London Bridge Incident

[Zhivago]

Which still doesn't explain Muslim killings of Christians who have nothing to do with western foreign policy.

As for the maximum effect theory. If that were the case why didn't the Manchester bomber drop his rucksack at Victoria station five hours earlier and take out a lot more people. Why did he choose a concert of a scantily dressed woman that would predominantly be attended by women and girls? Why did the London nutters choose late night on Saturday outside licensed premises rather than twenty nine hours earlier during rush hour where the pavements would've been far more packed?

"Muslim killings"?

Yep. See the infamous ISIS treatment of the Yazidis. See the amount of killings of Christians by Muslims in the India, Pakistan etc. I'm no Christian but to claim terrorism is occurring in the UK solely because of our foreign policy is just ridiculous.

Nobody is saying it's only foreign policy. But it is unhelpful to blame a whole community when you need to engage with them to counter terrorism.

Pretty sure you wouldn't say Jews are killing Muslims regarding the Palestine situation. Rightfully so too. Let's not let ourselves degrade to divisive language that blames whole communities for the actions of a minority.

[Digby]

but to claim terrorism is occurring in the UK solely because of our foreign policy is just ridiculous.

Even just marginally

More it seems there was at some point going to be an issue with the rise of certain ideas within Islam, and that sea would break upon whatever rocks it might find. And it's going to keep coming no matter our foreign policy until we adopt a strong theocratic state which denounces and denies all the many evils our pluralism allows, or Islam has its reformations in all its schools of thought and stumbles into a view of the world more akin to the Western world with its secularism with all the personal freedoms that entails (and I say stumbles as it's not like the intention of reformation in the Christian world was to bring about the society we recognise as our modern world)

[Zhivago]

You guys are more spot on when you used the term wahhabism. Such extreme ideologies look nothing like the mainstream, just as extreme Christian or Jewish or even Buddhist ideologies look nothing like their mainstream ideology.

[Mellsblue]

"Muslim killings"?

Yep. See the infamous ISIS treatment of the Yazidis. See the amount of killings of Christians by Muslims in the India, Pakistan etc. I'm no Christian but to claim terrorism is occurring in the UK solely because of our foreign policy is just ridiculous.

Nobody is saying it's only foreign policy. But it is unhelpful to blame a whole community when you need to engage with them to counter terrorism.

Pretty sure you wouldn't say Jews are killing Muslims regarding the Palestine situation. Rightfully so too. Let's not let ourselves degrade to divisive language that blames whole communities for the actions of a minority.

Read through my posts, I'm not saying it's solely because they're Muslim. I've said a few times that western foreign policy has a role to play. My point is that there are Muslims attacking and killing Christians all over the world and that has nothing to do western foreign policy. So, there is evidence that actions in the name of Islam are carried out because they don't like the Christian way of life. Heck, they even carry out deaths because someone is the 'wrong' sect. I'm certainly not tarring an entire community with the same brush - that reposte is so lazy. I have Muslim friends, I've lived with Muslims and I've been into my local mosque a fair few times and it's one of the most welcoming places I've been.
I'm an atheist and normally try and stay out of this religious bollocks, but WiW wanted to place most of the blame on western foreign policy. I responded to this by pointing out that Muslims carry out atrocities against non-Muslims with no need for foreign policy provocation. Where you decided I'm blaming an entire community I don't know.

[SerjeantWildgoose]

4 days after Manchester, men in pick up trucks armed with machine guns attacked a bus-full of Coptic Christians on their way to a monastery in Minya province in Egypt; 28 killed including mothers and children. ISIS claimed responsibility. They also claimed responsibility for suicide bombings of Palm Sunday services in Tanta and Alexandria, which killed 45 and left hundreds injured. Almost daily there are ISIS-inspired attacks in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya the Sahel, West Africa, East Africa - I could go on, but non of these, whose victims number in the thousands, are affected one jot by the UK's foreign policy.

