London and Madrid, "common denominator ... is undoubtedly Iraq"

[Benbow]

Whatever Tony Blair says.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/panorama/4666229.stm

The common denominator in London and Madrid is undoubtedly Iraq. The Madrid bombers planned to force the Spanish government to withdraw its troops from Iraq - and succeeded. London has long been in jihadi sights because of Tony Blair's unswerving support for George Bush. The former head of the CIA's Bin Laden unit, Mike Scheuer, tellingly told me that al-Qaeda's policy was to launch warning attacks against countries helping America in Iraq and Afghanistan: "At one point Bin Laden and Zawahiri (his number two) named 23 countries that deserved to be punished. All 23 have been hit. It's a pretty good record of consistency."

And the British have learned from their mistakes over 25 years of fighting the IRA.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4671577.stm

When the big IRA bombing campaign first hit London in the 1970s, a famous columnist of the time, Bernard Levin, advised his readers to respond to the bombs as a refined hostess might respond to a dinner-guest who belched loudly at the table: just ignore it, he said. at the time it seemed to me effete and mannered. Now I see it was exactly the right advice.

The first British response to IRA violence was the worst. The IRA was identified as an enemy which had to be destroyed. ...

<snip>

All these things did was to convince many people in Northern Ireland that the British Government operated on the same low moral level as the IRA itself. Fortunately, there was another strategy as well; and this one worked. It was to treat political violence like any other crime.

Like John Simpson, most of us believe that we "must hunt the bombers down, because they have committed a vicious crime against society. But we mustn't throw away the calm and self-possession which every decent society needs. It's not weakness; it's our greatest strength." But neither should we let anyone "spin" the motives, as our Prime Minister appears to want to do, to distract us.

[goclark]

1. kick

[back2basics909]

2. Both...

.. really important points IMHO. Also Blair is the only person to stop a major terrorist network attacking a country. He did not do it by force.. i remember him saying "to stop the violence we my legitimize the very real issues these people have" (not an exact quote, but it was along those lines). He did legitimize the cause by setting up trails for black Tuesday. It worked the IRA bombs stopped.

How quickly he forgets his winning strategy.

[kenny blankenship]

3. Seems likely, but

I don't think there's been a truly credible claim of responsibility yet. There may never be any, and so successful investigation of this bombing, treated dispassionately like any other crime, could be the only way we'll ever know. The WTC/Pentagon attacks, with all evidence falling under a veil of national security, would be a model of how NOT to go about it.