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12. mars 2004
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Madrid tonight
An estimated two million people are marching in the streets of Madrid tonight, braving heavy rain to deliver a strong condemnation of terrorism.
I hope this resolve keeps up, in the coming weeks, months and years of what will undoubtedly be a long war on terrorism.
9:04:22 PM 
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Slipping under the radar, almost
In other news...
Amid physical fighting in South Korea's parliament, President Roh Moo-hyun has been impeached. This suspends his powers until a constitutional court decides on his fate, maybe in as much as six months. Not precisely what South Korea's fragile democracy needed now, and it looked overwhelmingly like politicking going insane to me. Still, a 193-2 vote for impeachment is devastating. I think Roh should step aside for the good of all.
The IAEA is totally in disarray over criticising Iran for its nuclear programme. The US, Australia, Canada and Europe wants a harsh censure, the "nonaligned bloc" does everything to sabotage this, China is ambigious and Russia doesn't seem to give a damn. It is breathtaking that these countries will risk the Mullah-ruled Iran to become nuclear just to poke its nose at Washington.
Forty year old Susan Lindauer, a former congressional press aide for several democrats, has been arrested for having received money to do intelligence work for Iraq. While many news sources say she is accused of "spying" that is not precisely the case. Lindauer claims she is innocent, and hints she is targeted for being a peace activist.
California's Supreme Court has surprisningly, and sadly, ordered San Francisco to immediately stop issuing marriage licenses to gay couples. Note that this is no ruling on the legality of the marriages, which is to be decided, as I understand it, on some later date. I admit having some understanding that the court stepped in, considering that the legality of these licenses are dubious under California's law. This was a civil disobedience to make a point, and the point was made loud and clear. Still, I feel saddened for the couples that arrived too late.
Now, that is my opinions on these issues.
8:18:02 PM
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Attacking Spain part of al-Qaeda strategy?
The Norwegian Defense Research Establishment accidentally found a strategy document on an Islamist website mentioning an attack on Spanish targets which has some similarities to what just happened in Madrid. I have failed to find mention of this on any English language news site. Luckily, Bjørn Stærk has provided a translation, so I don't have to. This information deserves wider coverage.
In brief, the document says that Islamists wanted to force a withdrawal from Iraq by attacking US allies who were assumed to have a weaker resolve, in particular Spain. The document discussed attacks in Iraq, mind you, but may still point to a wider tactic.
If (still a very big 'if') this is an al-Qaeda attack, it means the Islamofascists are trying the resolve of Europeans in face of terror. Bjørn is not more optimistic than I am:
European anti-Americanism is a powerful tool in the hands of skilled propagandists. I don't have al-Qaeda's belief in the power of random slaughter, but I'm not confident that they're wrong about how Europeans will react, especially if they manage to make a campaign out of this.
Those who blamed America for 9/11, may well blame America for 3/11 as well.
Update: US experts are particularly skeptical towards the alleged al-Qaeda letter from the Brigade of Abu Hafs al-Masri. There is no evidence this group is anything more than one dude with a PC and a fax machine. It has taken responsibility for practically every terrorist attack on the planet, and some events which weren't, like the August blackouts in North America. Whoever they are, they are not credible. The Koran tape in the car found at the scene is definately stronger evidence.
Update 2: The Telegraph has a good overview of arguments for respectively ETA and al-Qaeda being to blame.
Update 3: I just heard on the radio that the explosives used in the attacks have been analysed, and they do not match the explosives used by ETA. I'm looking for links. (PS: I am beginning to doubt that report now)
5:54:39 PM
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Precisely 911 days?
Both the blogsphere (like VodkaPundit) and mainstream media pundits (like TCS) point out that the March 11 attacks happened precisely 2 years and 6 months after the September 11 attacks on the United States. Also, some argue, it happened precisely 911 days later.
Spanish media is now characterizing yesterday as Spain's 9-11, although it remains unclear how, in the aftermath, the Spanish psyche will be affected. Coincidentally - or perhaps not -- the attacks came exactly 911 days after September 11 on 3-11.
Not exactly. The attacks came 912 days after 9/11-01. The year 2004 is a leap year. Of course, with a bit of creative accounting, one can argue that since the attacks happened earlier in the day, local time, it was still 911-something days between the attacks. Or maybe the terrorists made the same mistake as the journalists?
5:00:10 PM
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Circular link
The Wired article Net Cries Out for Madrid links a number of blogs that write about the Madrid bombings, including this one.
2:54:44 PM
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Not the first Islamist terror attack against Spain
If (still a big 'if') al-Qaeda was behind the Madrid train attack, it would not be the first time the Islamists attack Spanish targets. The most serious of the attacks in Morocco May 17 hit a Spanish cultural center. Most of the victims were Moroccans, however.
Spanish National Radio said 15 people died in the attack on the Casa de Espana restaurant, making it the worst of the five bombings.
A Spanish businessman was among those killed, Spanish media reported.