I think that ISIS nipping in and claiming responsibility for the attacks in Westminster, Manchester and London Bridge is mere publicity opportunism. I don't believe that reliance on Wahhabism, Salafism or any other ism to explain the source of these attacks will ever prove fruitful, and nor will it do much to foster an understanding of something that we are morally unequipped to understand. To me, the only thing that characterises these attacks is nihilistic rage - and it was the same rage that led to the murder of Jo Cox, so it is far from being the unique preserve of a lunatic fringe of Islam.

[WaspInWales]

Yep. See the infamous ISIS treatment of the Yazidis. See the amount of killings of Christians by Muslims in the India, Pakistan etc. I'm no Christian but to claim terrorism is occurring in the UK solely because of our foreign policy is just ridiculous.

Nobody is saying it's only foreign policy. But it is unhelpful to blame a whole community when you need to engage with them to counter terrorism.

Pretty sure you wouldn't say Jews are killing Muslims regarding the Palestine situation. Rightfully so too. Let's not let ourselves degrade to divisive language that blames whole communities for the actions of a minority.

Read through my posts, I'm not saying it's solely because they're Muslim. I've said a few times that western foreign policy has a role to play. My point is that there are Muslims attacking and killing Christians all over the world and that has nothing to do western foreign policy. So, there is evidence that actions in the name of Islam are carried out because they don't like the Christian way of life. Heck, they even carry out deaths because someone is the 'wrong' sect. I'm certainly not tarring an entire community with the same brush - that reposte is so lazy. I have Muslim friends, I've lived with Muslims and I've been into my local mosque a fair few times and it's one of the most welcoming places I've been.
I'm an atheist and normally try and stay out of this religious bollocks, but WiW wanted to place most of the blame on western foreign policy. I responded to this by pointing out that Muslims carry out atrocities against non-Muslims with no need for foreign policy provocation. Where you decided I'm blaming an entire community I don't know.

No, you have misread what I have posted.

I asked the question whether these attacks would have taken place without our ME interference and answered 'possibly'. However, we don't know as we have been stoking the hornets nest that is the ME for too long and with devastating effects.

I believe that is why the UK, France and Germany have become recent targets.

Besides that, as I have said a number of times, religion and some people's bat shit crazy interpretation of it is part of the problem too.

Take religion out of the equation and you'd still have many people with a very negative, possibly vengeful attitude towards the west.

Take western interference out of the ME and you'd still have many people with a twisted, possibly murderous approach to other religions or sects.

Both have the potential to create massive issues on their own.

Lets also not forget that quite a few followers of other religions, including Christianity kill others too. We may not get to see that on our news though, and when we do, the people who carry out the attacks are labelled as nut cases with history of mental illness, instead of terrorists.

I'm pretty sure Christian terrorism is more wide scale in other parts of the world such as parts of Africa and India.

[Digby]

I believe that is why the UK, France and Germany have become recent targets.

I'm staying with it's cause they're vile subhumans. There's just no way British or even Western foreign policy is behind it all, they're sick of their own accord and carry out attacks way beyond what we could or should be credited with having an influence over. Even if we suppose we being the West are to blame for Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, India, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, USA, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Syria, Lebanon and so on (which is bollocks but just suppose) then what of Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, China, Morocco, Uganda, Somalia, Nigeria, Russia, Cameroon and so on?

[Sandydragon]

I believe that is why the UK, France and Germany have become recent targets.

I'm staying with it's cause they're vile subhumans. There's just no way British or even Western foreign policy is behind it all, they're sick of their own accord and carry out attacks way beyond what we could or should be credited with having an influence over. Even if we suppose we being the West are to blame for Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, India, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, USA, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Syria, Lebanon and so on (which is bollocks but just suppose) then what of Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, China, Morocco, Uganda, Somalia, Nigeria, Russia, Cameroon and so on?

