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As you all know by now, my country (Spain) has experienced some extreme events in the last weeks. Some of the info. that has been released is quite contradictory, and if you wish to ask any questions about what has been going on or how the people feels about it, go ahead. And please ignore the new signature, it was changed before the killings and it doesn't suit the nature of the post.

I was wondering what was going on with you over there.

What's your whole take on all of this?



Post Edited (03-18-04 14:32)

All my relatives in Madrid are fine, thaks God. About ETA, while their suppossed political goal is to obtain the independence of the Basque Country, they attack on the whole country, usually police officers and polititians. Anyway, their "fight" doesn't make sense at all since 1978, when the spanish constitution was aproved and nationalistic political parties were legalised. According to surveys, only 10% (if not less) of basques approve the use of violence to obtain independence, so that should give you an idea of how isolated they are.

About what has been going on (the bombings in Madrid and the defeat of the conservatives), it has deeper roots than you may imagine. The conservative government has become incredibly unpopular during the last four years. Accepting to become part of the Irak ocupation (when 92% of people were against it) was only of the things they did wrong. The government used their superiority on congress to pass quite a lot of unpopular messures, proved their ignorance and arrogance in several other occassions (for instance, when denying any mistakes in their management of the "Prestige" oil carrier crash... while the inhabitants of Galicia took out the oil from the coast themselves).    

The last nail on their coffin was to manipulate the information on the Madrid bombings. While most foreign media almost inmediatelly blamed on Al Qaeda, the government used (and it was not the first time they did it) their tight control on the national TV to put the blame on ETA, which was far more convenient for their purposes (the conservatives have been struggling for the last four years with nationalistic parties, and part of their strategy has been to blame them for terrorism, something that became very useful when one of the nationalistic leaders recently admitted that he had met ETA leaders in order to negotiate a ceasefire). The national TV even tried to minimize any sympathy acts coming from Catluña or the Basque Country, some of the regions with nationalistic aspirations.

So, by the days before the elections, the pressure on the conservatives to release all the information regarding the bombing increased. The government, instead of re-thinking their position, put pressure on the UN so they included ETA on their statements, which they did. They even insisted the bombing had been ETA's doing when the police captured the first muslim terrorists from the Al Qaeda cell. As a response, both from being included among Al Qaeda's targets and the dubious past actions from the government, the people decided to ditch them through their votes.

About the much-maligned decision of retiring our troops from Irak, surely the bombings are part of it, but among the promises from the new government there was, from months ago, to retire the troops if they won. As far as I know, the new government is respecting the decision of the conservatives of keeping the troops until the end of June, but they will retire them if by then the control of the situation, in their own words, is not in UN hands by then.

Without going into the politics of the situation, which I know very little about , one thing that has puzzled me from outside the situation is that before the elections there was reports of an Al Qaeda or other muslim terrorist communication that said that the purpose of the terrorist attacks in Spain is that they hoped that  the result would be that the socialists would win the election and would then pull the Spanish troops from Iraq. This is exactly what has happened.  So it looks like the terrorists got what they wanted and the attacks were politically/militarily successful.

But it did seem like the Spanish government was trying to blame the attacks on ETA for their own political purposes

Well, on one hand the terrorists obtained what they wanted, and that is a very dangerous precedent. But I still think that if the spanish government  had played their cards straight and their past actions hadn't been so stupid, people would have voted them just to support the government in a bad moment. Previous surveys, before the attacks, granted a victory for the conservatives,  but not as big as the last time.

I've heard some members of the Bush administration trying sell the socialist victory as a capitulation to terror. Simply put, it is not. People are not afraid. They are shocked, certainly angry, but not scared. The attacks have been a terrible shock, but we've had previous experience with terrorism, and we've never let it affect us to the extreme of accepting their threats. Even more, we are sure that those people will attack again, no matter what we do with our troops in Irak.  

I think (and take this as a personal opinion) that no terrorist attack could defeat a government with massive popular support. On the contrary, it would reinforce its position. Just remember that the George W. Bush government never had more popular support than right after the 11-S attacks. Moreover, in the case of my country, after more than 30 years of attacks that have caused about 1,000 deaths, ETA never has been able to even debilitate a government. And they've tried, killing polititians or attacking right before ellections, without result.

Neville,  Condolences to you and your countrymen for the loss of life.  I have tried to craft a note to express my utter frustration with the chess game that the world has become but I just can't put it into words.  I will say this.  Rest assured, my friend, that I have taken on a personal crusade to insure that my children and their children grow up to care for and love all humans...be they Anglo, Arab or whatever.  They will grow up knowing that all men are their brothers and each has value.  One man can't change the world.  One man can change the lives of those around him and that WILL change the world.

My condolences on the deaths and maimings, it truly was a sad day.  Also, belated condolences for the 8 Spanish soldiers who were killed in Iraq in the past year.

Neville. Glad to know your okey.
The terror mongers will not stop doing their ugly busness. They have too much hate and contempt to do so.
I've long wondered about the effects of the ETA attacks on Spain, socialy and politicaly. Your point of view, therefor, is valuable to us.
While we may not agree on some things, be sure i do sympethise with your people. This insanity is never justified.
Only the insane could think otherwise.
Where were you when you heard about it? I remember Sep. 11 vividly. I'd imagin you will too, even after the next 4 years.
I've wondered ...what is the current population of Spain? And, how many Islamic folks are there in Spain? How are they reacting to what happened?

Neville, it was with tremendous disgust that I listened to the news of this attack.  My condolences to you (for your country) and those who had to endure it first hand.

No matter what a nation's political system, socialist, conservative or whatever, no nation of people deserve an attack like this.  This was not a political, military or government target.  Therefore, it, and the people who did it, are beneath contempt.

I can only hope that something good can come of it.  In my view, that would be that senseless attacks on innocent people like this continue to open the eyes of people everywhere that the goals of the terrorists are simply to kill and destroy.  They deserve neither our sympathy, nor our understanding.

I don't care what problems someone thinks they have, intentionally killing innocent people cannot be part of the solution.

Many thanks to all of you for your support and condolences.

To Flangepart: In answer to your queries, the population of Spain is about 40 million people. The muslim population is (I'd say, because many of them are illegal residents) betweem half a million and a million. Most of them come from Morocco. Their leaders were fast to condemn the attacks and, luckily, there haven't been any attacks against them. I haven't noticed the slightest trace of hatred or resentment against them, and that is always good news.