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Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

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Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#321

Post by ptaipale »

ascorbic wrote: post #32
odinduty wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess it's hard to feel in any other way when recent migration policies have translated into a sharp decline of our own security in our own developed countries.

The Paris attackers were French and Belgian, not immigrants. This has been the case with almost all attacks in Europe, where the perpetrators have almost always been local.

>The Paris attackers were French and Belgian, not immigrants.

Two of the nine were not - they were actual, recent immigrants through asylum-seeking process.

"Ahmad al-Mohammad" who came as a refugee through Turkey to Leroa in Greece, and together with him were registered the fingerprints of another immigrant known as "M. al-Mahmodin".

The rest were second-generation immigrants:

Bilal Hadfi was French but he spent time in Syria and came back, not through controlled border crossings, so he might have come with the asylees/immigrants. Others included French citizens Samy Amimour, who fought in Yemen, and Omar Ismail Mostefai and Foued Mohamed-Aggad who fought in Syria, and they were on wanted lists but were not spotted on border, so they appear to have come through people smugglers as well.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_2015_Paris_attacks#Id...

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#322

Post by ptaipale »

ascorbic wrote: post #308
mistermann wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> By what possible rationale could you say that recent immigration has anything to do with this I didn't say it was recent immigration that caused this incident, we both know that (if they are 2nd generation, it couldn't be recent). > other than that they're Muslim You think that their religion has absolutely nothing to do with this? I mean, even unjust prejudice within their host country because of their religion co…

The original comment specified recent immigration. What gave you the impression I thought religion had nothing to do with this? Of course it does. I was talking about immigration though, and the fact they're both Muslim doesn't mean that these incidents have any connection to recent refugees from Syria, aside from the fact that the Syrians are running from these kind of people.

Actually, two of the nine Paris attackers were (probably) from Syria and had come as refugees, as they were registered with fingerprints in Greece.

A few of the others were French and were known to be in Syria, but how they came back to EU is apparently not known (could be with help from people smugglers, avoiding any registration at borders, because some of them were on wanted lists).

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#323

Post by ptaipale »

matthewmacleod wrote: post #93
odinduty wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess it's hard to feel in any other way when recent migration policies have translated into a sharp decline of our own security in our own developed countries.

No they haven't. The recent attacks in Europe have not been caused by 'recent migrants'. That's just a bald-faced lie.

In November Paris attacks, two of the nine actually were "recent migrants" as explained in another comment.

So perhaps that "bald-faced lie" needs to be toned down a bit.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#324

Post by sydneysider »

qb45 wrote: post #273
sydneysider wrote: post #228

I wonder how long it will take for people to connect the dots... Meanwhile Europe has no borders, massive security risk which we are only beginning to see the consequences of.

The problem is mainly with external borders, not internal. They are likely getting weapons and other aids from outside, you can't just buy AK47 in EU.

Should have been clearer, I meant external. But honestly, I don't mind having to show my passport while crossing internal borders.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#325

Post by Khaine »

melicerte wrote: post #110
Khaine wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - 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.

My advice: I do carefully select the experts I listen too

"One Belgian counterterrorism official told BuzzFeed News last week that due to the small size of the Belgian government and the huge numbers of open investigations — into Belgian citizens suspected of either joining ISIS, being part of radical groups in Belgium, and the ongoing investigations into last November’s attacks in Paris, which appeared to be at least partially planned in Brussels and saw the participation of several Belgian citizens and residents — virtually every police detective and military intelligence officer in the country was focused on international jihadi investigations.

“We just don’t have the people to watch anything else and, frankly, we don’t have the infrastructure to properly investigate or monitor hundreds of individuals suspected of terror links, as well as pursue the hundreds of open files and investigations we have,” the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said. “It’s literally an impossible situation and, honestly, it’s very grave.”"

See http://www.buzzfeed.com/mitchprothero/belgian-authorities-ov...

