Berlin terror attack

[Arakan]

Just now, Khaleesi did nothing wrong said:

I remember discussing immigration related topics with you around a year back, when the migrant crisis was going on in earnest. It seems that you have changed your views quite a bit since then. 

I assume that the public and political discourse has changed in Germany? It certainly has here in Sweden. 

I know...I was very very naive back then. But I cannot ignore the reality on the ground. 

Yes, I was wrong. 

[Bennis of the Brown Shield]

12 minutes ago, Arakan said:

I know...I was very very naive back then. But I cannot ignore the reality on the ground. 

Yes, I was wrong. 

I understand. I think these things have had the same effect on many other people. 

[Relic]

5 hours ago, Arakan said:

Unrelated in specific but related in general: at the weekend a group of young men tried to put a homeless man on fire. City: Berlin. Fortunately others could rescue the man. The case got nationwide attention. 

Now the 7 perpetrators turned themselves in. Seven guys, age 15-21, refugees from Libya and Syria. they did this less than one week after the truck. Very bad timing.

This case is not related to religion or terrorism. But the tolerance of German society to help refugees/asylum seekers is reaching its limit. I really wonder if those people would have dared to pull shit like this under Gadaffi, Assad or Saddam. 

The year 2016 and barbaric crimes committed by refugees/asylum seekers from Syria/MENA

- Reutlingen: 21y Syrian butchers pregnant woman with Kebap knife, 5 more injured

- Freiburg: 17y Afghan refugee rapes and murders 21y student 

- Cologne mass sexual assault, conducted by MENA refugees/asylum seekers

- Würzburg axe terror attack

- Ansbach suicide bomber 

- Berlin Christmas market 

- Berlin homeless man fire attack 

Germany was tolerant and tried to help. Germany got a massive problem which will only get worse. 

1.5 million young refugee men from MENA with most having zero positive job perspective...

No matter who you ask, be it ethnic German, ethnic Arab or ethnic Turk, people who grew up here ARE afraid, they are afraid of the safety of their daughters and sisters. And the people are tired of being told by the usual suspects that everything is fine...

Ok, what's your solution? Given that life is pretty untenable in certain places where the western world is conducting proxy wars, what is to be done with the flood of displaced people, most of whom have not and will not ever commit a crime?

[Arakan]

9 minutes ago, Relic said:

Ok, what's your solution? Given that life is pretty untenable in certain places where the western world is conducting proxy wars, what is to be done with the flood of displaced people, most of whom have not and will not ever commit a crime?

Don't let people in with a criminal record, like Anis Amri. for a start. 

A year ago I was very pro letting refugees in but not the way it happened. 

This is not an abstract discussion anymore. I just have to walk in the streets of Augsburg and Munich and open my eyes. 

But I know one thing for sure: ignoring what is happening is not a solution. 

And please stop this generalization of "Western World"...who is doing what? Germany, Sweden, Austria, Slovenia, Czech Republic, Switzerland?

Three western countries and their wrong foreign policy (USA, UK, France) is NOT "the West". And I will not let my country (which has some shitty foreign policy as well) taken hostage by the actions of those countries. 

[Relic]

5 minutes ago, Arakan said:

Don't let people in with a criminal record, like Anis Amri. for a start. 

A year ago I was very pro letting refugees in but not the way it happened. 

This is not an abstract discussion anymore. I just have to walk in the streets of Augsburg and Munich and open my eyes. 

But I know one thing for sure: ignoring what is happening is not a solution. 

And please stop this generalization of "Western World"...who is doing what? Germany, Sweden, Austria, Slovenia, Czech Republic, Switzerland?

Three western countries and their wrong foreign policy (USA, UK, France) is NOT "the West". And I will not let my country (which has some shitty foreign policy as well) taken hostage by the actions of those countries. 

Ok i agree that people with criminal records should be detained at borders. How do you implement that? 

And didn't NATO participate in destabilizing Libya? Is NATO not supporting American ops in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan? 

[Free Northman Reborn]

Answer:

Follow the Australia immigration model.

 

[The guy from the Vale]

Omly possible if you live on an island though

[Altherion]

10 hours ago, Rippounet said:

And... That's why you scare me so much more than terrorists.

Please take the time to consider that this isn't some petty rhetorical device to score points in another meaningless internet argument. Your discourse actually scares me shitless.

You ain't seen nothin' yet. Arakan's opinion is quite moderate compared to those encountered in the comments sections of many websites.

