John R. Carroll wrote
Rod Speed wrote
John R. Carroll wrote
Rod Speed wrote
John R. Carroll wrote
Rod Speed wrote
John R. Carroll wrote
Rod Speed wrote
F. George McDuffee wrote
John R. Carroll wrote

FWIW -- to be insane is not to be stupid. If you are smart
and insane, you are even more dangerous to the public.

Terrorists who are stupid enough to buy the line that blowing
themselves to bits will see an instant transport to nirvana in
spades.

People who perpetrate suicide attacks are acting on the belief
that their deaths will have more purpose than their lives ever
could have.

Or they 'think' that, anyway. Quite a few end up with just
as completely pointless a death as their pathetic excuse
for a 'life' before that, most obviously with those who
make a complete hash of blowing themselves to bits and
only succeed in killing themselves and no one else etc.

Yes, they think that way. You have made my point for me.

Nope, that is nothing like your original line.

Sure it is. You are correct that they don't always
carry it off properly but that's irrelevant. They are
successful often enough to set the desired example.
It isn't the number that screw up that counts, it's the
number that don't and the size and scope of the mess
they make. The failures are quickly forgotten.

Sure, but thats nothing like your original.

The disconnect is complete.

No it isnt with many of them.

Quite a few of them just realise that its an approach that
is close to impossible to prevent, and they consider that
as long as they take lots of those they hate with them, that
they have achieved a lot more than they otherwise could.

People used to think the earth was flat as well.

Irrelevant to what was being discussed.

In this case, their perception becomes our reality to
some degree. We are the ones cleaning up after all.

Yep, particularly when its impossible
to stop that sort of thing completely.

This would all stop in a heartbeat if we were to have GM and
GE build a bunch of manufacturing capacity in the affected areas.

Wrong. That aint what drives fantatics like that.

These people are driven by whoever scoops them into the fold.

Wrong with bin laden, atta, top, etc etc etc.

They wouldn't come up with it on their own.

Almost no one ever does with something as
unusual as blowing yourself to bits for the cause.

It only takes a couple to prove that its a very effective approach
that there isnt all that much that can be done to stop it.

People would be to busy learning, working and actually improving
the quality of their existence to give any thought to blowing up anything.

Have fun explaining the likes of Atta who did plenty
of that stuff, and chose to blow stuff up anyway.

Not himself he didn't. He had a purpose and that purpose
is to use the broken among his people to do his will.

Wrong again, he choose to kill himself in the process
of one of the most effective approaches ever seen.

He has both hope and a plan and his
hopes and plans are what he lives for.

Yes, but thats got nothing to do with your line
that those can be completely eliminated with
GE and GM manufacturing plants in their area
and distracting them with that sort of thing.

Quite a few of them are surprisingly well qualified, at a
much better level than monkeys on an assemblyline too.

Not the suicide bombers, only their recruiters and trainers.

Wrong. Atta was very well qualified.

And you wont distract all the suicide bombers with decent
job prospects either, most obviously with the most recent ones
in england, some of whom had good employment prospects.

bin Laden in spades.

You clearly havent actually got a clue about what drives people
like that.

They'd have a less violent and more stable means to attain their
goals.

Have fun explaining bin laden, atta, top, etc etc etc.

You seem to want to combine the master and the tool into a common
group.

Nope.

They aren't. The guys running the show
and the hopeless are two distinct peoples.
The master and the drones if you will.

Have fun explaining Atta.

I had him confused with one of the others, Zawahiri. My bad.

OK.

Given that, there is always insanity to contend with.

Atta wasnt insane. He just realised that that was
a very effective way to pull off what has been one
of the most effective acts of terrorism ever seen.

Tho I doubt he actually expected both
towers would implode like they did.

Great, I'll be paying close attention to your explanation.
You do have one don't you?

Yep.

I'm all ears, well almost.

Already explained it.

I didn't get it then.

Yes you did, you commented on it. Here it is again.

Quite a few of them just realise that its an approach that
is close to impossible to prevent, and they consider that
as long as they take lots of those they hate with them, that
they have achieved a lot more than they otherwise could.

It isnt even a simple matter that its just fools stupid
enough to buy the line that its a guaranteed ticket to
instant nirvana either, there have been some from
a non religious background who have done it too.

And it isnt so different from what has produced
quite a few VCs in the british military system.

It is indeed but that's the basis. The behavior becomes
ingrained over time because it produces the desired result.

Yep, but they clearly do have that hope, and quite a bit of
the time they do get at least part of what they are aiming for,
most obviously with the tamils and palestinians and lebanon.

Even you should have noticed that Raygun pulled the troops out
after one of the most successful suicide bombings of all time.

His other options weren't viable and he knew it. There
wasn't anything in Beirut worth the cost of staying.

He wouldnt have pulled out without that happening.

No but he wouldn't have acomplished anything useful either

Sure.

and that was the judgement he made after the fact.

It was purely the success of that suicide bombing
that produced the pullout. That fool ordered
shelling from ex WW2 battleships after that.

Even more futile.

There isn't, or wasn't at least, anything in Iraq either.

There was in Afghanistan.

Yes and it's back, in spades if you will.

No it isnt, the Talibums aint back.

The "it" that's back is heroine.

Afghanistan wasnt about heroin.

It's back because people need to eat.

They ate before they exported heroin.

Until an alternative exists on the economic front, nothing much is
going to change there. They will likely be a little more circumspect
about the activities of foreigners within their borders, however.

And that was what it was about, stopping
bin Laden from operating from there.

THAT worked.

Having your country blow up in your face is something to avoid.

We should have paid more attention to the Russian experience.

Mindless stuff. We ****ed over the Talibums very comprehensively
indeed, nothing like what happened with the Russians.

41 was right and made a good call.

Sure.

43 is learning that the hard way.

He wasnt the one driving that. Just the front monkey.

That's a credible statement but a little premature.
Well, it MAY be premature. It may not be.

Nope, he's always been just the front monkey.

Looks like a group effort to me and W is the weak mind.

Just the electable front monkey.

He was, however, electable.

He was indeed. A hell of a lot more electable than his dad too.

Rummy in spades.

That makes them easy targets to convert. Check
out an AA or Christian revival meeting sometime
and you will see something along these lines.

Nope, nothing like it. Hardly any of those blow themselves to bits.

Only because their hopelessness is replaced with something else.

Nope, essentially because thos cults have always
frowned on that sort of thing except in wartime.

Not the big ones.

Yep, the big ones.

The smaller groups didn't have the fodder to waste.

Have fun explaining Jim Jones.

They didn't take out a target, they "saved" themselves. LOL
Nice "save" wouldn't you say...

They clearly wasted their fodder very spectacularly indeed.