I had a couple of problems with the article Implications of bombings depend on who's to blame by Steven Komarow in USA TODAY. The first is that it gives false information.
The bombings of commuter trains in Madrid on Thursday prove at least one of two nightmare scenarios:* Al-Qaeda has pulled off its first big attacks on the West since 9/11.
* Basque terrorists in Spain, and maybe terrorists everywhere, are learning the tactics of al-Qaeda and its affiliates.
Investigators in the next few days will try to determine which is true. Most Spanish government officials believe the bombings are the work of ETA, a radical group fighting for an independent Basque state. Spanish authorities say that in the weeks before Thursday's attacks, several ETA plots were foiled. Police discovered two backpack bombs in a train station on Christmas Eve. A van was found recently containing explosives similar to those used in the backpack bombs Thursday.
But Thursday's well-coordinated attacks also have the hallmarks of al-Qaeda. The bombers targeted civilians -- something ETA has avoided. An Arabic-language newspaper in London received a letter claiming credit from an al-Qaeda offshoot organization. And after the bombings, police discovered a van near a train station with bomb detonators and an Arabic tape inside, fueling speculation that the bombings were the work of Muslim extremists. (Italics mine.)
From 1969 to 2003, out of 817 victims of ETA, 339 were civilians. According to Amnesty International, since January 2000 "the majority of the targets have been civilian." The same article has this quotation:
In a recent apperance before Spain's National Court ETA's former ''number one'', Francisco Mugica Garmendia (''Pakito'') was reported to have told the court: ''As an ETA activist, I would like to say that ETA, in its actions, takes special care not to incur civilian victims, although unfortunately this happens''
Of course he is lying, regardless of the evidence, he's not going to admit to targeting civilians. Terrorists are evil, it doesn't necessarily follow that they are stupid.
The other part of the article that bothered me was:
Regardless of who is responsible, Europeans, who have been battling terrorism longer than the United States has, are unlikely to react as the United States did after 9/11, Gordon (Phil Gordon, a foreign policy analyst at the Brookings Institution) said. ''They see it as something that needs to be managed and cannot be defeated, at least not easily.''
I don't think there is anyone who thinks that defeating terrorism will be easy but that is the only way to "manage" it.
Posted by marybeth at March 13, 2004 12:32 AM NewsI am really getting sick of seeing this "ETA doesn't usually target civilians" bullshit pop up constantly.
Thanks for pointing out the truth, Mary Beth.
Posted by Paul Jané at March 13, 2004 03:09 AMETA is seldom at the forefront of the news here. Over the last few decades, when they are in the news it has seemed to me that the slant is that the group are simply fighting for independence from Spain. (That's what I get for listening to public radio.) On the surface that's an idea that resonates with Americans, they want to be independent just as we wanted independence from Britian.
Dig a little deeper and you see that it's a lie. 3/11 and Spain's immediate assumption that ETA was behind it along with comments that you've written made me decide to fact-check the statement that they don't target civilians.
Posted by marybeth at March 13, 2004 10:38 AMMaybe you should dig even a little deeper and learn about Partido Popular's repression of Basque cultural and political rights (banning newspapers, etc.). While most Basques abhor terrorism, they are as frustrasted as ETA with the Spanish governments repressive actions in the past few years. ETA declared a ceasefire in 1999, but even during that time, the Spanish government refused Basques the right to self-determination (as in the right to vote on whether to separate from Spain as Quebec did a few years back).
Posted by diana at March 16, 2004 02:48 PMDiana,
This post and the comments were not about the Basque people. If it had been, I could have written about the uniqueness of their language. I could have written about Juan Sebastian Elkano, Ignatius of Loyola, Simon Bolivar, and Ravel.
I could have written about their military and political history from the time of the Roman Empire through Franco's dictatorship.
I could have written about Guernica.
I didn't because I was writing about a group of terrorists who claim not to target civilians while evidence shows otherwise.
Posted by marybeth at March 17, 2004 01:07 AM