Many dead in coordinated Paris shootings and explosions

[Jimmy Turr]

That folly is the price that the US (and other resource-thirsty states) are willing to pay. To those states, a hundred or even a thousand Parises are "a price worth paying" to keep the oil flowing. Human cost is a secondary consideration when set against facilitating the continuation of capitalism.

Not only capitalism but any industrial, energy-intensive system. We're trapped in it and there's no exit, and no conceivable alternative. Most of us like it.

Of course, the mass slaughter that comes with it is the price we pay, and in historical terms those lives mean nothing. The victims of the attacks in Paris, London, Madrid, New York etc, and those of the slaughter in the Middle East and elsewhere will be of academic interest only in a few short decades, sadly.

 

[Idris2002]

Were this many idiots and trolls on the threads for 9/11 and the London bombings, can anyone remember?

 

[kebabking]

...rather than demanding evidence that supports the right's claims.

i don't know if you recall - it was something of a niché interest at the time - but IS's franchise/affiliate in Libya/Mali etc.. was claiming at the time of the French Op Serval in summer 2014 that they would use the migrant/refugee route going over the Med to get their people into Europe. whether they did or not is pretty irrelevent, they certainly made noise about doing so, and some of the security precutions used during the summer during the SAR operation in the Med both this year and last year suggests that it was a threat taken seriously.

the Syrian route was debated here in last month or so, and while that 'debate' only lasted a few posts, the consensus of opinion was that if IS wanted to get its people into Europe, using the massive refuge column would be a pretty good way of avoiding the concentrated gaze of security agencies found at airports.

its not a fabrication, it was always a risk - of a size to be debated - the lefts failure is not the failure to chase down this or that story or claim, its a failure to accept that it might be an issue, and to suggest ways of mitigating that risk while still campaigning for a humanitarian respose to the refugee crisis.

if it turns out that IS have used the refugee columns as cover, then the political difficulty of dealing with that will be vastly greater this week than it would have been to give the issue 10 minutes consideration 6 months ago.

 

[machine cat]

This is true but the nature of an ETA target is also very different. They do target people they consider to be legitimate - Guardia Civil or politicians/businesspeople they don't like. Also, they often plant bombs and issue warnings - destroying buildings but trying not to kill people.

By contrast, the ISIS jihadis consider every single person in Europe, more or less, to be a legitimate target. There is no innocent death. The way they dehumanise their targets is scary imo. Scares me.

Yes. The nature of the target is different. ETA etc would have to plan for months, practice runs etc. Islamic extremists on the other hand just need to rock up in a restaurant or train station and start shooting / hacking away.

 

[existentialist]

Were this many idiots and trolls on the threads for 9/11 and the London bombings, can anyone remember?

I joined Urban around the time of the London tube bombings, and - while the Urban experience was a bit to a n00b - I don't remember it being outrageously so.

 

[frogwoman]

This is true but the nature of an ETA target is also very different. They do target people they consider to be legitimate - Guardia Civil or politicians/businesspeople they don't like. Also, they often plant bombs and issue warnings - destroying buildings but trying not to kill people.

By contrast, the ISIS jihadis consider every single person in Europe, more or less, to be a legitimate target. There is no innocent death. The way they dehumanise their targets is scary imo. Scares me.

Well the dissident republicans and loyalists also dehumanised people with eg the bomb in the omagh shopping centre, the shankhill butchers murders etc. But there wasnt a huge irish protestant/catholic diaspora they were trying to encourage to move to ireland or to carry out attacks at home. The IRA carried out an attack in germany on british soldiers and that's it I think. And yes IRA/ETA aims were what they thought would support political objectives rather than just indiscriminate killing.

 

[Idris2002]

Well the dissident republicans and loyalists also dehumanised people with eg the bomb in the omagh shopping centre, the shankhill butchers murders etc. But there wasnt a huge irish protestant/catholic diaspora they were trying to encourage to move to ireland or to carry out attacks at home. The IRA carried out an attack in germany on british soldiers and that's it I think.