I agree with you that the reaction has the potential to be more scary than the attacks, but what is the alternative? I do not know of a way to guarantee that the attacks will stop without discarding the post-WWII framework of rights and norms. The really scary part is that if these attacks continue (and I don't see why they would stop), then eventually (probably during an economic recession) some charismatic populist will come along and say "Do you want to live in fear for the rest of your lives? Stand with me and fight back!"

[Loge]

10 hours ago, Arakan said:

Don't let people in with a criminal record, like Anis Amri. for a start. 

A year ago I was very pro letting refugees in but not the way it happened. 

This is not an abstract discussion anymore. I just have to walk in the streets of Augsburg and Munich and open my eyes. 

But I know one thing for sure: ignoring what is happening is not a solution. 

And please stop this generalization of "Western World"...who is doing what? Germany, Sweden, Austria, Slovenia, Czech Republic, Switzerland?

Three western countries and their wrong foreign policy (USA, UK, France) is NOT "the West". And I will not let my country (which has some shitty foreign policy as well) taken hostage by the actions of those countries. 

This is a bit disingenuous. We have been America's faithful vassals ever since World War II. You can't just claim these wars have nothing to do with us. And of course Germany has troops in many countries.

The Bundeswehr's current missions. 

They're always just the mighty American empire's auxiliary forces, of course, but they are there. 

[Relic]

3 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Answer:

Follow the Australia immigration model.

 

Can work for non mainland European countries, but not very practical for the rest of the E.U. 

So again, how do you sort the small percentage of criminals and agitators from the rest of the refugees? 

[James Arryn]

12 hours ago, Arakan said:

Don't let people in with a criminal record, like Anis Amri. for a start. 

A year ago I was very pro letting refugees in but not the way it happened. 

This is not an abstract discussion anymore. I just have to walk in the streets of Augsburg and Munich and open my eyes. 

 

It's ironic that you keep mentioning the Nazis when promoting the idea of rejecting refugees...the very same idea that lead to the worst of the Nazis atrocities. Nice one!

Also, as an aside, the terror and destruction the refugees are fleeing from isn't exactly an academic discussion, either. It's live/die stuff. Try, if you can, to keep that in mind when walking down the streets of Augsburg. You may feel a bit less safe; the refugees are fleeing from much, much, much, much, much, much, much, much, much, much worse. That's why they're refugees. 

[Rippounet]

7 hours ago, Altherion said:

I agree with you that the reaction has the potential to be more scary than the attacks, but what is the alternative? I do not know of a way to guarantee that the attacks will stop without discarding the post-WWII framework of rights and norms.

It depends what kind of attacks we're discussing.
If it's about terrorism generally speaking, then not even discarding our current framework of rights and norms will prevent it. Terrorism, as it is currently defined, simply cannot be stopped. If there was a way, we (and others) would have used it long ago. Even an authoritarian regime has no guarantee of being able to prevent terrorism, especially when it has some kind of foreign sponsoring (direct or indirect) as it has today.

Organized large-scale terrorist attempts should be stopped by the reinforcement of "regular" lawful means: intelligence operations, surveillance, and greater cooperation between European agencies. Some minor changes in the legal framework can be considered, to facilitate surveillance and arrest of terror suspects, though I think we must always be wary of giving a blank check to our security apparatus.
There is absolutely no way to sytematically prevent "lone-wolf" attacks as anyone serious about security matters will tell you. Some types of surveillance (social networks or websites) may prove mildly successful in detecting some individuals as they radicalize, but they have obvious limits, tend to target specific age groups, and come dangerously close to creating "thought crime" and mass surveillance, which in the long run tend to be abused by the state and -paradoxically- to be unable to actually prevent the deeds themselves.
What works very well (according to experts) is having a network on the ground, infiltrated security officiers and informants within the Muslim community (as the RG used to have in France before our midget-in-chief screwed up) who will be able to quickly identify targets for surveillance. Generally speaking, enlisting the support of Western Muslims has proved efficient against both large-scale and lone-wolf attacks. Ideally, we'd want the support of the fundamentalists themselves (i.e. quietist/purist Salafists).
What would not work is to criminalize Muslims/fundamentalists indiscriminately, since it would not only encourage many to radicalize, but also make all of them unlikely to cooperate with security agencies. In other words, it would create the very situation that some erroneously perceive today. This of course, is precisely what ISIS wants, as has been explained on a regular basis in the media.
 

