Brief Note on the Strategical Usefulness of the Madrid and London Bombings
Elias Davidsson, 2 Feburary 2007
On April 17, 2002, a multinational opinion survey was conducted by Pew Global Attitudes Project in association with the International Herald Tribune and the Council on Foreign Relations. This survey compared the attitudes of Americans and Europeans to a number of foreign policy issues, including the war on Afghanistan, the war on terrorism and other related issues.
The findings of these survey are reported at http://pewglobal.org/reports/display.php”PageID=452.
Commenting the results of this survey, Kenneth M. Pollack, Director, National Security Studies, at the Council on Foreign Relations, writes:
“The gap between the United States and European public opinion on dealing with terrorism continues to grow, according to the latest Pew Research Center public opinion survey of the United States and four leading European countries (Germany, Italy, France, and Britain)…. Perhaps the greatest problem for the [U.S.] Administration is that it does not appear to have convinced European publics that the war on terrorism is their war… The view from the Old World seems to be that this is an American war on American enemies, not a universal struggle against evil, as the White House likes to define it… [T]hese findings suggest that the European governments are not feeling much heat from their publics to do more to help what they consider an American war on terrorism…
On March 11, 2004, Europe got the first taste of a massive “terrorist” attack which occurred in Madrid.” The next massive “terrorist” attack occurred in July 7, 2005 in London. By these bombings the “terrorists” brought home the threat of terror to Europeans and helped to make Europeans more supportive of the war against terror. These attacks provided the right climate for enacting strong anti-terrorist legislation in various European countries, including in Spain and the U.K. and strenghten the resolve of European NATO governments in supporting the global “war on terror.” The bombings in Madrid and London served perfectly the interests of the architects of the global “war on terror”. Whether these bombings were masterminded by these architects in order to promote their goals is a question that can only be answered by an impartial and comprehensive criminal investigation. No such investigation has been envisaged by the Spanish and U.K. authorities.