11M - Madrid
- Thread starter solara
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solara
Active Member
Multzam frumos pt balacareala pe care ati facut-o pe tema mea :-x
De unde stii tu, Antonio, ca electoratul a fost las si si-a schimbat parerea din cauza atentatelor? Sa nu-mi vii cu sondaje... Electoratul spaniol a iesit in strada cand Aznar a anuntat ca e de acord cu atacul asupra Irakului (de genul "not in my name". Au fost demonstratii mai mult impotriva conducerii decat de solidaritate cu irakienii). Electoratul spaniol e ala care zice ca de la Franco incoace s-au saturat de nepoti de-ai lui si de alti nomenclaturisti.
De unde stii tu, Antonio, ca electoratul a fost las si si-a schimbat parerea din cauza atentatelor? Sa nu-mi vii cu sondaje... Electoratul spaniol a iesit in strada cand Aznar a anuntat ca e de acord cu atacul asupra Irakului (de genul "not in my name". Au fost demonstratii mai mult impotriva conducerii decat de solidaritate cu irakienii). Electoratul spaniol e ala care zice ca de la Franco incoace s-au saturat de nepoti de-ai lui si de alti nomenclaturisti.
a.d.i.d.a.s
Member
Filip Antonio said:
Filip Antonio… Socialistii se aflau intre favoriti inca inainte de atentatul de la Madrid… Conform sondajelor acestia aveau cateva procente in urma Partidului Popular… Oricine [din aceste 2 partide] ar fi castigat alegerile (la fel ca in Grecia) – cu sau fara “ajutorul” teroristilor…
Sant sigur ca spaniolii nu i-au votat pe socialisti pt ca acestia o sa le garanteze “o securitate mai buna”… Continui sa cred ca infrangerea de duminica a Partidului Pupular e o palma aplicata de poporul spaniol --- pt ca acesta (PP) a acuzat ETA fara nici un temei… doar in scopuri ELECTORALE (iaca asta DA lasitate)
Filip Antonio
New Member
solara said:
De aia a castigat Aznar alegerile locale anul trecut imediat dupa razboiul cu Irakul? Si electoratul spaniol (sau jumatate din el) s-a saturat de bolsevicii pe care Franco i-a invins in 1939. Pentru documentare citeste An homage to Catalonia, de George Orwell (altfel om de stanga, care a luptat de partea republicanilor in razboiul civil).
Filip Antonio
New Member
a.d.i.d.a.s said:
TOATE sondajele din Spania pana pe 11 martie (ca si cele din Grecia) au dat PP (respectiv ND) castigator. In Spania a avut loc un atentat terorist iar spaniolii care au votat in ultima clipa ci PSOE (cei care in principiu nu aveau de gand sa voteze) au oferit victoria pe tava islamistilor (daca ei au fost cei care au organizat atentatul).
Cat despre manipulare, ar trebui sa nu te faci ca uiti ca sambata seara "trupe" de comando ale PSOE si IU (comunisti) au aparut ca prin minune in fata sediului PP (desi campania era interzisa) strigand lozinci antiguvernamentale. Daca PP ar fi fost asa de perfid, ar fi aparut ministrul de interne sambata noaptea sa anunte despre arestarile de suspecti? Asa incat opozitia de stanga a folosit la maximum in scop electoral acest atentat. Cu alte cuvinte partidul idiotilor utili ai islamofascismului - PSOE (si catelusul IU cu 5 deputati) cu neica nimeni in frunte s-a trezit la guvernare.
Filip Antonio
New Member
Rebista presei
The Spanish elections: a landslide win for bin Laden
Tim Hames
After September 11, America stood firm; after March 11, Europe retreated
JOHN ADAMS wrote some 190 years ago that: “There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” After the profoundly depressing election result in Spain, it is tempting to conclude that the second President of the United States was justified in his pessimism. If Osama bin Laden is alive today he must be, despite physical discomfort, almost paralysed with laughter. Even Saddam Hussein, stuck in a prison cell, is entitled to a chuckle.
There can be little doubt that the Madrid bombings and the belated emergence of al-Qaeda or one of its affiliates as the principal suspects, won this contest for the Socialists. The Popular Party had led in all the opinion polls not only for the duration of the election campaign itself, but also for most of the 12 months before the ballot. Jos Mara Aznar, the outgoing Prime Minister, could point to a record of economic and social achievement since assuming power in 1996 that has no equal in Europe.
His colleagues seemed to be coasting to a third term in office. His political support for the US-led war in Iraq, and deployment of 1,300 troops in that country after its liberation, were not popular, but there was no hint that this would prove fatal for his party.
All that has changed. And with it, at a stroke, has the character and content of Spanish foreign policy. Jos Luis Rodrguez Zapatero, the Prime Minister-designate, has made it clear that Spanish forces will leave the Gulf in little more than three months’ time and that he will realign his country within the EU alongside those who loudly opposed the Iraqi venture. Even if the shift is largely symbolic, it is a staggering reversal. It is also by far the largest victory that al-Qaeda has achieved, and one with ominous potential repercussions.
For what have the terrorists learnt about the relative costs and benefits of operating in the US and Europe? The attacks they committed in New York and Washington were obviously spectacular but, as events rapidly demonstrated, they also represented a spectacular miscalculation by bin Laden and his associates. Far from withdrawing from the Middle East, an enraged Bush Administration chased the Taleban out of Afghanistan and went on to oust Saddam Hussein for good measure. “Don’t Mess with Texas” might not be the most eloquent foreign policy message ever devised, but it was surely plain, even to the fanatics, that neither the US President nor public would back down in the face of terrorism.
Now turn to Europe. A section of the Spanish electorate has apparently decided that the appropriate response to the murder of 200 of their fellow citizens is to ask what their Government might have done to provoke this outrage. This is a stance that smacks of weakness, not defiance. It is bound to lead those who plan terrorist atrocities to assume that if they can induce slaughter in continental Europe then pronounce those deeds to have been “retaliation” for decisions taken by George W. Bush, then they will prompt not anger directed at them but introspection and retreat.
