Germany (catch all, incl. terrorism)

[Tacitus]

# Terror vs. Germans

Is considered as marginal threat. We seem to care more about smoking in pubs or not, for example.
We had some terror victims in 9/11, some in Tunisia IIRC in 2002, but not much else. AQ sometime declared us as their foe due to our involvement in Afghanistan, so far without significant consequences.

Left out of this summary is anything about Mohamed Atta.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammed_Atta#Germany
He apparently felt comfortable enough operating in Hamburg to create the Hamburg Cell, which was central to carrying out the 9/11 assault.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg_Cell

I've been to several places in Germany, but never Hamburg. Is Hamburg especially hospitable for radical Islamists, for some reason?

I'm not a big fan at all of this democracy project of ours in Mesopotamia. But if the USA was discovered to be used as a base of planning operations for an Al Qaeda attack on another place (say Germany), I would regard this as a pretty serious development. If they feel comfortable planning something like that from here, then we've got a problem.

[Fuchs]

Left out of this summary is anything about Mohamed Atta.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammed_Atta#Germany
He apparently felt comfortable enough operating in Hamburg to create the Hamburg Cell, which was central to carrying out the 9/11 assault.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg_Cell

I've been to several places in Germany, but never Hamburg. Is Hamburg especially hospitable for radical Islamists, for some reason?

I'm not a big fan at all of this democracy project of ours in Mesopotamia. But if the USA was discovered to be used as a base of planning operations for an Al Qaeda attack on another place (say Germany), I would regard this as a pretty serious development. If they feel comfortable planning something like that from here, then we've got a problem.

"# Terror vs. Germans"

He behaved reasonably in Germany. I mean, besides preparing a terror strike.
His terror cell pretty much wiped itself out on 9/11 (one or two alleged supporters were sent to our courts, but iirc the police wasn't able to prove anything).

They happened to be in Hamburg to study at the university (something technical iirc), no other specific reason that I know about. You can find more Muslims in the Ruhrgebiet (west) than in Hamburg (north).

Btw, did you miss that the 9/11 pilots learned to fly in Florida?

[Tom Odom]

Btw, did you miss that the 9/11 pilots learned to fly in Florida?

Yep and that is why SWC has its chief insurgent, Ken White, on a recce for us...

[Tacitus]

Btw, did you miss that the 9/11 pilots learned to fly in Florida?

Why some flight students were so interested in learning to fly a jet airplane, but unconcerned with how to land it, ought to have caused somebody down there in Florida to wonder just WHAT kind of pilot they were training to be. Since the demand for Kamikaze pilots dried up on September 2, 1945, this sort of pilot training has gone out of fashion, I believe.

I'm just saying that if an Al Qaeda sleeper agent pulled off some big 9/11 style attack on Canada tomorrow, and it turns out he was organizing the thing out of a farmhouse in Indiana, the fact that he decided to attack elsewhere wouldn't make me feel any safer or immune from whatever this terrorist group might pull next. I am pretty sure most Americans would feel the same. But maybe we are a unique nation for feeling that way.

Where Americans differ amongst themselves is this Iraq thing. Some think this Iraq democracy project is "the central front in the war on terror".

Others, perhaps thinking that the mere idea of a front applied to a terrorist group is a strange metaphor to begin with, are skeptical of this.

I'll tell you in November which political leader of these respective groups will have the most say in what happens next.

[Fuchs]

I'm just saying that if an Al Qaeda sleeper agent pulled off some big 9/11 style attack on Canada tomorrow, and it turns out he was organizing the thing out of a farmhouse in Indiana, the fact that he decided to attack elsewhere wouldn't make me feel any safer or immune from whatever this terrorist group might pull next.

The reason why Germans don't feel as being really threatened by AQ is more that we didn't piss the Arabs off for 25 years (well, just a little bit - about twice since 2002; OEF and Mohammed caricature re-prints).

[Ken White]

The reason why Germans don't feel as being really threatened by AQ is more that we didn't piss the Arabs off for 25 years (well, just a little bit - about twice since 2002; OEF and Mohammed caricature re-prints).

far longer than that...