It is however an argument against the Madrid bombings being al-Qaeda that no suicide attackers were involved. Martyrdom has until now been a virtual obsession with the Islamist terrorists. The alternative, that it is an ETA operation, is equally hard to harmonise with the facts, however. The Basque terrorists have never attempted such a murderous operation in the past. When the ETA killed 21 shoppers in a Barcelona supermarket in June 1987, it afterwards apologised for the "mistake."
Assuming this was an al-Qaeda attack, we should expect the usual suspects to argue that this shows the price of cooperating with the USA in the war on terror and in Iraq, and encourage European countries to withdraw from supporting the US. That would be a grave mistake. In Morocco, Spanish targets were attacked, but so was nationals from Belgium, which has been one of the most outspoken critics of the US policy on Iraq. Also remember that Turkey, which refused the US to use its bases and attack Iraq from their soil, have also been subject to deadly terrorist attacks. On the evidence, cowardice is not a defense against terrorist attacks. I am confident this fact will not escape the Spanish government.
PS: For what it's worth: the decline on the European and US stock exchanges show that the markets now strongly suspect this was an al-Qaeda attack.
7:49:11 AM
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Al-Qaeda allegedly takes responsibility for Madrid attack
Spanish authorites now appear to be more cautious about who were behind Thursday's deadly terrorist attacks, which has claimed 190 lives (so far) and left more than 1400 people wounded. ETA is still the prime suspect, however, an al-Qaeda affiliated group has claimed responsibility for the attack:
The Arabic newspaper Al-Quds al-Arabi said Thursday it had received a claim of responsibility for the Madrid train bombings issued in the name of Al Qaeda, the terror organization responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
Earlier Thursday Spanish officials accused the Basque separatist terror group ETA of the bombings and have yet to comment on the Al Qaeda claim.
The five-page e-mail claim, signed by the shadowy Brigade of Abu Hafs al-Masri, was received at the paper's London offices. It said the brigade's "death squad" had penetrated "one of the pillars of the crusade alliance, Spain."
"This is part of settling old accounts with Spain, the crusader, and America's ally in its war against Islam," the claim said.
The paper's editor, Bari Atwan, told Fox News the alleged letter from Al Qaeda "looks authentic" and consistent with letters the paper has received from the terrorist organization in the past.
Asked about the claim of responsibility, White House spokesman Sean McCormack said, "we've seen the news reports and we're going to determine what the facts are."
A van containing several detonators and an Arabic-language tape of Koranic verses was found near Madrid, Interior Minister Angel Acebes said later Thursday, announcing that new lines of investigation into the bombings were being opened.
So now there are concrete leads in at least two directions. Maybe it's too far fetched to speculate about a cooperation between the secular separatist ETA and the Islamist al-Qaeda? It would certainly be unusual.
It is not as if it necessarily means anything that an allaged al-Qaeda group has claimed responsibility. I seem to remember a few fringe groups taking responsibility for the Columbia shuttle disaster. And al-Qaeda normally waits a bit longer before boasting about its atrocities.
5:57:53 AM
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Kofi's son trading with Iraq
The scandal over the UN oil-for-palaces programme, and the unhealthy side trade in vouchers, is pretty much stonewalled in the mainstream media, but it appears more and more likely that there are lots of skeletons buried in the UN building.
The UN itself insists that it saw no evil, heard no evil, spoke no evil while Saddam bypassed the sanctions programme en masse.
That's fascinating, not least given the ties of Annan's own son, Kojo Annan, to the Switzerland-based firm, Cotecna, which from 1999 onward worked on contract for the U.N. monitoring the shipments of Oil-for-food supplies into Iraq. These were the same supplies sent in under terms of those tens of billions of dollars worth of U.N.-approved contracts in which the U.N. says it failed to notice Saddam Hussein's widespread arrangements to overpay contractors who then shipped overpriced goods to the impoverished people of Iraq and kicked back part of their profits to Saddam's regime.
Cotecna was hired by the U.N. on December 31, 1998. Shortly afterward, press reports surfaced that Kojo was a partner in a private consulting firm doing work for Cotecna, and that just 13 months previously he had occupied a senior slot on Cotecna's own staff. Asked about this in 1999 by the London Telegraph, a U.N. spokesman, John Mills, replied that the U.N. had not been aware of the connection, and that "The tender by Cotecna was the lowest by a significant margin."
Maybe Kojo was not at all involved in anything shady, but the UN doesn't exactly inspire confidence by shutting out about it. His father Kofi Annan was personally involved in negotiation the oil-for-food programme even before he became Secretary General.
This is certainly a topic where the UN should be open and actively clearing its name, if it can.
Via InstaPundit. Also check out Roger L. Simon's comments.
5:07:40 AM
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© Copyright 2004 Jan Haugland.
Last update: 01.04.2004; 02:26:36.
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This is my blogchalk:
Norway, Bergen, Norwegian, English, Jan, Male, 31-35.
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