BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?

Subject: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 11:55 AM

Very wierd concept on the Radio today and it just struck me what was wrong.

They were asking the question "Why has the UK not yet seen a terrorist attack?" and came out with 3 possible reasons

1. We are lucky
2. The security forces have stopped them and
3. The threat of a terrorist attack is not serious.

I got to wondering which it could be and *BANG* - Terrorist attck on the grey cells...

What the bloody hell are they talking about? The UK has already been subject to countless terrorist attacks! My own home town of Manchester has had 3. What about Warrington? Canary Wharf? Where have these radio producers been for the last 30-odd years?

Why, all of a sudden, are only attacks by anyone claiming to be Al Qaida (sp?) significant? It's not just happening in the UK either. Spain have had their share of bombings but all of a sudden people seem to think that only the recent Madrid attack is significant. I was just leaving Madrid that day btw but that's another story...

Is the only important threat nowadays the one that comes from Bin Laden and co? What does a poor ETA, IRA or Black September terrorist have to do to get heard nowadays?

Makes me wonder.

But then again so do Worcester Sauce falvoured crisps...

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Layah
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 01:03 PM

I wonder more about chicken flavored crackers than worcester suace flavored crisps (which I never encountered in the US). Chicken flavored crisps would be more worrisome than both. I hope those don't exist.

Or were you trying to talk about terrorists or something? Got sidetracked by the crisps. Mmm foood...

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 01:09 PM

Pheewww, what a relief - I'll get out of my bunker then.
Anybody want to buy an unused portable generator, ditto air purifier and water filter? Several tins of best olives going spare too.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Thompson
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 01:14 PM

Make sure the worcester sauce flavoured crisps are Lea & Perrins, though, not Crosse & Blackwell.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 01:16 PM

Kalamata El G ?

G ¦¬]

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 04:37 PM

Does that answer your question, Dave?

"Zoom zoom, we will all go together"
Jack E. McAuley

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Linda Kelly
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 04:58 PM

I remember in 1970 something being in a pub when the IRA blew up the telephone exchange the next door, then I went to London and they blew up a smallish bomb at Charing Cross station as i stood outside. The terrorist who blew up the Air India plane in the eary 80's over the Irish Sea lived over the road to me. I grew up in Cyprus during the IOKA terror campaign - I don't take it personally .......

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: skipy
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 04:59 PM

The "big one" - just a matter of time!
Skipy (in a bunker)

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: jacqui.c
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 05:53 PM

I worked in the City of London on 9.11 and we followed the unfolding drama with a certain amount of trepidation. It surprises me that there have been no Al Quieda attacks in the UK, maybe they think that we are too experienced as a result of the IRA attacks over the past thirty years and that the effect would not be great enough.

It was interesting that, a day or so before 9.11 a big 42 had been put at the top of what used to be the NatWest tower, only to be taken down the day after the attack!

By the way, Layah, chicken flavour crisps have ben in circulation in the UK for many years!

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 06:10 PM

Some years back, I was about 200 yards away when the I.R.A. blew an eight foot square hole in the front wall of The Hare an Hounds pub in Maidstone, Kent, sending the landlord's Rover saloon across the road, on its roof. The blast literally stopped my car dead in the road. It sure felt like a terrorist attack. The pub was rebuilt, and is still thriving; not so the Rover (there's a good side to everything).

DT

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: GUEST,Jim
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 07:04 PM

Expect that and worse. We didn't call them 'poor IRA terrorists' when our time with them was at its height.

What annoys me, sometimes about some of my fellow citizens is how blasé they get about the past, as if there were to be no lessons to be learnt from it.

We failed to whip the IRA's ass, and after 30 odd years of trying to, we end up talking peace with them.

When it does happen next time, it will not be the 'poor IRA terrorist', who thankfully weren't in the business of suicide bombings, or letting loose chemical and biological attacks.

I would batten down the hatches in double quick time, and try as far as possible not to be so bloody smug about the whole thing.
What does a suicide bomber care about 'increased security?
Is London as well defended as Isreal?
Is it half as well defended?