There comes a point when history gets stale and you can't blame all your ills on the actions of a former colonial power. Blaming colonial rules for poverty in Africa is populist tripe and masks the inadequacies or down right corruption of past independence rulers, for example.

Islamic terrorists target those who disagree with them, and it's worth remembering that the overwhelming majority of their victims are other muslims.

[Mellsblue]

Nobody is saying it's only foreign policy. But it is unhelpful to blame a whole community when you need to engage with them to counter terrorism.

Pretty sure you wouldn't say Jews are killing Muslims regarding the Palestine situation. Rightfully so too. Let's not let ourselves degrade to divisive language that blames whole communities for the actions of a minority.

Read through my posts, I'm not saying it's solely because they're Muslim. I've said a few times that western foreign policy has a role to play. My point is that there are Muslims attacking and killing Christians all over the world and that has nothing to do western foreign policy. So, there is evidence that actions in the name of Islam are carried out because they don't like the Christian way of life. Heck, they even carry out deaths because someone is the 'wrong' sect. I'm certainly not tarring an entire community with the same brush - that reposte is so lazy. I have Muslim friends, I've lived with Muslims and I've been into my local mosque a fair few times and it's one of the most welcoming places I've been.
I'm an atheist and normally try and stay out of this religious bollocks, but WiW wanted to place most of the blame on western foreign policy. I responded to this by pointing out that Muslims carry out atrocities against non-Muslims with no need for foreign policy provocation. Where you decided I'm blaming an entire community I don't know.

No, you have misread what I have posted.

Apologies if I misread or misinterpreted your post. It seems I am the hypocrite here

As you say there are numerous reasons for their atrocious acts but my issue is the idea that western foreign policy is solely/mostly to blame seems to be getting a lot of traction when, as with all these things, it is never that simple.

I've no doubt the few Christians atrocities I have read about are just the tip of the iceberg. I'm not singling out Muslims/Islam as bad. As I say, I'm atheist and anyone who uses religion as a pretext for acts of violence or suppression is a **** regardless of which fictional character they believe in or work of fiction they read.

[Zhivago]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

[Digby]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

She will, there's a vote on Thursday. What more do you want? And too if by some miracle Glorious Leader™ were to win on Thursday if you're going to say 3 successful attacks isn't acceptable what should the Glorious Leader™ do once he racks up 3 attacks? (and it seems rather unlikely the attacks would suddenly stop no matter who the next PM is)

[Zhivago]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

She will, there's a vote on Thursday. What more do you want? And too if by some miracle Glorious Leader™ were to win on Thursday if you're going to say 3 successful attacks isn't acceptable what should the Glorious Leader™ do once he racks up 3 attacks? (and it seems rather unlikely the attacks would suddenly stop no matter who the next PM is)

Yes. An insecure nation can never truly prosper.

[Mellsblue]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

She will, there's a vote on Thursday. What more do you want? And too if by some miracle Glorious Leader™ were to win on Thursday if you're going to say 3 successful attacks isn't acceptable what should the Glorious Leader™ do once he racks up 3 attacks? (and it seems rather unlikely the attacks would suddenly stop no matter who the next PM is)

It's definately the 20,000 less policeman, I mean there haven't been any other terrorist attacks in other nations. Especially one run by a socialist president where they have nearly double the numbers of police. Nope, can't think of any. Must've been austerity.

[Zhivago]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

She will, there's a vote on Thursday. What more do you want? And too if by some miracle Glorious Leader™ were to win on Thursday if you're going to say 3 successful attacks isn't acceptable what should the Glorious Leader™ do once he racks up 3 attacks? (and it seems rather unlikely the attacks would suddenly stop no matter who the next PM is)

It's definately the 20,000 less policeman, I mean there haven't been any other terrorist attacks in other nations. Especially one run by a socialist president where they have nearly double the numbers of police. Nope, can't think of any. Must've been austerity.

