend to create a backlash that works counter to the aim of such attacks.
The book sounds interesting, though.
RG, Lets talk about Iraq for a second and terrorism there. Do you think the attacks there have helped reach the goal of removing US forces or do you think the public feelings of backlash against shoe actions have American citizens wanting to keep troops there longer?
This is a quick wikipedia look at what part of the book covers, RG.
Part I: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism
[edit]Ch. 3: A Strategy for Weak Actors
The willingness of an attacker to die has strategic value (27-29). As a weapon of weak groups incapable of “denial” as a “coercive strategy,” suicide terrorism relies on punishment and, especially, “the expectation of future damage,” which provides coercive leverage (29-33).
[edit]Ch. 4: Targeting Democracies
Pape claims that his is the first complete analysis of suicide terrorism, as such revealing that not religion but “to compel democracies to withdraw military forces from the terrorists’ national homeland” is its key (38). Patterns of timing (39-41), nationalist goals (42-44), and the targeting of democracies (44-45) reveal its logical, not irrational, nature. “At bottom, suicide terrorism is a strategy for national liberation from foreign military occupation by a democratic state” (45). Foreign occupation is defined in terms of control of territory (not military occupation alone) (46). The targets selected by suicide terrorists suggests nationalist, not religious, aims (46-47). Hamas (47-51) and Al-Qaeda (51-58) are analyzed in some detail. In general, the harshness of occupation does not strongly correlate with suicide terrorism (58-60).
[edit]Ch. 5: Learning Terrorism Pays
Terrorists are predisposed to attribute success to their technique whenever plausible (62-64). Pape claims that “recent suicide terrorist campaigns . . . are associated with gains for the terrorists’ political causes about half the time” (64-65). Hamas’s success is difficult to evaluate, but Hamas spokespersons express belief in their own success (65-73). Terrorists learn from each other; the spread of the method is therefore neither irrational nor surprising (73-75). But suicide terrorism has failed “to compel target democracies to abandon goals central to national wealth or security” (75-76).
Well I've once heard the opinion of an army strategist that basically said that for a small price (life of the bomber - and you know that to his bosses he's worth less than an insect) the victims pay a very high price in lost lives, damage to the infrastructure, medical services, increased security after wards, police and other resources aimed at preventing a repeat.
He compared it to anti personnel mines, who are aimed at maiming and not killing combatants because an injured soldier is a bigger burden than a dead one.
I suggest the senitive, curious and intelligent among you -there might be some-
to watch
Nikita Mikhalkov's movie
12 (The jury).
Thereater, you can judge, perhaps.
Incidentally, the "knife dance" scene is one of my favoured movies scenes of all time.
For all the others, war on terrorism etch is just fine.
I am just so worried about the people behind this act.
Will the get their civil rights in Russia.
boutons, can you please advise us on this.....
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