Don't forget Gibraltar.

 

[Idris2002]

i don't know if you recall - it was something of a niché interest at the time - but IS's franchise/affiliate in Libya/Mali etc.. was claiming at the time of the French Op Serval in summer 2014 that they would use the migrant/refugee route going over the Med to get their people into Europe. whether they did or not is pretty irrelevent, they certainly made noise about doing so, and some of the security precutions used during the summer during the SAR operation in the Med both this year and last year suggests that it was a threat taken seriously.

the Syrian route was debated here in last month or so, and while that 'debate' only lasted a few posts, the consensus of opinion was that if IS wanted to get its people into Europe, using the massive refuge column would be a pretty good way of avoiding the concentrated gaze of security agencies found at airports.

its not a fabrication, it was always a risk - of a size to be debated - the lefts failure is not the failure to chase down this or that story or claim, its a failure to accept that it might be an issue, and to suggest ways of mitigating that risk while still campaigning for a humanitarian respose to the refugee crisis.

if it turns out that IS have used the refugee columns as cover, then the political difficulty of dealing with that will be vastly greater this week than it would have been to give the issue 10 minutes consideration 6 months ago.

A bit of googling does bring up threats to do that, but given that refugees crossing the med have a very good chance of dying in mass drowning events, I'd still infiltration via a nicely forged passport and a plane ticket as a more likely option.

 

[LDC]

Some of the comments on here have been pretty grim and depressing, but at least I haven't seen any 'false flag' or conspiracy drivel yet.

 

[Idris2002]

double post

 

[ViolentPanda]

You missed my point completely. Malik didn't mention Breivik in his list. I would, and I think it's important to include him.

I can think of at least one important reason why Breivik shouldn't be included - because he displays the sorts of psychoses and neuroses that render his crimes not as terrorism - i.e. an attempt to change politics through violence, but as artefacts of his disordered personality. There's been a reasonable volume of research (a readable account is Robert Pape's "Dying to Win") on the psychological state of "suicide terrorists" (Pape does a reasonably in-depth study of the histories of successful "martyrs" and the psychology of failed "martyrs") that shows that overwhelmingly "suicide terrorists" and their non-martyr associates don't manifest psychoses and neuroses of the type or severity that Breivik did - they're mostly psychologically "normal" .

 

[frogwoman]

Don't forget Gibraltar.

Well OK but the targets the IRA chose were largely, altho not exlusively, military no? They had no plans to set up a Caliphate and no ambitions to rule in the UK with an archaic system of law and i think that many IRA guys thought that once ireland was united there would be no more 'armed struggle'.

Whereas i dont think daesh are like that at all.

 

[DotCommunist]

Don't forget Gibraltar.

gaddafi supposedly asked for some reciprocation for his aid but they politely declined, the sense that they were too busy running their own war

 

[ViolentPanda]

acceptable level of violence

Acceptable to them, anyway.

 

[DotCommunist]

Whereas i dont think daesh are like that at all.

well no, the IRA were never end of the world death cultists, daesh supposedly follow the end time prophecy stuff

 

[frogwoman]

Don't forget Gibraltar.

Just been reading about that, fucking hell

 

[maomao]

I joined Urban around the time of the London tube bombings, and - while the Urban experience was a bit to a n00b - I don't remember it being outrageously so.

Your join date is 2009. Sockpuppet or banned returner?

 

[agricola]

By contrast, the ISIS jihadis consider every single person in Europe, more or less, to be a legitimate target. There is no innocent death. The way they dehumanise their targets is scary imo. Scares me.

I disagree - if they genuinely think anything*, its that every event is known to God beforehand and it is up to Him (and only Him) to determine whether or not it is good or evil; that is why they kill so many observant Sunnis, are indifferent to the deaths of many more that take place because of their actions, (edit) are willing to butcher people who no-one would have ever said had committed any kind of sin against Islam (Henning, for instance) and have no conception of the worth of anyone else. To use a phrase uttered by another bigot "Kill them all, God will recognize his own".