They have about 50% more (per capita). But they have more problems. They have a harder to control immigrant population with significant historical grievances (Algeria) along with more refugees taken in from the war zones. They have, in addition to that, all the issues that come with being the most visited country in the world, and the difficulties that Schengen results in. Let's not compare ourselves to the worst performer in this area...

[SerjeantWildgoose]

As of March last year, the MPS had 32,125 sworn police officers (Does not include 1626 community support officers or 3271 special constables). This compares to 32,543 in 2009 and about 25,000 in 2001.

Tell me again how that additional 418 Bobbies on the streets of London would have prevented this, given that 4 shifts of 105 covering an area of 1600 square km represents one extra truncheon-wielding bloke in each 4 x 4 km square of Greater London?

[Mellsblue]

She will, there's a vote on Thursday. What more do you want? And too if by some miracle Glorious Leader™ were to win on Thursday if you're going to say 3 successful attacks isn't acceptable what should the Glorious Leader™ do once he racks up 3 attacks? (and it seems rather unlikely the attacks would suddenly stop no matter who the next PM is)

It's definately the 20,000 less policeman, I mean there haven't been any other terrorist attacks in other nations. Especially one run by a socialist president where they have nearly double the numbers of police. Nope, can't think of any. Must've been austerity.

They have about 50% more (per capita). But they have more problems. They have a harder to control immigrant population with significant historical grievances (Algeria) along with more refugees taken in from the war zones. They have, in addition to that, all the issues that come with being the most visited country in the world, and the difficulties that Schengen results in. Let's not compare ourselves to the worst performer in this area...

So you're agreeing that just having more police wouldnt have stopped this happening. That's it's actually a nuanced area where a whole host of issues are at play. Excellent.

[SerjeantWildgoose]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

The number of attacks that get through is obvious, the number of attacks that are foiled can only ever be an estimate (We are more often victims of our own success in being entirely unaware that disruptive actions have actually deterred, delayed or deflected an imminent attack) and it is impossible to measure how many people did not become radicalised extremists as a consequence of interventions under the Prevent strand of the Government's strategy. I wouldn't write May off as a failure just yet.

[Stones of granite]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

The number of attacks that get through is obvious, the number of attacks that are foiled can only ever be an estimate (We are more often victims of our own success in being entirely unaware that disruptive actions have actually deterred, delayed or deflected an imminent attack) and it is impossible to measure how many people did not become radicalised extremists as a consequence of interventions under the Prevent strand of the Government's strategy. I wouldn't write May off as a failure just yet.

The, ahem, elephant in the room of course, is how Prevent would perform in the tender care of Dianne Abbott.

[Mellsblue]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

The number of attacks that get through is obvious, the number of attacks that are foiled can only ever be an estimate (We are more often victims of our own success in being entirely unaware that disruptive actions have actually deterred, delayed or deflected an imminent attack) and it is impossible to measure how many people did not become radicalised extremists as a consequence of interventions under the Prevent strand of the Government's strategy. I wouldn't write May off as a failure just yet.

The, ahem, elephant in the room of course, is how Prevent would perform in the tender care of Dianne Abbott.

The performance would improve by 300,000%. No.....ah......wait....ummm.......1,000,000%. No, that's not correct either ......... *condescending stare* ...... its 22,000,000%.

[Zhivago]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

The number of attacks that get through is obvious, the number of attacks that are foiled can only ever be an estimate (We are more often victims of our own success in being entirely unaware that disruptive actions have actually deterred, delayed or deflected an imminent attack) and it is impossible to measure how many people did not become radicalised extremists as a consequence of interventions under the Prevent strand of the Government's strategy. I wouldn't write May off as a failure just yet.

Prevent is ridiculously discriminatory by nature. The notion of reporting people for 'pre-crimimality' is to me heinously Orwellian.

[Stones of granite]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

The number of attacks that get through is obvious, the number of attacks that are foiled can only ever be an estimate (We are more often victims of our own success in being entirely unaware that disruptive actions have actually deterred, delayed or deflected an imminent attack) and it is impossible to measure how many people did not become radicalised extremists as a consequence of interventions under the Prevent strand of the Government's strategy. I wouldn't write May off as a failure just yet.