Europe is, therefore, a far, far less safe place today than it was a week ago — not because of the Madrid bombings themselves, but what will be perceived as the political reaction in Spain to them. It is now well worth al-Qaeda and its ilk at least attempting to discern whether the same strategy will produce similar results in another European nation with close links to Washington. One does not have to be a genius or a fatalist to realise that an outrage perpetrated on Britain soil would be a propaganda coup of vast value.
The most disturbing aspect of the Madrid blasts is that Western intelligence agencies had no idea that they might be coming. It is precisely because not a whisper had been picked up via the intelligence “chatter” that the CIA initially assumed the Spanish authorities were entirely right to point the finger at Eta immediately.
That an attack of this scale and sophistication could be mounted without either the nation to be hit, the method to be employed, or the rough date when the event might occur seeping out in one form or another is an appalling development. It suggests that a major terrorist cell, probably backed by what is left of the bin Laden network, is at large and has not been infiltrated.
Europe thus may find itself in the worst of all worlds. The organisational capacity of the terrorists might be of a higher quality than had been hoped, while the political will of Europeans to resist terrorism looks weaker than that encountered in America. If terrorists believe they can make or break governments at whim, that is what they will attempt to do.
All of which places a special responsibility on this country. If there were to be an atrocity here, would we respond as the US did after September 11, 2001, or as certain Spanish voters have done after March 11, 2004? Would we redouble our efforts to conduct a “War on Terror” or rush to reward politicians who would distance Britain from the United States on the false and futile promise of an easier life?
It would take extraordinary good fortune now, in the aftermath of what al-Qaeda seems to have secured in Spain, for that moment and that choice to be avoided. Numerous politicians, senior policemen and intelligence experts have been warning for many months that a terrorist outrage in London is “virtually inevitable”. It is surely time that we took what they assert, and how we would react, a lot more seriously.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,482-1039703,00.html
Changing horses
Spain’s Socialists should aim for continuity
Few Western governments have come to power in more fraught circumstances than the Spanish Socialists. Having expected, at best, to make only enough inroads into the support for the ruling Popular Party (PP) to deny it an absolute majority, Jos Luis Rodrguez Zapatero unexpectedly found himself heading a government without a parliamentary majority, a clear foreign policy or, most urgently, a coherent response to the catastrophe that brought him to power. His supporters’ elation was dampened by the terror that Spain has experienced; his allies’ congratulations were tempered by uncertainty over his in- tentions; his campaign promises have to be measured against the realities of a society that is wounded, angry and confused.
Señor Zapatero’s first job is to form a stable government. That may not be easy. With 12 seats short of a majority, he has said that he will govern through “dialogue” with other groups. That looks like a recipe for instability, horse-trading and the exploitation of their position by radical groups, including the Basque nationalists. While the Basques are relieved at the thought that Eta was not directly responsible for the bombings, they are resentful of what they saw as the slurs from Madrid. Much of the rest of Spain is distrustful of these nationalists who, they feel, have not sufficiently distanced themselves from the men of violence. Even if he can manoeuvre between groups and factions in the Lower House, Señor Zapatero still faces a solid PP majority in the Upper House, which may be in no mood to pass his legislation.
The Socialists, committed to reversing many of Jos Mara Aznar’s policies at home and abroad, may be tempted to raid the economic storehouse that he so carefully replenished in an attempt to honour extravagant Socialist campaign promises of greater social welfare benefits, job creation and the satisfaction of union demands. Such echoes of the economic mess that the last Socialist Government left behind would herald a disaster, and the sharp fall in the stock exchange has already served as a salutary warning. The new Prime Minister appears to sense some of the dangers, however, and moved swiftly to appoint an economic adviser trusted for his fiscal prudence.
But it is in foreign policy that Señor Zapatero faces his greatest challenge. He has already made clear his eagerness to return to the vanguard, with France and Germany, of the European federalists, and spoke of restoring “magnificent” relations with them. There are profound implications in leaping into bed with old Europe: not only will Spain now find itself again subservient to the diktats of the Franco-German alliance — with an inevitable cooling in relations with Britain; but Madrid will come under pressure to accept a reduced voting strength in the European constitution if it is to demonstrate its federalist devotion.
There is even more at stake outside Europe. Both Señor Zapatero’s campaign rhetoric and the sudden support of some voters terrified by Spain’s commitment to Iraq may make it hard to retreat from his promise to pull its troops out. President Bush will not be the only leader urging him to think again of the disastrous implications. It would, at the very least, be a betrayal of Iraqis who will need the security of international support to rebuild their country.
Spaniards rightly expect the new Government, and their allies, to make terrorism a priority. This is a problem for which their little-known leader was wholly unprepared. His best course now, therefore, would be a judicious silence on Iraq, a pragmatic re-assessment of the Aznar record and a decision to bring a measure of continuity to a country that has been profoundly unsettled.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,542-1039771,00.html
The Spanish dishonoured their dead
By Mark Steyn
(Filed: 16/03/2004)
"When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, naturally they will like the strong horse." So said Osama bin Laden in his final video appearance two-and-a-half years ago. But even the late Osama might have been surprised to see the Spanish people, invited to choose between a strong horse and a weak horse, opt to make their general election an exercise in mass self-gelding.
To be sure, there are all kinds of John Kerry-esque footnoted nuances to Sunday's stark numbers. One sympathises with those electors reported to be angry at the government's pathetic insistence, in the face of the emerging evidence, that Thursday's attack was the work of Eta, when it was obviously the jihad boys. One's sympathy, however, disappears with their decision to vote for a party committed to disengaging from the war against the jihadi. As Margaret Thatcher would have said: "This is no time to go wobbly, Manuel." But they did. And no one will remember the footnotes, the qualifications, the background - just the final score: terrorists toppled a European government.
What was it all those party leaders used to drone robotically after IRA atrocities? We must never let the bullet and the bomb win out over the ballot and the bollocks. Something like that. In Spain, the bombers hijacked the ballot, and very decisively. The Socialist Workers' Party wouldn't have won, except for the terrorism.
