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Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

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101–110 of 345 posts

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#101
post #73
post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - we need more surveillance rights and money for the secret services Looks like it's not working too well. Surveillance services have gained mass resources since 2015 in France and that did not stop the December attacks at all.

France has had the most extensive surveillance system in continental Europe for over a decade and it has helped roundabout nothing.

Indeed. It seems to be the prevalent opinion among European counter-terrorism experts that the most effective policies are:

- Bringing more eyes and ears in the form of social workers and community policemen in problematic neighborhoods.

- Provide better education/work opportunities for immigrants.

- Better cooperation between municipalities and Muslim organisations/mosques.

- Deradicalization programs.

Of course, implementing such policies takes time and it's much more popular to present the 'easy solutions' (more surveillance, closing borders, etc.).

France has been doing pretty much the opposite, investing money in surveillance and special forces instead. Belgium has kind of ignored problems.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#102

People always freak out when this happens. As long as there have been people with enough hate (or often political motives) there has always been terrorist attacks. Even the Romans suffered as much. I don't think there is any solution which makes everyone perfectly safe. Politicians always want to guarantee perfect safety but it's not possible. Some things you can prevent, some things you can stop, but some horrible t…

You seem to attribute a lot to politics. I would argue that religion is the variable that plays the dominant role in this war of ideas.

It's less religion and more economic disparity. That's why you have beheadings in Mexico as well.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#103
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to attribute a lot to politics. I would argue that religion is the variable that plays the dominant role in this war of ideas.

I would say that religion is only a means here. The underlying reason for the problems is political failure.

Whereby the biggest political failure is to not separate politics and religion.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#105

This is a mess larger than I can comprehend, with scores of innocent dead. The spectrum of political issues this crosses is vast. We're talking nationalism, immigration, religion, extremism, surveillance, privacy, and war to name a few. The nuance required to understand and attack the big picture is almost nowhere to be found. I saw the French PM said something like "we're at war" - I'm not sure who they're at war wi…

The media certainly doesn't want to discuss the real issues in regards to terrorist attacks and why they may exist. I don't think it's as simple as "they hate our way our life" as the governments around the world try to portray it and the media seems to go along with it without questions that logic.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to BBC the explosion are believed to have been in the checkin area, i.e. outside of the security screening.

Get dogs trained to detect explosives patrolling all areas of the airport and I'm not sure what they're called, but they have these sniffer devices at the CN tower where they basically make you walk through a large hairdryer and it sniffs the residue blown off you for chemical signatures. It's not perfect, but a combination of those two things any place where you have large volumes of people congregating would surely…

Perhaps, but then bombs could just be detonated in open public squares, playgrounds, etc - it's actually surprising they're not.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#107

As sad as it is, I think the responses will be: - we need more surveillance rights and money for the secret services - we need more police and higher spending - and possibly bomb some country (Syria is en vogue) What won't be said is: - How come this happens again without anyone having seen it coming? - What does it say about the success of the Western anti-terror foreign policy adopted ~2001?

> How come this happens again without anyone having seen it coming? A lot of people could see it coming, except for the naive PC people

Political correctness supports terrorism? I bet you are as anti-terrorism as they get.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Local", yes, keep telling yourself that 2nd generation immigrants I'm not against immigration per se, but there's a lot of problems coming from people who fail (because it's mostly their responsibility) to integrate

They don't fail to integrate, they don't want to. Big difference. I believe there will be a time in Europe, when people will have enough and will demand deportation of every muslim. So 99 good muslims will be deported for every 1 bad muslim. I'm not saying I want this time to come, but what else can happen ? Drastic times == drastic measures.

Yes, the word "fail" in this case does not mean the aspect you're pointing does not exist

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#109
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would we bomb Syria? Isn't the al-Assad government working against ISIS and related organisations?

Assad is anti-west.

There are many of us Westerners that have some anti-west tendencies - like anti-surveillance, anti-government-sticking-its-nose-in-where-it-shouldn't-be, anti-corruption-caused-by-lobbyists-and-big-business-running-our-government, etc. etc.

But we're not completely anti-west, we enjoy the freedoms and religious autonomy we're granted and we enjoy the cultural mix that "the West" affords us.

It also doesn't mean we wish to maim and murder the innocent (on either side of the argument!) in order to make our point. I think 99% of us can agree that groups (like ISIS) who think it's acceptable and act to torture and kill the innocent to make their political point need to die in a hell-fire and be damned to all eternity. Or maybe that's just me.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#110
post #86

As sad as it is, I think the responses will be: - we need more surveillance rights and money for the secret services - we need more police and higher spending - and possibly bomb some country (Syria is en vogue) What won't be said is: - How come this happens again without anyone having seen it coming? - What does it say about the success of the Western anti-terror foreign policy adopted ~2001?

> - we need more police and higher spending Belgium certainly does. Its failures in counter terrorism have lead to the Paris attacks and now these attacks. At least that is the understanding I have gleaned from twitter conversations of CT experts

My advice: stop making opinions about what you read on twitter and carfully select the so called CT experts you are talking about.
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