The words 'sitting ducks' come to mind

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Layah
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 07:44 PM

Chicken flavored crisps are not quite as scary as terrorist attackes, but they're up there. If the chicken flavored crisps start launching terrorist attacks we are all in trouble. If I'm gonna call them crisps I probably have to say they're chicken flavoured I suppose.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 07:58 PM

What about 'Human flavored crisps'?

You'll always find them in the kitchen at parties

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Layah
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 08:02 PM

Do people eat them?

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 08:22 PM

No, oddly enough...

They're usually what's left after the party is over...

Nobody around to eat them, you see.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 08:22 PM

Where is the IRA fan club, all the usual suspects?

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 08:25 PM

Minding their own business, I would imagine

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Boab
Date: 01 Mar 05 - 11:16 PM

In no way do I condone any violent action by any terrorist organisation--but there wasn't a sign of any al Quaeda attack on the U.K. till blooterhead Blair set the scene for one.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: ard mhacha
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 03:56 AM

Wise words Boab, remember the fuse was lit in earnest after the bloody Sunday Derry murders.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Gervase
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 04:12 AM

Careful Dave, you'll find yourself under house arrest if you come out with any more seditious talk like that!
Fear is a vital tool of modern government, and people like you are not helping. Without fear they wouldn't have the ability to enforce the most draconian controls on those irritating civil liberties since the Enlightenment. And remember, we have to trust them. After all, the wise people who will be ridding the streets of all those pesky terrorists are the same wise people who told us that Saddam had WMDs and could deploy them in 45 minutes. They tell us that Al Queda is a global Wallmart of terrorism, poised to strike at the heart of all we hold dear at any moment (cf: the Catholics, the Jews, the Bolsheviks, the Anarchists and the Communists and other big bad wolves from the past), rather than a disparate collection of idealogues, loony tunes and Walter Mitty wannabe terrorists, so who are we to doubt?
Are you some sort of pinko cynic or summat? Go back into your bunker and await further instructions. Sheesh, some people...

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 05:38 AM

I think it might be down to a simple difference between the aims of the IRA, ETA, etc, and the Islamist terrorists
They ( the IRA, etc ) wish to see X goverment out of area Y, or other limited aims. This requires them to deal with said goverment, when they have bombed the population into voting for people who'll give in. The Goverment involved is acting domestically. This is why they will sometimes issue warnings. If they can demonstrate power, and terrorise people without killing them, then they will seem more 'acceptable' to deal with later. If they start killing hundreds, or thousands at a time, rather than a few or a dozen, there is no way the public will accept any kind of deal with them.

From the BBC
Al-Qaeda's central goal is to act as a base, a kind of revolutionary vanguard, drawing as many as Muslims as possible into a broader jihadist tide of radical Islam.

This movement, they believe, would then drive the Americans from Muslim lands and overthrow governments like those of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia (which they see as propped up by the US) and lead the way for the unification of the umma - the Islamic community which would then follow what they see as a "pure" brand of Islam.

This allows no compromise, and so there is no need to ever talk to the goverments involved. The IRA have Sinn Feinn as a 'legitamte' front, but as far as I know, there is no eqivilent for islamic terrorists that target westerners. There are for groups operating in Isreal, and in North Africa, but not the ones supposedly threatening us.

The islamist terrorist groups seem more likley to kill more people, and be harder to stop. That is why the fuss is about them.

Bunnahabhain.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: greg stephens
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 06:58 AM

GUEST Jim says "we failed to whip the IRA's ass". Who is the "we" exactly? "We" dont whip anyone's asses, we have the RSPCA to stop that sort of thing.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Blissfully Ignorant
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 12:18 PM

It could just possibly be that the threat from Al Queda isn't quite as terrible as we're being told by certain people.
Personally, i'm not going to run around messing my pants and repenting, because i think the chances of getting killed in a terrorist attack are miniscule, and if it did happened....well, there's bugger all i can do about it, is there? You're probably more likely to snuff as a result of choking on a chicken flavoured crisp...they do exist, by the way. Roast chicken flavour...yup...

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 01:53 PM

Not much chance of being killed in a train crash, and nothing you could do if you were.
But we still expect the authorities to take all reasonable precautions for our safety.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Blissfully Ignorant
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 02:07 PM

One might also expect the authorities not to exaggerate the risk of a terrorist attack so they could take liberties with our....umm....liberties...and one would expect any precautions to be practicle, effective and legal.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Peace
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 02:07 PM

Terrorist attacks usually require a purpose that goes beyond the destruction of a particular object, place, etc. If there are organizations that have the 'political' will to implement a terrorist attack, there are going to be more.