At the end of last week, American friends kept saying to me: "3/11 is Europe's 9/11. They get it now." I expressed scepticism. And I very much doubt whether March 11 will be a day that will live in infamy. Rather, March 14 seems likely to be the date bequeathed to posterity, in the way we remember those grim markers on the road to conflagration through the 1930s, the tactical surrenders that made disaster inevitable. All those umbrellas in the rain at Friday's marches proved to be pretty pictures for the cameras, nothing more. The rain in Spain falls mainly on the slain. In the three days between the slaughter and the vote, it was widely reported that the atrocity had been designed to influence the election. In allowing it to do so, the Spanish knowingly made Sunday a victory for appeasement and dishonoured their own dead.
And, if it works in Spain, why not in Australia, Britain, Italy, Poland? In his 1996 "Declaration of War Against the Americans", Bin Laden cited Washington's feebleness in the face of the 1992 Aden hotel bombings and the Black Hawk Down business in Somalia in 1993: "You have been disgraced by Allah and you withdrew," he wrote. "The extent of your impotence and weaknesses became very clear." To the jihadis' way of thinking, on Thursday, the Spaniards were disgraced by Allah; on Sunday, they withdrew. The extent of their impotence and weaknesses is very clear.
Or, as Simon Jenkins put it in a hilariously mistimed cover story for last Thursday's Spectator arguing that this terrorism business is a lot of twaddle got up by Blair and Bush: "Bombs kill and panic the panicky. But they do not undermine civilised society unless that society wants to be undermined." And there's no chance of that happening, right?
Jenkins's argument, such as it is, is that a bomb here, a bomb there, nothing to get your knickers in a twist about: that's one thing we Europeans understand. But what he refuses to address is the shifting facts on the ground.
Europe's home-grown terrorism problems take place among notably static populations, such as Ulster and the Basque country. One could make generally safe extrapolations about the likelihood of holding Northern Ireland to what HMG used to call an "acceptable level of violence".
But in the same three decades as Ulster's "Troubles", the hitherto moderate Muslim populations of south Asia were radicalised by a politicised form of Islam; previously broadly unIslamic societies such as Nigeria became Islamified; and large Muslim populations settled in parts of Europe that had little or no experience of mass immigration.
You can argue about what these trends mean, but surely not that they mean absolutely nothing, as Sir Simon and the Complaceniks assure us: nothing to see here, chaps; switch back to the Test and bring me another buttered crumpet; when Osama vows to avenge the "tragedy of Andalucia", it's just a bit of overheated campaign rhetoric, like Kerry calling Bush a "liar", that's all.
For the non-complacent, the question is fast becoming whether "civilised society" in much of Europe is already too "undermined". Last Friday, for a brief moment, it looked as if a few brave editorialists on the Continent finally grasped that global terrorism is a real threat to Europe, and not just a Bush racket. But even then they weren't proposing that the Continent should rise up and prosecute the war, only that they be less snippy in their carping from the sidelines as America gets on with it. Spain was Washington's principal Continental ally, and what does that boil down to in practice? 1,300 troops. That's fewer than what the New Hampshire National Guard is contributing.
The other day, the editor of Le Monde, writing in the Wall Street Journal, dismissed as utterly false the widespread belief among all Americans except John Kerry's campaign staff that France is a worthless ally: "Let us remember here," he wrote, "the involvement of French and German soldiers, among other European nationalities, in the operations launched in Afghanistan to pursue the Taliban, track down bin Laden and attempt to free the Afghans."
Oh, put a baguette in it, will you? The Continentals didn't "launch" anything in Afghanistan. They showed up when the war was over - after the Taliban had been toppled and the Afghans liberated. And a few hundred Nato troops in post-combat mopping-up operations barely registers in the scale against the gazillions of Americans defending the Continent so that EU governments can blow their defence budgets on welfare programmes that make the citizens ever more enervated and dependent.
The only fighting that there is going to be in Europe in the foreseeable future is civil war, and when that happens American infantrymen will want to be somewhere safer. Like Iraq. There are strong horses and weak horses, but right now western Europe is looking like a dead horse.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/...l&secureRefresh=true&_requestid=82329
La haine et la dmocratie
LE MONDE | 15.03.04 | 15h19 • MIS A JOUR LE 15.03.04 | 16h50
Il faut, hlas, l'admettre, et en mesurer les consquences : l'Union europenne, frappe à Madrid, est entre à son tour, le jeudi 11 mars, dans l'ère sinistre du terrorisme de masse. Comme les Etats-Unis, après le 11 septembre 2001, et avec les Etats-Unis, elle va devoir faire face à un adversaire insaisissable. Cet adversaire n'a ni revendication particulière, comme peut en avoir l'ETA aujourd'hui ou l'IRA hier, ni territoire particulier. Il s'en prend aux socits dmocratiques, attaques pour ce qu'elles sont : ouvertes, fluides, respectueuses de l'Etat de droit. La dmocratie, ici comme en terre d'islam, voilà l'ennemi !
Et il serait tout aussi vain qu'absurde, et lche, de croire tel ou tel pays plus ou moins à l'abri, selon le curseur où se trouve place sa politique extrieure : la France n'est pas plus à l'abri que l'Espagne ou l'Italie ; elle a d'ailleurs t vise (à Karachi) comme l'ont t l'Australie (à Bali), le Maroc (à Casablanca) et dsormais l'Espagne. Le territoire est un, la cible est la même, vue par Al-Qaida. Nos socits sont des objectifs faciles. Elles sont frappes au nom d'une bataille "contre les croiss et les juifs", en arguant d'une prtendue oppression dont seraient victimes les pays de la communaut musulmane.