[Tacitus]

far longer than that...

Amen to that, Ken.

You could trace the USA's conflict with violent, Islamic elements all the way back to 1784, when the ink was barely dry on the peace treaty with Britain. The Barbary Pirates, anyone?

In 1786, Thomas Jefferson, then the ambassador to France, and John Adams, then the ambassador to Britain, met in London with Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja, the ambassador to Britain from Tripoli. The Americans asked Adja why his government was hostile to American ships, even though there had been no provocation. The ambassador's response was reported to the Continental Congress:

It was written in their Koran, that all nations which had not acknowledged the Prophet were sinners, whom it was the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave; and that every mussulman who was slain in this warfare was sure to go to paradise. He said, also, that the man who was the first to board a vessel had one slave over and above his share, and that when they sprang to the deck of an enemy's ship, every sailor held a dagger in each hand and a third in his mouth; which usually struck such terror into the foe that they cried out for quarter at once.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary_pirates

Citing the Koran as a justification to kill, rob, and/or enslave American infidels was well chronicled in history long before Nixon or Carter occupied the White House. U.S. Marines singing about fighting "to the shores of Tripoli", doesn't have anything to do with Colonel Khadaffi.

[davidbfpo]

Excellent thread, especially Fuchs comments.

I do wonder, nay ask, whether the FRG has not changed its counter-terrorism laws and techniques as they are quite adequate to the threat? There are some, on both sides of the Atlantic, that feel many of the legislation passed since 9/11 has been more "spin" than substance.

Inidentally it was important in the UK to make illegal private possession of nuclear material, an important gap in our laws.

davidbfpo

[selil]

I'm just saying that if an Al Qaeda sleeper agent pulled off some big 9/11 style attack on Canada tomorrow, and it turns out he was organizing the thing out of a farmhouse in Indiana, the fact that he decided to attack elsewhere wouldn't make me feel any safer or immune from whatever this terrorist group might pull next.

There are terrorists in Indiana!!!??? I bet they are hiding in the corn... I'll get my gun.

[bourbon]

Left out of this summary is anything about Mohamed Atta.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammed_Atta#Germany
He apparently felt comfortable enough operating in Hamburg to create the Hamburg Cell, which was central to carrying out the 9/11 assault.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg_Cell

I've been to several places in Germany, but never Hamburg. Is Hamburg especially hospitable for radical Islamists, for some reason?

I'm not a big fan at all of this democracy project of ours in Mesopotamia. But if the USA was discovered to be used as a base of planning operations for an Al Qaeda attack on another place (say Germany), I would regard this as a pretty serious development. If they feel comfortable planning something like that from here, then we've got a problem.

Tacitus,
I believe the Hamburg Cell’s radicalization process was the “bunch of guys” dynamic. The key was their recruitment, what happened once they decided they wanted to join an armed Jihadi front. Their original aim was to fight in Chechnya, but they were selected for a bigger mission while they were in the AQ training process. Two individuals also located in Hamburg are involved in linking them into this process, Mohammed Haydar Zammar and Mamoun Darkazanli.

Zammar and Darkazanli were both born in Allepo, Syria, both are German citizens, and both are members of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood. Zammar was active in the 1990’s in supplying foreign fighters and arms to Bosnian Muslims. It is known that Germany covertly aided Croatia and the Bosnian Muslims, as did we-overtly once the arms embargo was dropped. Islamic NGO’s based in German (and in the U.S.) also provided humanitarian and military aide to the Bosnian Muslims with little interference by both governments.

[Sarajevo071]

It is known that Germany covertly aided Croatia and the Bosnian Muslims, as did we-overtly once the arms embargo was dropped. Islamic NGO’s based in German (and in the U.S.) also provided humanitarian and military aide to the Bosnian Muslims with little interference by both governments.

Helping Croatia sure and maybe Croats in Bosnia but helping Bosnian Muslims Germany did not. Or, at least I never heard of and i was there for years... U.S. did have couple covert operations before embargo was lifted. I know for some of them and I manage to meat couple guys who was there.