Quote

 

The Islamic State’s strategy is to polarize Western society — to “destroy the grayzone,” as it says in its publications. The group hopes frequent, devastating attacks in its name will provoke overreactions by European governments against innocent Muslims, thereby alienating and radicalizing Muslim communities throughout the continent. [...]

The strategy is explicit. The Islamic State explained after the January attacks on Charlie Hebdo magazine that such attacks “compel the Crusaders to actively destroy the grayzone themselves. . . . Muslims in the West will quickly find themselves between one of two choices, they either apostatize . . . or they [emigrate] to the Islamic State and thereby escape persecution from the Crusader governments and citizens.” The group calculates that a small number of attackers can profoundly shift the way that European society views its 44 million Muslim members and, as a result, the way European Muslims view themselves. Through this provocation, it seeks to set conditions for an apocalyptic war with the West.

Unfortunately, elements of European society are reacting as the Islamic State desires. Far-right parties have gained strength in many European countries. France’s National Front is expected to dominate local elections in northern France this winter; on Saturday, Marine Le Pen, its leader, declared “those who maintain links with Islamism” to be “France’s enemies.” The Danish People’s Party gained 21 percent of the vote in national elections in June on a nationalist, anti-Islamic platform. The anti-foreigner Sweden Democrats is steadily growing in popularity.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/hating-muslim-refugees-is-exactly-what-the-islamic-state-wants-europe-to-do/2015/11/15/dfe0ca84-87d1-11e5-be39-0034bb576eee_story.html?utm_term=.8f722a66d8b4

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/11/17/isis-wants-you-to-hate-muslims/?utm_term=.781c1cdff692

 

Ultimately, terrorism creates a "zugzwang" for the West: our position being so much stronger, terrorism has no way to come even close to harming our societies unless we actively help it by over-simplifying, over-reacting, and making dramatic strategic mistakes.

And yes Altherion, I'm well aware of what the comments section of a site like Breitbart looks like (I go there every once in a while). But then, in every Western country there is a minority of white supremacists/nationalist xenophobes that are active regardless of the geopolitical situation. I don't think there is much to explain to these guys, because in a twisted sort of way, terrorist attacks are an opportunity for them to advance an agenda just as sinister as ISIS's.

To quote an article from The Guardian:

Quote

 

[ISIS] conscientiously exploits the disheartening dynamic between the rise of radical Islamism and the revival of the xenophobic ethno-nationalist movements that are beginning to seriously undermine the middle class – the mainstay of stability and democracy – in Europe in ways reminiscent of the hatchet job that the communists and fascists did on European democracy in the 1920s and 30s.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/15/terrorists-isis

 

 

 

[Altherion]

38 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

t depends what kind of attacks we're discussing.
If it's about terrorism generally speaking, then not even discarding our current framework of rights and norms will prevent it. Terrorism, as it is currently defined, simply cannot be stopped. If there was a way, we (and others) would have used it long ago. Even an authoritarian regime has no guarantee of being able to prevent terrorism, especially when it has some kind of foreign sponsoring (direct or indirect) as it has today.

A means or method cannot be stopped or prevented (although it can be made undesirable with a sufficiently strong retaliatory response). However, terrorism by a specific group of people can be prevented if one is willing to be ruthless enough.

42 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

Ultimately, terrorism creates a "zugzwang" for the West: our position being so much stronger, terrorism has no way to come even close to harming our societies unless we actively help it by over-simplifying, over-reacting, and making dramatic strategic mistakes.

I disagree. As with most forms of asymmetric warfare, it finds ways to minimize our strengths and target weak points. We are stronger, but we have to defend from many, many scenarios all the time while they only have to find a single weak point every once in a while. And it doesn't matter that in absolute terms, the damage done by a specific attack is not large -- the whole point is to generate fear and it works.

[Rippounet]

7 minutes ago, Altherion said:

A means or method cannot be stopped or prevented (although it can be made undesirable with a sufficiently strong retaliatory response). However, terrorism by a specific group of people can be prevented if one is willing to be ruthless enough.

Hmmm... Possibly. But just how ruthless would you have to be exactly? And is being that ruthless to 44 million people even logistically feasible anyway? I mean, morals aside, I don't see how this could even be done, concretely. And because I don't think it can be done efficiently, I see any attempt at going down that road as being inherently counter-productive.

Then, we also have the very real problem of the legal framework. The European Convention on Human Rights would prevent any EU member state from implementing any ethnic or religious targetting. Basically the EU would have to implode for anything significant to happen. Which is exactly what the ethno-nationalists want, of course, but the subsequent weakening of our societies would also benefit ISIS.