Au nom de ce combat, cet adversaire met en œuvre une stratgie terroriste à la simplicit effrayante : tuer le plus grand nombre possible. Il n'a pas d'objectif politique, hormis empêcher la dmocratie de se dvelopper dans la sphère musulmane. Il n'a qu'un seul critère de russite : faire le plus de morts. Il n'a pas non plus d'adresse prcise. Ce n'est pas un Etat, ou un groupe d'Etats, même s'il possède dans certains pays (Afghanistan, Pakistan, et, peut-être encore, Arabie saoudite) de solides rseaux. Ce n'est pas davantage une gurilla localisable en un primètre prcis. C'est une organisation n'ayant probablement pas de "centre", structure en une arme de cellules dormantes, tissant à travers les frontières un rseau d'appuis logistiques et disposant d'un grand nombre de candidats au martyre, installs à "l'ouest" après avoir subi à "l'est" - en Afghanistan et au Pakistan notamment - l'endoctrinement de quelque mir islamiste-extrmiste. Cet adversaire ne rpond pas à la dissuasion politique. Il n'y a pas de ngociation à engager avec lui. Il n'y a pas davantage de diplomatie "pro" ceci, ou "pro" cela qui mettrait un Etat à l'abri des foudres de la nbuleuse Al-Qaida.
L'adversaire, enfin, ne rpond pas à la dissuasion militaire. Même s'il a t un temps affaibli par les oprations menes en Afghanistan, il n'a ni territoire, ni population à dfendre, pas davantage d'installations civiles ou militaires à protger ; hormis des camps d'entranement abrits ici et là dans des pays amis. En ce sens, il ne relève pas d'une "guerre", pas au sens classique en tout cas, comme le croient George Bush et ses quipes ; encore moins d'une guerre contre l'Irak. Car avec qui signerait-on une reddition, avec qui conclure la paix ? La force d'Al-Qaida rside dans sa quasi-inexistence matrielle, localisable. Elle est plus une ide qu'un tat-major ; elle dispose plus de fidèles que de soldats. Elle n'a qu'un programme : la haine.
Mais comment peut-on lutter contre un tel danger ? La manière amricaine est connue. Lgitime dans un premier temps - l'Afghanistan, compte tenu du rle et de la place des talibans dans le dispositif Al-Qaida -, elle a conduit les Etats-Unis à ouvrir, en Irak, une parenthèse dommageable, illgitime et inutile que les tragiques vnements de Madrid devraient contribuer à refermer... D'une part parce que l'on sait faux l'un des prtextes de la guerre en Irak - le lien entre Bagdad et Al-Qaida - et que l'on voit bien, à l'inverse, que les infiltrations des partisans de Ben Laden sont la consquence de la guerre, et non l'inverse. D'autre part parce que la rponse globale, consistant à vouloir "remodeler" toute une rgion à partir du coup de pied dans la fourmilière irakienne, se rvèle, à ce stade, ni oprante, ni porteuse de moins de terrorisme.
MENSONGE D'ETAT
Au reste, il serait plus juste d'voquer la "manière Bush", plutt que la manière amricaine, tant s'affirme aux Etats-Unis, conduite par le candidat dmocrate John Kerry, une critique radicale d'une politique extrieure dnonce comme exclusivement idologique. C'est d'ailleurs l'idologie qui fait dire au dsastreux Donald Rumsfeld qu'ETA ou Al-Qaida, "c'est la même chose". Comme c'est peut-être l'idologie qui a conduit le gouvernement Aznar au mensonge d'Etat que les Espagnols ont aussitt sanctionn. Comme les Amricains sanctionneront peut-être d'autres mensonges, ceux de George Bush.
Comment lutter ? Certainement pas par plus de nationalisme, alors même que grandit, dans nos pays, la tentation du repli et du protectionnisme. Plus que jamais, il faut rechercher l'dification d'une relation rnove entre les Etats-Unis et l'Union europenne. La puissance amricaine, à la condition qu'elle troque son actuel souverainisme contre l'acceptation d'un partenariat, reste en effet au cœur de la stabilit internationale. Mais l'extrême complexit du contexte devrait interdire les mots d'ordre simplificateurs et empêcher de se prêter à une mobilisation viscrale de l'opinion.
La lutte contre pareil adversaire s'organise en tout cas sur plusieurs fronts : cooprations policière, judiciaire, militaire ; mais aussi protection civile. Elle va nous imposer des conditions, des prcautions qui sont à l'envers de nos aspirations, de nos modes de vie et de la fluidit qu'appelle l'conomie moderne, au sein de laquelle les transports jouent un rle essentiel. Elle pose aussitt la question des liberts publiques ; plus prcisment, de leur sauvegarde. Elle nous impose de nous interroger : au lendemain d'une attaque contre une grande gare parisienne, aussi meurtrière que celle qui a frapp Madrid, nos dputs rejetteraient-ils un "Patriot Act" à la franaise ?
C'est ici un dbat fondamental. En contrecoup des attentats, l'Europe voudra-t-elle redfinir sa conception des liberts ? On a bien vu poindre aux Etats-Unis même une tentation d'isolement, la monte de courants xnophobes et l'obsession de la scurit. Dans le monde d'aujourd'hui, il est un Etat qui prfigure un avenir possible : Isral. Isral est un Etat dmocratique. Mais, pour se dfendre, il se ferme et s'enferme, au point de construire un "mur". Cette solution aura vraisemblablement, dans nos pays, de plus en plus de partisans. Heureusement, le roi d'Espagne y a rpondu par avance et pour le compte commun des pays europens : "Nous devons lutter, a-t-il dit, avec les moyens de l'Etat de droit". Notre confrère Juan Luis Cebrian, fondateur du quotidien El Pais, a lui aussi affirm que "contre les ennemis de la dmocratie, la seule rponse est plus de dmocratie". Dans ces moments si difficiles, rvlateurs de la priode dans laquelle nous sommes entrs le 11 septembre 2001, l'un et l'autre ont su incarner notre identit commune. Il nous faudra ensemble la prserver.
Jean-Marie Colombani
• ARTICLE PARU DANS L'EDITION DU 16.03.04
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/imprimer_article/0,1-0@2-3208,36-356728,0.html
The Spanish elections: a landslide win for bin Laden
Tim Hames
After September 11, America stood firm; after March 11, Europe retreated
JOHN ADAMS wrote some 190 years ago that: “There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” After the profoundly depressing election result in Spain, it is tempting to conclude that the second President of the United States was justified in his pessimism. If Osama bin Laden is alive today he must be, despite physical discomfort, almost paralysed with laughter. Even Saddam Hussein, stuck in a prison cell, is entitled to a chuckle.