* given that these justifications are inevitably given after the fact, and the history of religion being used to justify the unjustifiable.

 

[frogwoman]

well no, the IRA were never end of the world death cultists, daesh supposedly follow the end time prophecy stuff

What sort of state did the ira want after they took it over? I know some were supposedly 'marxist'/stalinist, some were pretty nasty nationalists but iirc many of them just wanted a more increased social democracy type arrangement or just the end of british rule.

I dont think they would have wanted public beheadings in dublin for immodesty or that sort of thing etc.

 

[Maurice Picarda]

Some of the comments on here have been pretty grim and depressing, but at least I haven't seen any 'false flag' or conspiracy drivel yet.

Apart from the assertion from one poster that DGSE involvement should be acknowledged as a possibility, of course.

 

[Pickman's model]

Your join date is 2009. Sockpuppet or banned returner?

how limited your mind is. only two possibilities? i can think of at least one more alternative.

 

[DotCommunist]

What sort of state did the ira want after they took it over? I know some were supposedly 'marxist'/stalinist, some were pretty nasty nationalists but iirc many of them just wanted a more increased social democracy type arrangement or just the end of british rule.

I dont think they would have wanted public beheadings in dublin for immodesty or that sort of thing etc.

united ireland, 6 counties back was the theme that unified. Post that I wouldn't know, I mean you had factions like the INLA who violently disagreed with pira etc.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Your join date is 2009. Sockpuppet or banned returner?

Neither. His first manifestation was pretty much hounded off the boards by "fuck off" dwyer.

 

[Sasaferrato]

What sort of state did the ira want after they took it over? I know some were supposedly 'marxist'/stalinist, some were pretty nasty nationalists but iirc many of them just wanted a more increased social democracy type arrangement or just the end of british rule.

I dont think they would have wanted public beheadings in dublin for immodesty or that sort of thing etc.

The IRA are hard left politically. They would have wanted an East German sort of Ireland, with them firmly in control.

 

[Idris2002]

The IRA are hard left politically. They would have wanted an East German sort of Ireland, with them firmly in control.

That wasn't the case until Adams and McGuiness displaced the older, southern-based faction around Ruari O'Bradaigh. And I'd agree with Ed Moloney that that was just because it provided a handy stick to beat the old guard with.

Up until the '80s, the idea was for a federal Ireland, with autonomous regional governments in each of the four provinces. The soviet model would have been viewed with suspicion.

 

[maomao]

Neither. His first manifestation was pretty much hounded off the boards by "fuck off" dwyer.

I'd just worked out who he was last week. Thanks for confirming.

 

[frogwoman]

That wasn't the case until Adams and McGuiness displaced the older, southern-based faction around Ruari O'Bradaigh. And I'd agree with Ed Moloney that that was just because it provided a handy stick to beat the old guard with.

Up until the '80s, the idea was for a federal Ireland, with autonomous regional governments in each of the four provinces. The soviet model would have been viewed with suspicion.

But no beheadings obviously.

 

[Sasaferrato]

Apart from the assertion from one poster that DGSE involvement should be acknowledged as a possibility, of course.

I find the idea that the DGSE were involved risible. The old question 'cui bono?' is always a good starting point. The outcome of this is likely to be an increase in membership for the FN, which is hardly a desirable outcome for the French government.

The answer to the question, in this instance, is no one.

 

[Idris2002]

Now they're saying it was three brothers, French-based, who did the massacres:

Three brothers 'involved in Paris attacks'

 

[Sasaferrato]

But no beheadings obviously.

Well, you would have to ask the IRA about the fate of the 'disappeared' about that.

No, vile as the IRA are, they would not engage in public beheading for disrespecting the Pope. There are lines that even they would not cross.