As per usual, one should look for motive.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Layah
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 07:38 PM

In pure number terrorist attacks don't really kill all that many people (and I'm too lazy to look at real statistics) but the point of them is they cause terror. Although of all the things I tend to be afraid of, a terrorist attack has never made the list. It's like being afraid of an earthquake, you could waste all your time being afraid of them. The difference is I suppose people have more control over terrorism than they do over earthquakes.
More terrifying crisp flavors: smoky bacon, tomato ketchup (isn't that redundant, what other kind of ketchup is there?)

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Den
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 11:06 PM

I think the more interesting question is why does no one have a problem when the big dog bites the little dog. Seemingly its only a problem when the little dog bites back.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 06 Mar 05 - 02:18 PM

Er, we know the motive Brucie.
They intend to keep attacking until we embrace Islam and Sharia Law.

I surely hope they are exagerating B.I. The just retired head of Metropolitan Police (non UK readers, Britain's most senior police officer and not a political appointment here) does not think so does he.

I also recall the Bali bomb,where British and Australian youngsters were targetted and slaughtered. Were they big dogs Den?

I also recall the Istanbul bombs where British targets were singled out.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: GUEST,Paul Burke
Date: 07 Mar 05 - 06:30 AM

The retired head of the Met was a complete political plonk who totally failed to do anything about the pressing problem of racism in the police forcce- that racism is likely to recruit for Al Kaboomya or the Alaska Martyr's Brigade far more effectively than any concepts of sharia law or jihad.

And as for the IRA in Manchester, we who were there at the time assumed it was the responsibility of the the Irish Republican Town Planning Authority.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 07 Mar 05 - 09:04 AM

Irish Republican Town Planning Authority. *BG* Nice one Paul! Shame they didn't go further:-) Incidentaly - Have you seen that the postbox that survived now has a plaque on? In the words of the unique Stanley Accrington "What's that left standing in the rubble? It's a postbox, Pat. Postbox, Pat..."

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Den
Date: 07 Mar 05 - 09:34 AM

Keith, I was making reference to certain governments foriegn policy and not arbitrary attacks. I have a feeling you know what I was getting at.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 05 - 10:20 AM

"Er, we know the motive Brucie."

Er, I think maybe you don't, uh, Keith. Like that?

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 05 - 10:22 AM

The Muslim world is not stupid enough to think that terrorist attacks will make people embrace Islam. The attacks have had economic motives, Keith. Er, maybe look there, Keith.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 07 Mar 05 - 02:40 PM

The Muslim world is not attacking us Brucie.
A bunch of extremist muslim fanatics is, and they are not seeking to negotiate on economics.

Den, yes I'm sorry. But it sounded as if you were justifying attacks on our people because of what has gone before, or rather some peoples perception of what has gone before.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 07 Mar 05 - 02:43 PM

Paul, you may regard him as a plonker, but he is not in politics, and he was a professional, career police officer who rose to the highest rank that there is.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 05 - 03:25 PM

Keith,

The people doing the terrorist attacks are indoctrinated with Islamic stuff--much of it perverted Islamic stuff. Religions don't export worth a darn. So while I agree that the reasons for the attacks are up for grabs, they only make sense if they cripple or hurt the attacked in someway that is painful. Economics is one of those ways. What are some others?

The 9/11 attacks on the US have led to a climate in which Americans have given up what they always considered fundamental freedoms for a new 'perceived' safety. "Radio Islam" and the Islamic religion are not getting new converts in the US or any place else they have attacked. That's the way I see it, anyway. Sorry for getting snotty with you.

Bruce M

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 07 Mar 05 - 03:35 PM

OK Brucie. I started the sarcasm. Sorry.
We are not far from agreeing here.
Keith.

Subject: RE: BS: UK not a target for terrorism..?
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 05 - 03:47 PM

No, we're not, Keith. (Also, you are very gracious. Thank you.)

Thing is, if we knew what they really wanted, lotsa governments would want to employ us to read tea leaves. I wish I was half as sure as I try to say I am.