There can be little doubt that the Madrid bombings and the belated emergence of al-Qaeda or one of its affiliates as the principal suspects, won this contest for the Socialists. The Popular Party had led in all the opinion polls not only for the duration of the election campaign itself, but also for most of the 12 months before the ballot. Jos Mara Aznar, the outgoing Prime Minister, could point to a record of economic and social achievement since assuming power in 1996 that has no equal in Europe.
His colleagues seemed to be coasting to a third term in office. His political support for the US-led war in Iraq, and deployment of 1,300 troops in that country after its liberation, were not popular, but there was no hint that this would prove fatal for his party.
All that has changed. And with it, at a stroke, has the character and content of Spanish foreign policy. Jos Luis Rodrguez Zapatero, the Prime Minister-designate, has made it clear that Spanish forces will leave the Gulf in little more than three months’ time and that he will realign his country within the EU alongside those who loudly opposed the Iraqi venture. Even if the shift is largely symbolic, it is a staggering reversal. It is also by far the largest victory that al-Qaeda has achieved, and one with ominous potential repercussions.
For what have the terrorists learnt about the relative costs and benefits of operating in the US and Europe? The attacks they committed in New York and Washington were obviously spectacular but, as events rapidly demonstrated, they also represented a spectacular miscalculation by bin Laden and his associates. Far from withdrawing from the Middle East, an enraged Bush Administration chased the Taleban out of Afghanistan and went on to oust Saddam Hussein for good measure. “Don’t Mess with Texas” might not be the most eloquent foreign policy message ever devised, but it was surely plain, even to the fanatics, that neither the US President nor public would back down in the face of terrorism.
Now turn to Europe. A section of the Spanish electorate has apparently decided that the appropriate response to the murder of 200 of their fellow citizens is to ask what their Government might have done to provoke this outrage. This is a stance that smacks of weakness, not defiance. It is bound to lead those who plan terrorist atrocities to assume that if they can induce slaughter in continental Europe then pronounce those deeds to have been “retaliation” for decisions taken by George W. Bush, then they will prompt not anger directed at them but introspection and retreat.
Europe is, therefore, a far, far less safe place today than it was a week ago — not because of the Madrid bombings themselves, but what will be perceived as the political reaction in Spain to them. It is now well worth al-Qaeda and its ilk at least attempting to discern whether the same strategy will produce similar results in another European nation with close links to Washington. One does not have to be a genius or a fatalist to realise that an outrage perpetrated on Britain soil would be a propaganda coup of vast value.
The most disturbing aspect of the Madrid blasts is that Western intelligence agencies had no idea that they might be coming. It is precisely because not a whisper had been picked up via the intelligence “chatter” that the CIA initially assumed the Spanish authorities were entirely right to point the finger at Eta immediately.
That an attack of this scale and sophistication could be mounted without either the nation to be hit, the method to be employed, or the rough date when the event might occur seeping out in one form or another is an appalling development. It suggests that a major terrorist cell, probably backed by what is left of the bin Laden network, is at large and has not been infiltrated.
Europe thus may find itself in the worst of all worlds. The organisational capacity of the terrorists might be of a higher quality than had been hoped, while the political will of Europeans to resist terrorism looks weaker than that encountered in America. If terrorists believe they can make or break governments at whim, that is what they will attempt to do.
All of which places a special responsibility on this country. If there were to be an atrocity here, would we respond as the US did after September 11, 2001, or as certain Spanish voters have done after March 11, 2004? Would we redouble our efforts to conduct a “War on Terror” or rush to reward politicians who would distance Britain from the United States on the false and futile promise of an easier life?
It would take extraordinary good fortune now, in the aftermath of what al-Qaeda seems to have secured in Spain, for that moment and that choice to be avoided. Numerous politicians, senior policemen and intelligence experts have been warning for many months that a terrorist outrage in London is “virtually inevitable”. It is surely time that we took what they assert, and how we would react, a lot more seriously.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,482-1039703,00.html
Changing horses
Spain’s Socialists should aim for continuity
Few Western governments have come to power in more fraught circumstances than the Spanish Socialists. Having expected, at best, to make only enough inroads into the support for the ruling Popular Party (PP) to deny it an absolute majority, Jos Luis Rodrguez Zapatero unexpectedly found himself heading a government without a parliamentary majority, a clear foreign policy or, most urgently, a coherent response to the catastrophe that brought him to power. His supporters’ elation was dampened by the terror that Spain has experienced; his allies’ congratulations were tempered by uncertainty over his in- tentions; his campaign promises have to be measured against the realities of a society that is wounded, angry and confused.
Señor Zapatero’s first job is to form a stable government. That may not be easy. With 12 seats short of a majority, he has said that he will govern through “dialogue” with other groups. That looks like a recipe for instability, horse-trading and the exploitation of their position by radical groups, including the Basque nationalists. While the Basques are relieved at the thought that Eta was not directly responsible for the bombings, they are resentful of what they saw as the slurs from Madrid. Much of the rest of Spain is distrustful of these nationalists who, they feel, have not sufficiently distanced themselves from the men of violence. Even if he can manoeuvre between groups and factions in the Lower House, Señor Zapatero still faces a solid PP majority in the Upper House, which may be in no mood to pass his legislation.
The Socialists, committed to reversing many of Jos Mara Aznar’s policies at home and abroad, may be tempted to raid the economic storehouse that he so carefully replenished in an attempt to honour extravagant Socialist campaign promises of greater social welfare benefits, job creation and the satisfaction of union demands. Such echoes of the economic mess that the last Socialist Government left behind would herald a disaster, and the sharp fall in the stock exchange has already served as a salutary warning. The new Prime Minister appears to sense some of the dangers, however, and moved swiftly to appoint an economic adviser trusted for his fiscal prudence.
But it is in foreign policy that Señor Zapatero faces his greatest challenge. He has already made clear his eagerness to return to the vanguard, with France and Germany, of the European federalists, and spoke of restoring “magnificent” relations with them. There are profound implications in leaping into bed with old Europe: not only will Spain now find itself again subservient to the diktats of the Franco-German alliance — with an inevitable cooling in relations with Britain; but Madrid will come under pressure to accept a reduced voting strength in the European constitution if it is to demonstrate its federalist devotion.
