Stand With Brussels (Updated)
More than 30 people are dead and more than 200 wounded, after explosions struck Brussels during the Tuesday morning rush hour, Belgian media report. Two blasts hit the international airport; another struck a metro station.
Apparently, Daesh has claimed responsibility. 1
Domestic politicians are, of course, soberly responding to the situation with respect and not capitalizing upon the death and misery abroad at all. No way.
Please direct your hearts and thoughts, and if prayer is your way then your prayers too, to the people of Belgium.
Postscript: a commenter points out that only a few days ago, there were horrific attacks in Ankara, Turkey also chargeable to the appalling bill of blood rung up by Daesh. I am shamed to say that I was unaware of this. Turkey is no less an ally of the United States than is Belgium, and the lives of Turks count every bit as much as the lives of Belgians. Let us not forget these bereaved people either, nor forget who and what we are in our sorrow and anger for the loss of innocent life.
Images by [Mixtography] 
and fdecomite
- Or ISIS or ISIL or the Islamic State, but speaking for myself only, I prefer to use “Daesh” because it is the transliterated acronym for their proto-state which I am informed fortuitously is the Arabic word for “bigot.”
My thoughts go out to the people of Brussels. And to the people of Ankara, where there wasn’t nearly as much coverage in the West.Report
And Istanbul, from whence I recently consumed turkish delight bought not 100 yards from the place of the explosion.Report
Long live Belgium and death to the agents of the Islamic State. My family is from Flanders and thankfully none of them were present at these attacks. My heart goes out to those who did have family there.Report
So, does Obama send a request for authorization to use military forces, including grounds forces, against ISIS? Do we send tanks and troops into Turkey to roll into Syria? As of today, I honestly don’t know what the best course of action is.Report
I sure as hell hope not since that’d be giving ISIS exactly what they feverishly pray for.Report
Yes! That’s precisely what they’re trying to provoke with these attacks. As long as their main activities are killing, terrorizing and oppressing Muslims in the Middle East, they’re going to be largely unpopular with mideastern Muslims. What they want is an attack by Western nations, so that they can say they’re fighting against the infidels.Report
Let’s do a better job of arming Middle-Eastern Muslims!Report
I was thinking more that if ISIL has no support, in the long run they’re largely going to wither away and die. A movement that wants to be revolutionary – that wants to gain political control of a country without access to existing power structures or finances – needs at least some minimum level of public support. If the government of Syria wasn’t already fighting a civil war against various other groups, ISIL would never have had a chance; and if the Syrian government and the non-ISIL rebel groups can come to terms, ISIL won’t last long.
The Middle East has many problems; “too few guns” is not one of them.Report
You can’t stop terrorist tactics with a conventional military invasion. There have been plenty of terrorist groups that never occupied a territory. The means to conduct terror attacks are simple, mobile and minimal. Taking ISIS’s territory won’t stop them from using terror tactics. It’s great if they ground they occupy is taken and given to better people but not necessarily easy. Well pushing them out is easier then finding better people since Assad is a bastard and we can’t actually just invade Syria w/o starting a larger war.Report
We have about 5,000 ground troops in Iraq right now for just that.Report
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
On Flanders streets.Report
My heart bleeds for Belgium. This is naked barbarism and it’s so frustrating how hard a constructive response is.Report
More proof of how un-ready certain politicians are for higher office.Report
Umm that’s the great not-Trump hope of the GOP there.Report
You know, maybe we wouldn’t have do that sort of thing if only they would have some sort of easily visible identification so that people could know who they were around. Like, say, a patch in the shape of a green crescent moon sewn onto their clothing.Report
Too soon Burt.Report
In the wake of this, I expect the FBI will soon be prowling Engineering Colleges.
I suspect Daesh thinks the Europeans can be cowed because they seem to have lost their stomach for war. I expect what they will find is that the reason the Europeans choose to practice war no more is because they had gotten so very, very good at it.Report
Looks like there was some warning of the attacks. Too bad the Europeans sat on their hands.
http://www.haaretz.com/world-news/1.710572Report
Does not detract from the sentiment of this post, but the Turks would point out that the Ankara bombing was actually the work not of Daesh, but TAK (Kurdistan Freedom Falcons), a hardline offshoot of the pro-Kurdish separatist PKK. The PKK have killed over 300 members of the Turkish security forces since last July, the Turks claim to have killed 1000 PKK militants, and over 100 civilians caught up in the fighting have died. The latest cycle of violence in an almost forty year war which has killed tens of thousands.Report
It’s tragic and very frustrating that the Syrian civil war has re-inflamed conflict between the Turkish government and Kurds. There was genuine, significant progress on a peace deal between the PKK and the Turkish government (a deal supported by the ex-leader of the PKK) before things in Syria spilled over into Turkey. Given that the AKP was the only major Turkish political party willing to negotiate, and that the AKP is in a downward spiral, it’s a very sad missed opportunity.Report