The Never Ending War
It's been another hectic week with no time for the blog. Have been rearranging the IT at home, installing a new, faster Linux box for me, and upgrades for the server, the kids and SWMBO. Lots of software reinstalls accompanied by a few problems, now ironed out. Fingers crossed.
The shocking events in London have been dominating my reading this week. It's all the more poignant as I lived in the city for three years during the late seventies and early eighties. Since then I've been back several times for business and pleasure. Must have ridden the Underground hundreds of times. The thought of a large explosion in those narrow, deep tunnels fills me with horror.
It's predictable that after an event like this there are calls for ever more draconian measures to keep the fanatics in check, countered by a less noisy crowd warning of the dangers of impacted personal freedoms from those measures. It's the usual conservative vs liberal thing ... the conservatives feel that the correct response is to show no weakness, that person privacy and freedoms should not hinder the authorities in policing terrorism, and brook no thought that terrorist actions in London or elsewhere have anything to do with international events.
The liberals, on the other hand, while not condoning the acts, can understand how some people can be so incensed by what they see as injustice to their brethren, at the same time being emboldened by a dose of fundamental religion, would allow themselves to be used to perform terrible events. They wonder if the west changed the way they related to the Muslim world it may diffuse some of the revolutionary rhetoric of the fanatical clerics. They worry that ignoring the bigger picture to persue ever more draconian control measures at home will simply errode individual freedoms to the point where they resemble those in many authoritarian states.
The answer, of course, is somewhere in the middle. Bring on the tougher laws, but allow the actions of the authorities to be examined by the courts and the media. Persue the fanatics, while being careful not to tar every Muslim with the brush of fanaticism. Leave the Muslim world alone as as much possible. Seek dialogue with the Islamic moderates to help weed out the criminal fundamentalists. Get our house in order in the Islamic regions.
It's not going to happen, though.
In reality, spooked governments are going to pander to the frightened population and take the advice of the populist media. We can expect tougher anti-terrorist laws accompanied by less scrutiny of the enforcers' actions. Conservative leaders are going to cover their arses by warning us of the possibility of terrorist attach, while reaping the electoral advantage of been seen as tough on terror. The carnage in Iraq will continue to educate the 'class of 05,' as I've heard them described, those young extremists who are learning the terrorist trade in a real battle ground, and who, in coming years, will spread round their acquired skills around the globe.
Let's hope the war in terrorism doesn't degenerate into a debilitating war of attrition, with shocking consequences for both sides.
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I was over there when it all happened. I have no idea what the coverage here was like of the event, but in London, the media was kept well away from anything to do with any of the bombing scenes, and whilst all the reporters were terribly upset by the whole thing, their reaction was controlled and to my mind quite professional. Unlike here in Australia or America, the media were not crying for blood 10 minutes after the events and whipping the public into some crazed revenge frenzy.
Politically and in the media, the Brits seemed to react in just the way you said would be ideal. There seemed to be a lot of confidence in the authorities ability to track down and deal with the people responsible. The media behaved respectfully of the Task Force imbued with the responsibility of finding these people, and the task force seemed to be really honest about their findings, keeping the media informed with regular updates as to their progress, the whole time being careful not show any prejudice, or create any kind of mob mentality.
The reaction of the Londoners was that of resolute and calm solidarity. I was very impressed at how well the events were handled by the them and how resilient and mature their culture seemed to be - possibly because a lot of them have lived through it before.
Sure enough within a week the task force had identified each of the suicide bombers, and provided the media with their backgrounds. They were Pakistanis, 3 of them were in their late teens, one of them was a father and taught special kids at the local school. All of them were born and lived in England. All of them had gone to Pakistan for some kind of religious training. It seemed to me they had been indoctrinated into an extremist cult. The people in their community who knew them were all as gob smacked as the rest of us - Muslims were killed in the bombings as well.
The only thing that worried me was that no one really had a definitive explanation as to why they decided to do it. Theories ranged from 'Anarchy' to 'The G8' to 'Iraq'. It would be good to have a clearer understanding as to what is bugging these guys so much. Personally I would guess that they are watching their age old culture diminish and are blaming the west, and then are trumping up religeous and political reasons to vent their frustration and fear...
At the same time, whatever the reasons are, they are pretty bloody flimsy for killing all of those innocent people - clearly mass murder is a stupid way to gain political clout these days.
Anyway, the whole experience has left me with a tremendous respect for Londoners and their great town. Looking forward to going back.