There is even more at stake outside Europe. Both Señor Zapatero’s campaign rhetoric and the sudden support of some voters terrified by Spain’s commitment to Iraq may make it hard to retreat from his promise to pull its troops out. President Bush will not be the only leader urging him to think again of the disastrous implications. It would, at the very least, be a betrayal of Iraqis who will need the security of international support to rebuild their country.
Spaniards rightly expect the new Government, and their allies, to make terrorism a priority. This is a problem for which their little-known leader was wholly unprepared. His best course now, therefore, would be a judicious silence on Iraq, a pragmatic re-assessment of the Aznar record and a decision to bring a measure of continuity to a country that has been profoundly unsettled.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,542-1039771,00.html
The Spanish dishonoured their dead
By Mark Steyn
(Filed: 16/03/2004)
"When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, naturally they will like the strong horse." So said Osama bin Laden in his final video appearance two-and-a-half years ago. But even the late Osama might have been surprised to see the Spanish people, invited to choose between a strong horse and a weak horse, opt to make their general election an exercise in mass self-gelding.
To be sure, there are all kinds of John Kerry-esque footnoted nuances to Sunday's stark numbers. One sympathises with those electors reported to be angry at the government's pathetic insistence, in the face of the emerging evidence, that Thursday's attack was the work of Eta, when it was obviously the jihad boys. One's sympathy, however, disappears with their decision to vote for a party committed to disengaging from the war against the jihadi. As Margaret Thatcher would have said: "This is no time to go wobbly, Manuel." But they did. And no one will remember the footnotes, the qualifications, the background - just the final score: terrorists toppled a European government.
What was it all those party leaders used to drone robotically after IRA atrocities? We must never let the bullet and the bomb win out over the ballot and the bollocks. Something like that. In Spain, the bombers hijacked the ballot, and very decisively. The Socialist Workers' Party wouldn't have won, except for the terrorism.
At the end of last week, American friends kept saying to me: "3/11 is Europe's 9/11. They get it now." I expressed scepticism. And I very much doubt whether March 11 will be a day that will live in infamy. Rather, March 14 seems likely to be the date bequeathed to posterity, in the way we remember those grim markers on the road to conflagration through the 1930s, the tactical surrenders that made disaster inevitable. All those umbrellas in the rain at Friday's marches proved to be pretty pictures for the cameras, nothing more. The rain in Spain falls mainly on the slain. In the three days between the slaughter and the vote, it was widely reported that the atrocity had been designed to influence the election. In allowing it to do so, the Spanish knowingly made Sunday a victory for appeasement and dishonoured their own dead.
And, if it works in Spain, why not in Australia, Britain, Italy, Poland? In his 1996 "Declaration of War Against the Americans", Bin Laden cited Washington's feebleness in the face of the 1992 Aden hotel bombings and the Black Hawk Down business in Somalia in 1993: "You have been disgraced by Allah and you withdrew," he wrote. "The extent of your impotence and weaknesses became very clear." To the jihadis' way of thinking, on Thursday, the Spaniards were disgraced by Allah; on Sunday, they withdrew. The extent of their impotence and weaknesses is very clear.
Or, as Simon Jenkins put it in a hilariously mistimed cover story for last Thursday's Spectator arguing that this terrorism business is a lot of twaddle got up by Blair and Bush: "Bombs kill and panic the panicky. But they do not undermine civilised society unless that society wants to be undermined." And there's no chance of that happening, right?
Jenkins's argument, such as it is, is that a bomb here, a bomb there, nothing to get your knickers in a twist about: that's one thing we Europeans understand. But what he refuses to address is the shifting facts on the ground.
Europe's home-grown terrorism problems take place among notably static populations, such as Ulster and the Basque country. One could make generally safe extrapolations about the likelihood of holding Northern Ireland to what HMG used to call an "acceptable level of violence".
But in the same three decades as Ulster's "Troubles", the hitherto moderate Muslim populations of south Asia were radicalised by a politicised form of Islam; previously broadly unIslamic societies such as Nigeria became Islamified; and large Muslim populations settled in parts of Europe that had little or no experience of mass immigration.
You can argue about what these trends mean, but surely not that they mean absolutely nothing, as Sir Simon and the Complaceniks assure us: nothing to see here, chaps; switch back to the Test and bring me another buttered crumpet; when Osama vows to avenge the "tragedy of Andalucia", it's just a bit of overheated campaign rhetoric, like Kerry calling Bush a "liar", that's all.
For the non-complacent, the question is fast becoming whether "civilised society" in much of Europe is already too "undermined". Last Friday, for a brief moment, it looked as if a few brave editorialists on the Continent finally grasped that global terrorism is a real threat to Europe, and not just a Bush racket. But even then they weren't proposing that the Continent should rise up and prosecute the war, only that they be less snippy in their carping from the sidelines as America gets on with it. Spain was Washington's principal Continental ally, and what does that boil down to in practice? 1,300 troops. That's fewer than what the New Hampshire National Guard is contributing.
The other day, the editor of Le Monde, writing in the Wall Street Journal, dismissed as utterly false the widespread belief among all Americans except John Kerry's campaign staff that France is a worthless ally: "Let us remember here," he wrote, "the involvement of French and German soldiers, among other European nationalities, in the operations launched in Afghanistan to pursue the Taliban, track down bin Laden and attempt to free the Afghans."
Oh, put a baguette in it, will you? The Continentals didn't "launch" anything in Afghanistan. They showed up when the war was over - after the Taliban had been toppled and the Afghans liberated. And a few hundred Nato troops in post-combat mopping-up operations barely registers in the scale against the gazillions of Americans defending the Continent so that EU governments can blow their defence budgets on welfare programmes that make the citizens ever more enervated and dependent.