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#326

Post by AnthonyMouse »

tmptmp wrote: post #302
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For every attack that they "didn't see coming" there are, most likely, plenty of attacks that they "did see coming" and stopped. Even more likely is that we don't hear about these stopped attacks because they aren't sexy news. Or, when attacks ARE stopped, and it's published, people question whether it's just blustering by the government to justify their jobs. The problem with this argument is that it can be used t…

>>So no, they have to justify that the costly and stupid security measures actually work. Or we'll have nothing but costly and stupid security measures that don't actually work. How exactly do you want them to justify. Your demand is too vague to be even considered. How do you propose, they should advertise every thwarted terrorist attack, without alerting the other terrorists? All security is plain unproductive over…

> How exactly do you want them to justify. Your demand is too vague to be even considered. How do you propose, they should advertise every thwarted terrorist attack, without alerting the other terrorists?

How about they stop doing it and if the level of terrorism remains in the "still kills fewer people than bathtubs" range, we realize we didn't need it.

> All security is plain unproductive overhead, which is compulsory in the presence of adversary.

All security is compulsory? Madness.

Security is risk management. All government activity is risk. You spend a dollar on surveillance technology instead of scientific research that would have led to safer products or life saving medicine and people die. You take a dollar from the taxpayer who now can't afford those products or medicine and people die. Government waste kills more people than terrorism. To say nothing of the people bad governments kill much more directly.

> You're basically saying, "don't trust the govt" and that is the recipe for total anarchy

Only if by anarchy you mean democracy.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#327

Post by sjg007 »

adrianN wrote: post #246
sjg007 wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's a weird idea. What about cutting benefits and forcing people to get jobs? Would it prevent terrorism? If everyone is too busy working??

Not feeding the poor has historically a great track record for preventing unrest...

So America has a great prison system and no benefits. Most immigrants work... No real terrorism to speak of outside the lone wolfs. Bad? Good?

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#328

Post by krapp »

sjg007 wrote: post #327
adrianN wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not feeding the poor has historically a great track record for preventing unrest...

So America has a great prison system and no benefits. Most immigrants work... No real terrorism to speak of outside the lone wolfs. Bad? Good?

Could be worse. Could be a lot better.

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#329

Post by tmptmp »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #326
tmptmp wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>So no, they have to justify that the costly and stupid security measures actually work. Or we'll have nothing but costly and stupid security measures that don't actually work. How exactly do you want them to justify. Your demand is too vague to be even considered. How do you propose, they should advertise every thwarted terrorist attack, without alerting the other terrorists? All security is plain unproductive over…

> How exactly do you want them to justify. Your demand is too vague to be even considered. How do you propose, they should advertise every thwarted terrorist attack, without alerting the other terrorists? How about they stop doing it and if the level of terrorism remains in the "still kills fewer people than bathtubs" range, we realize we didn't need it. > All security is plain unproductive overhead, which is compuls…

>... if the level of terrorism remains in the "still kills fewer people than bathtubs" range, we realize we didn't need it.

Comparing terrorism to bathtub is foolish at its best and outright dangerously misleading at its worst. Tomorrow you can say `if the level of terrorism remains in the "still kills fewer people than old age" range, we realize we didn't need it.`

Statistics can be (mis)used to justify any claim.

One reason why people find terrorism more dangerous than heart disease, cancer, etc is this - bathtub and cars are NOT human beings and thus do NOT actively not tolerate difference of opinions amongst other groups of people and do NOT engage in acts of "killing other people for difference of opinions" while human terrorists do engage in such killings and do constantly search for opportunities to kill people with different opinions.

>How about they stop doing it and ...

Define "it".

Re: Brussels Rocked by Terrorist Attacks

#330

Post by creshal »

sjg007 wrote: post #327
adrianN wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not feeding the poor has historically a great track record for preventing unrest...

So America has a great prison system and no benefits. Most immigrants work... No real terrorism to speak of outside the lone wolfs. Bad? Good?

The US don't have terrorist groups, but crime rates in general are comparatively high.
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