Prevent is ridiculously discriminatory by nature. The notion of reporting people for 'pre-crimimality' is to me heinously Orwellian.

....aaaaannnnnnddddd there we have it. This, multiplied by about twelvetyseventeen, is exactly the attitude the Abbopotumus would have to it, resulting in the abandonment of the only remotely successful initiative there is. Outside of Special Branch, that is.

[Zhivago]

It's definately the 20,000 less policeman, I mean there haven't been any other terrorist attacks in other nations. Especially one run by a socialist president where they have nearly double the numbers of police. Nope, can't think of any. Must've been austerity.

They have about 50% more (per capita). But they have more problems. They have a harder to control immigrant population with significant historical grievances (Algeria) along with more refugees taken in from the war zones. They have, in addition to that, all the issues that come with being the most visited country in the world, and the difficulties that Schengen results in. Let's not compare ourselves to the worst performer in this area...

So you're agreeing that just having more police wouldnt have stopped this happening. That's it's actually a nuanced area where a whole host of issues are at play. Excellent.

Yes there is no single root cause. But some contributing factors are unmissable. The Tories' watering down of control orders didn't help either. And that's according to IDS...

[SerjeantWildgoose]

Five attacks foiled, three successful. 63%... That's a piss poor record. The buck stops at the top. May is a failure, she has failed all of us. She MUST be held accountable.

The number of attacks that get through is obvious, the number of attacks that are foiled can only ever be an estimate (We are more often victims of our own success in being entirely unaware that disruptive actions have actually deterred, delayed or deflected an imminent attack) and it is impossible to measure how many people did not become radicalised extremists as a consequence of interventions under the Prevent strand of the Government's strategy. I wouldn't write May off as a failure just yet.

Prevent is ridiculously discriminatory by nature. The notion of reporting people for 'pre-crimimality' is to me heinously Orwellian.

Hmmmmmm?

1. Young white Christian girls from Cleethorpes don't tend to be the principal source of risk; when resources are finite you must apply them where they can do most good. This is the very definition of discrimination, but not as you would define it.

2. The purpose of Prevent is to provide the vulnerable with alternative narratives and alternative paths and to protect vulnerable communities against the usurpation of the rule of law by criminals. It is not - as those who are most threatened by it would have you believe - a means to create a society of touts, but you cannot call for communities to do more to isolate the extremists in their midst on the one hand, and then castigate them for doing so on the other.

[SerjeantWildgoose]

The Tories' watering down of control orders didn't help either. And that's according to IDS...

And yet you argue that Prevent is Orwellian?

You do know that control orders are a means of imposing sanctions on an individual when the evidence is insufficient to convict them before an open court, don't you?

[Zhivago]

The Tories' watering down of control orders didn't help either. And that's according to IDS...

And yet you argue that Prevent is Orwellian?

You do know that control orders are a means of imposing sanctions on an individual when the evidence is insufficient to convict them before an open court, don't you?

I'm not arguing for a return to control orders, but the Tories should have replaced them with something that worked. They didn't and now we have the chaos that we have. If you have a large body of suspects - potentially dangerous people, you need the sufficient resources to be able to monitor them. Intel is the most key factor in the equation.

The need for control orders arose from the problem of insufficient HUMINT. When they were scrapped, the reason why they were introduced /necessary - i.e. Not enough intel - was not addressed. On top of this, May actually reduced our HUMINT by cutting community policing, replacing it with the radicalising Prevent program that gets the community to dob members of the public in to the police for thought crimes.

Meanwhile, our foreign policy has provided easy propaganda for those evil organisations that mean us harm, which has led to an increase in radicalisation. All this not mentioning other issues such as preventable radicalisation occurring as a consequence of an underfunded and overcrowded prison system...