The only fighting that there is going to be in Europe in the foreseeable future is civil war, and when that happens American infantrymen will want to be somewhere safer. Like Iraq. There are strong horses and weak horses, but right now western Europe is looking like a dead horse.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/...l&secureRefresh=true&_requestid=82329
La haine et la dmocratie
LE MONDE | 15.03.04 | 15h19 • MIS A JOUR LE 15.03.04 | 16h50
Il faut, hlas, l'admettre, et en mesurer les consquences : l'Union europenne, frappe à Madrid, est entre à son tour, le jeudi 11 mars, dans l'ère sinistre du terrorisme de masse. Comme les Etats-Unis, après le 11 septembre 2001, et avec les Etats-Unis, elle va devoir faire face à un adversaire insaisissable. Cet adversaire n'a ni revendication particulière, comme peut en avoir l'ETA aujourd'hui ou l'IRA hier, ni territoire particulier. Il s'en prend aux socits dmocratiques, attaques pour ce qu'elles sont : ouvertes, fluides, respectueuses de l'Etat de droit. La dmocratie, ici comme en terre d'islam, voilà l'ennemi !
Et il serait tout aussi vain qu'absurde, et lche, de croire tel ou tel pays plus ou moins à l'abri, selon le curseur où se trouve place sa politique extrieure : la France n'est pas plus à l'abri que l'Espagne ou l'Italie ; elle a d'ailleurs t vise (à Karachi) comme l'ont t l'Australie (à Bali), le Maroc (à Casablanca) et dsormais l'Espagne. Le territoire est un, la cible est la même, vue par Al-Qaida. Nos socits sont des objectifs faciles. Elles sont frappes au nom d'une bataille "contre les croiss et les juifs", en arguant d'une prtendue oppression dont seraient victimes les pays de la communaut musulmane.
Au nom de ce combat, cet adversaire met en œuvre une stratgie terroriste à la simplicit effrayante : tuer le plus grand nombre possible. Il n'a pas d'objectif politique, hormis empêcher la dmocratie de se dvelopper dans la sphère musulmane. Il n'a qu'un seul critère de russite : faire le plus de morts. Il n'a pas non plus d'adresse prcise. Ce n'est pas un Etat, ou un groupe d'Etats, même s'il possède dans certains pays (Afghanistan, Pakistan, et, peut-être encore, Arabie saoudite) de solides rseaux. Ce n'est pas davantage une gurilla localisable en un primètre prcis. C'est une organisation n'ayant probablement pas de "centre", structure en une arme de cellules dormantes, tissant à travers les frontières un rseau d'appuis logistiques et disposant d'un grand nombre de candidats au martyre, installs à "l'ouest" après avoir subi à "l'est" - en Afghanistan et au Pakistan notamment - l'endoctrinement de quelque mir islamiste-extrmiste. Cet adversaire ne rpond pas à la dissuasion politique. Il n'y a pas de ngociation à engager avec lui. Il n'y a pas davantage de diplomatie "pro" ceci, ou "pro" cela qui mettrait un Etat à l'abri des foudres de la nbuleuse Al-Qaida.
L'adversaire, enfin, ne rpond pas à la dissuasion militaire. Même s'il a t un temps affaibli par les oprations menes en Afghanistan, il n'a ni territoire, ni population à dfendre, pas davantage d'installations civiles ou militaires à protger ; hormis des camps d'entranement abrits ici et là dans des pays amis. En ce sens, il ne relève pas d'une "guerre", pas au sens classique en tout cas, comme le croient George Bush et ses quipes ; encore moins d'une guerre contre l'Irak. Car avec qui signerait-on une reddition, avec qui conclure la paix ? La force d'Al-Qaida rside dans sa quasi-inexistence matrielle, localisable. Elle est plus une ide qu'un tat-major ; elle dispose plus de fidèles que de soldats. Elle n'a qu'un programme : la haine.
Mais comment peut-on lutter contre un tel danger ? La manière amricaine est connue. Lgitime dans un premier temps - l'Afghanistan, compte tenu du rle et de la place des talibans dans le dispositif Al-Qaida -, elle a conduit les Etats-Unis à ouvrir, en Irak, une parenthèse dommageable, illgitime et inutile que les tragiques vnements de Madrid devraient contribuer à refermer... D'une part parce que l'on sait faux l'un des prtextes de la guerre en Irak - le lien entre Bagdad et Al-Qaida - et que l'on voit bien, à l'inverse, que les infiltrations des partisans de Ben Laden sont la consquence de la guerre, et non l'inverse. D'autre part parce que la rponse globale, consistant à vouloir "remodeler" toute une rgion à partir du coup de pied dans la fourmilière irakienne, se rvèle, à ce stade, ni oprante, ni porteuse de moins de terrorisme.
MENSONGE D'ETAT
Au reste, il serait plus juste d'voquer la "manière Bush", plutt que la manière amricaine, tant s'affirme aux Etats-Unis, conduite par le candidat dmocrate John Kerry, une critique radicale d'une politique extrieure dnonce comme exclusivement idologique. C'est d'ailleurs l'idologie qui fait dire au dsastreux Donald Rumsfeld qu'ETA ou Al-Qaida, "c'est la même chose". Comme c'est peut-être l'idologie qui a conduit le gouvernement Aznar au mensonge d'Etat que les Espagnols ont aussitt sanctionn. Comme les Amricains sanctionneront peut-être d'autres mensonges, ceux de George Bush.
Comment lutter ? Certainement pas par plus de nationalisme, alors même que grandit, dans nos pays, la tentation du repli et du protectionnisme. Plus que jamais, il faut rechercher l'dification d'une relation rnove entre les Etats-Unis et l'Union europenne. La puissance amricaine, à la condition qu'elle troque son actuel souverainisme contre l'acceptation d'un partenariat, reste en effet au cœur de la stabilit internationale. Mais l'extrême complexit du contexte devrait interdire les mots d'ordre simplificateurs et empêcher de se prêter à une mobilisation viscrale de l'opinion.
La lutte contre pareil adversaire s'organise en tout cas sur plusieurs fronts : cooprations policière, judiciaire, militaire ; mais aussi protection civile. Elle va nous imposer des conditions, des prcautions qui sont à l'envers de nos aspirations, de nos modes de vie et de la fluidit qu'appelle l'conomie moderne, au sein de laquelle les transports jouent un rle essentiel. Elle pose aussitt la question des liberts publiques ; plus prcisment, de leur sauvegarde. Elle nous impose de nous interroger : au lendemain d'une attaque contre une grande gare parisienne, aussi meurtrière que celle qui a frapp Madrid, nos dputs rejetteraient-ils un "Patriot Act" à la franaise ?