So perhaps there is a way... If we sacrifice... Pretty much everything.

7 minutes ago, Altherion said:

I disagree. As with most forms of asymmetric warfare, it finds ways to minimize our strengths and target weak points. We are stronger, but we have to defend from many, many scenarios all the time while they only have to find a single weak point every once in a while. And it doesn't matter that in absolute terms, the damage done by a specific attack is not large -- the whole point is to generate fear and it works.

Yes, this is my point. Terrorism hurts individuals, but only hurts societies if the fear it generates has a significant political and societal impact.

[Werthead]

As has often been said, the current rate of fatalities in Europe from terrorist attacks is significantly lower than it was in the 1970s and 1980s. The current level of violence feels considerably higher because of on-the-spot coverage, social media and 24 hour rolling news, but in fact it's still taking place during one of the more peaceful periods of human history. An overreaction, starting treating Muslims differently or by different standards etc would make the situation significantly worse than it is at present.

Clearly intelligence-sharing can and must be improved and vigiliance is still necessary. As has been shown by the success of ramped-up security programs in Spain and Britain (no major attacks on the scale of either Madrid or London have successfully taken place), you can defeat plots without massively increasing amounts of surveillance and prejudice, as advocated by some.

[Chaircat Meow]

2 hours ago, Rippounet said:

 

Then, we also have the very real problem of the legal framework. The European Convention on Human Rights would prevent any EU member state from implementing any ethnic or religious targetting. Basically the EU would have to implode for anything significant to happen. Which is exactly what the ethno-nationalists want, of course, but the subsequent weakening of our societies would also benefit ISIS.

 

No. If enough Europeans came to the view that the ECHR was an obstacle to preserving their nations they could ignore it with immunity.

How many divisions do the lawyers have?

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

10 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

And when the group perpetrating these attacks comes out and says their end game is to provoke irrational responses from their targets that end up provoking even more Muslims to join their cause, then Westerners should probably refrain from playing into ISIS' strategy, regardless of how irrationally fearful we become of attacks that don't really mean much in the grand scheme of things.

I've got to echo this. Reading this thread is rather depressing when you see multiple posters say things like "we need to crack down" or "be more ruthless" towards potential terrorists, and indirectly, the Muslim community as a whole. There isn't a silver bullet that will solve the current problems, but playing right into the IS' hands is definitely not the way to go. We need to be vigilant, but vigilance cannot become synonymous with cruel. 

[Altherion]

2 hours ago, Rippounet said:

Hmmm... Possibly. But just how ruthless would you have to be exactly? And is being that ruthless to 44 million people even logistically feasible anyway? I mean, morals aside, I don't see how this could even be done, concretely. And because I don't think it can be done efficiently, I see any attempt at going down that road as being inherently counter-productive.

44 million sounds like an overestimate to me, but even so, it is still less than 10% of the EU population. That said, I doubt anyone would go after all of them at once -- if it happens at all, it would be done in stages starting with those perceived to be most dangerous.

3 hours ago, Rippounet said:

Then, we also have the very real problem of the legal framework. The European Convention on Human Rights would prevent any EU member state from implementing any ethnic or religious targetting. Basically the EU would have to implode for anything significant to happen. Which is exactly what the ethno-nationalists want, of course, but the subsequent weakening of our societies would also benefit ISIS.

Yes... but this is not implausible. Anti-Muslim persecution is something that is possible, but I don't consider it very likely (it needs a rather specific set of circumstances to really get going). On the other hand, the EU was already in trouble for completely unrelated reasons and this just makes things worse. Here's an article about it:

Quote

Perhaps worst of all, Merkel's great defense of "European values" could mean a forever changed European life. The border-free world that symbolized peace and prosperity, and that was the practical experience of widening freedom and possibility for Europeans under 45, is now a source of danger. German mayors warn women not to travel unaccompanied or seem too "frisky," lest they invite an assault. French synagogues are surrounded by military personnel. Major events in large European cities are heavily guarded with the portentous and menacing presence of machine guns and bomb-sniffing dogs. Instead of finding new ways of integrating migrants, the individual European states are coming up with new ways to surveil them. This is a Europe no one wanted.

 

[Larry of the Lawn]

On 12/22/2016 at 3:53 PM, Arakan said:

[Larry of the Lawn]

And this thread has jumped the genocidal shark