C'est ici un dbat fondamental. En contrecoup des attentats, l'Europe voudra-t-elle redfinir sa conception des liberts ? On a bien vu poindre aux Etats-Unis même une tentation d'isolement, la monte de courants xnophobes et l'obsession de la scurit. Dans le monde d'aujourd'hui, il est un Etat qui prfigure un avenir possible : Isral. Isral est un Etat dmocratique. Mais, pour se dfendre, il se ferme et s'enferme, au point de construire un "mur". Cette solution aura vraisemblablement, dans nos pays, de plus en plus de partisans. Heureusement, le roi d'Espagne y a rpondu par avance et pour le compte commun des pays europens : "Nous devons lutter, a-t-il dit, avec les moyens de l'Etat de droit". Notre confrère Juan Luis Cebrian, fondateur du quotidien El Pais, a lui aussi affirm que "contre les ennemis de la dmocratie, la seule rponse est plus de dmocratie". Dans ces moments si difficiles, rvlateurs de la priode dans laquelle nous sommes entrs le 11 septembre 2001, l'un et l'autre ont su incarner notre identit commune. Il nous faudra ensemble la prserver.
Jean-Marie Colombani
• ARTICLE PARU DANS L'EDITION DU 16.03.04
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/imprimer_article/0,1-0@2-3208,36-356728,0.html
a.d.i.d.a.s
Member
Filip Antonio said:
Pai asta am spus si eu, nu ? ... PP era cu doar cateva procente in fata socialistilor (un avantaj nesemnificativ) .... S-ar fi putut intampla orice... (la fel ca-n Grecia)... - CU sau FARA aportul teroristilor ... Iar atentatul din Madrid a fost DOAR picatura ce a umplut paharul...
Clovis Sangrail
New Member
Am dat ieri seara peste o stire unde se afirma ca explozivele utilizate in atentatele din Spania au fost facute in ... SUA ! Culmea e ca linkul unde am gasit informatia a fost blocat astazi :
http://www.memes.org/modules.php?op...=2516&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
http://www.memes.org/modules.php?op...=2516&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
lia
Active Member
Au fost identificati doi moldoveni raniti in urma atentatelor teroriste de la Madrid
18 martie 2004
Ministerul Afacerilor Externe al Republicii Moldova a confirmat joi ca in urma atentatelor terorist din Madrid au fost raniti doi cetateni moldoveni, informeaza AP FLUX, citand un comunicat al Serviciului de presa al MAE.
Potrivit unei note a Ambasadei Spaniei in Franta, prezentata joi misiunii Republicii Moldova din aceasta tara, "printre persoanele ranite in atentatul cu bombe din Madrid s-a aflat Petru Sanduta, care s-a declarat cetatean moldovean, fara acte de identitate, fiind deja externat din spitalul Gregorio Maranon". "In aceeasi institutie medicala continua sa se afle Natalia Tomasevscaia, nascuta la 4 august 1958 in Cimislia, titulara a pasaportului de cetatean al Republicii Moldova A 0371297".
Pana in prezent, nici un cetatean moldovean nu a fost inregistrat in lista decedatilor. Totodata, mai sunt persoane decedate si ranite neidentificate.
Ambasada Republicii Moldova in Franta continua monitorizarea situatiei si va aduce operativ la cunostinta opiniei publice orice informatie oficiala a autoritatilor spaniole referitoare la cetatenii Republicii Moldova care au avut de suferit in atacul terorist de la Madrid.
Despre cazul Nataliei Tomasevscaia, MAE a informat Departamentul Tehnologii Informationale, care va lua masuri pentru a aduce la cunostinta rudelor informatia de rigoare.
FLUX
http://www.azi.md/news?ID=28332
http://www.jurnal.md/articol.php?id=1353&cat=2&editie=
18 martie 2004
Ministerul Afacerilor Externe al Republicii Moldova a confirmat joi ca in urma atentatelor terorist din Madrid au fost raniti doi cetateni moldoveni, informeaza AP FLUX, citand un comunicat al Serviciului de presa al MAE.
Potrivit unei note a Ambasadei Spaniei in Franta, prezentata joi misiunii Republicii Moldova din aceasta tara, "printre persoanele ranite in atentatul cu bombe din Madrid s-a aflat Petru Sanduta, care s-a declarat cetatean moldovean, fara acte de identitate, fiind deja externat din spitalul Gregorio Maranon". "In aceeasi institutie medicala continua sa se afle Natalia Tomasevscaia, nascuta la 4 august 1958 in Cimislia, titulara a pasaportului de cetatean al Republicii Moldova A 0371297".
Pana in prezent, nici un cetatean moldovean nu a fost inregistrat in lista decedatilor. Totodata, mai sunt persoane decedate si ranite neidentificate.
Ambasada Republicii Moldova in Franta continua monitorizarea situatiei si va aduce operativ la cunostinta opiniei publice orice informatie oficiala a autoritatilor spaniole referitoare la cetatenii Republicii Moldova care au avut de suferit in atacul terorist de la Madrid.
Despre cazul Nataliei Tomasevscaia, MAE a informat Departamentul Tehnologii Informationale, care va lua masuri pentru a aduce la cunostinta rudelor informatia de rigoare.
FLUX
http://www.azi.md/news?ID=28332
http://www.jurnal.md/articol.php?id=1353&cat=2&editie=
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tm...20040702/ap_on_re_mi_ea/egypt_attacks_warning
Grupul islamist Brigazile lui Abu Hafs al-Masri care a luat asupra sa responsabilitatea atacului de la Madrid, ameninta tarile europene care participa cu soldati in Iraq, cu atacuri similare, in caz ca nu se retrag.
Grupul islamist Brigazile lui Abu Hafs al-Masri care a luat asupra sa responsabilitatea atacului de la Madrid, ameninta tarile europene care participa cu soldati in Iraq, cu atacuri similare, in caz ca nu se retrag.