The Three Bombs on the Underground Train in London - Essay Example

Fifty six people, 4 of which, the bombers, died in London on 7 July 2006 as a result of coordinated bombings at 3 points in the London underground train network and one double decker bus during the morning rush hour. About 700 were injured from the bombings: 340 at Russel Square; 90 at Aldgate; 163 at Edgware Road and 100 at the bus explosion at Tavistock Place. 350 of whom were treated at the scene and the rest treated at nearby hospitals: Royal London Hospital and St. Mary's Hospital in Paddington. Non-British victims of the bombing include people from Australia, China, Colombia, Israel, New Zealand, Poland, Romania and Sierra Leone ("Casualties of the 7 July 2005 London bombings", 2006). The three bombs at the underground train: Russel Square, Aldgate and Edgware Road exploded at around 8:50 in the morning, with 50 second interval from each other. About an hour later, another bomb exploded in Tavistock Place on a bus. The bombing is said to be the deadliest incident in London since the Second World War and in the whole United Kingdom since the Pan Am Flight 103 incident. It is also the first suicide bombing in Western Europe ("7 July 2005 London bombings", 2006). The British authorities confirmed the identities of the four bombers: Germaine Lindsay, 19; Hasib Hussain, 18; Shehzad Tanweer, 24 and Mohammad Sidique Khan, 30. Among the Bombers, Khan was identified to be the leader and Tanweer, second in command ("7 July 2005 London bombings", 2006). Their inclusion in the death toll and their participation in the bombing were made certain by forensic evidence taken from the sites of bombing. DNA tests show that the four bombers were near the bomb during the explosions. Forensic evidence also shows the link between Khan, Tanweer and Hussain, and the bomb factory discovered in Alexandra Grove. In addition, the camera footages taken before the attack showed the bombers, each carrying rucksacks of distinctive size. The authorities confirm the possibility that the bombs used in the attack were contained in the rucksacks. Based on the reports gathered from witnesses, two of the bombers were remembered to be fiddling with their rucksacks before the explosions ("Report of the Official Account of the Bombings in London on 7th July 2005", 2006). Twelve thousand statements and 5000 forensically examined exhibits were used to and are still being used to connect situations and give the most detailed account of what happened. On 11 May 2006, an official account of the bombings was released ("Report of the Official Account of the Bombings in London on 7th July 2005", 2006). Initially, prior to the release of the 11 May report, it was theorized that high grade explosives with timed detonators were used by the bombers. The report refuted this theory stating that the bombs used were actually home-made explosives which materials could be very easily obtained. This report also provided a narrative of how the attack took place and a background on each bomber. In summary, the report ascertained that the planning of the London attacks took place after two of the bombers, Khan and Tanweer came back from Pakistan. It was claimed that some Al Qaeda training took place. Immediately after the attack, Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attacks in a website operated by the associates of Al Qaeda. According to them, the attacks were done in retaliation for the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan ("Report of the Official Account of the Bombings in London on 7th July 2005", 2006). The profiles of the bombers detailed in the report illustrate the difficulty in determining who and who are not possible suspects. All the bombers were known to be living seemingly ordinary lives with personalities not indicating any terroristic tendencies: Khan, being a role model for the youth; Tanweer with his friendly nature and modesty; Hussain being shy and quiet and Lindsay, although with possible criminal tendencies, did not exhibit any manifestation of terrorist tendencies ("Report of the Official Account of the Bombings in London on 7th July 2005, 2006; BBC", 2006). All the bombers had never been associated with terrorist plots except for Khan whose name was implicated in a terrorist plot to detonate a truck bomb in London in 2004. He was not placed under surveillance (Reynolds, 2006). The video message from Kahn was released after the attack, suggesting allegiance with the objectives of the Al Qaeda which is to form a unified Islamic nation without the oppression perpetrated the people of the West ("7 July 2005 London bombings", 2006). The message is a representation of the motivations behind Muslim terrorist acts which is their perceived oppression by the Westerners of the Muslim people. The message also suggests their seriousness about their sense of vengeance that for them, even the sacrifice of innocent lives is justified by their cause. The government of UK responded immediately after the attack with expressions of sympathy, medical and psychological assistance ("7 July 2005 London bombings", 2006). Meanwhile, the Queen, after hearing about the incident quoted: "Those who perpetrate these brutal attacks against innocent people should know that they will not change our way of life." The incident happened on the same day as the 31st G8 summit and the Prime Minister was forced to leave the summit. He expressed his derision over the incident by saying: "Our determination to defend our values and our way of life is greater than their determination to cause death and destruction to innocent people in a desire to impose extremism upon the world." Some families were assigned to liaison officers as part of the government response to the bombing. This was announced by the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair. Paramedics, the St. John Ambulance, the British Red Cross were immediately dispatched to provide assistance to the victims of the incident. Medical professionals who were off-duty were also summoned to give assistance. Immediate access to medicine was needed so some portions of the stations were improvised as hospitals ("Casualties of the 7 July 2005 London Bombings", 2006). The police, during the incident acted, according to some commentators, by suggesting that the explosions were actually caused by power surge. This was to manage the hype and panic and enable a safer clearance of passengers from the tube network. Security alerts were implemented. The transportation system, specifically the London Underground was temporarily shutdown. The citizens were made more alert on suspicious packages. Police officers followed suspected members and associates of the Al Qaeda. A shoot-to-kill order was even suggested if problems arise with suspected Al Qaeda members ("7 July 2005 London bombings", 2006). Despite concerns for immediate response for aid, certain circumstances impeded the speed rescue actions. One example is the nature of the Piccadilly line in Russel Square. Unlike the Circle Line which is relatively wide, the Piccadilly line is deep, about 30 meteres with very narrow single track tubes and only 15 cm clearances. Being a single-line, it slowed any rescue action and the retrieval of bodies by limiting access through the passages. Aside from limiting the access of teams through the narrow passages, temperature was as high as 60 degrees Celsius. The presence of vermins and asbestos also contributed to the dangerous conditions that slowed the operations ("Casualties of the 7 July 2005 London Bombings", 2006). As with any other terrorist attacks, the London bombings in 2005 are the same in principle and nature with the other bombings such as the 1995 Oklahoma City Bombing and the 1996 Olympic Bombing. Similar to the London Bombings, the Oklahoma City Bombing was considered the deadliest in its time. If the London Bombing is the deadliest since the Pan Am Flight incident, the Oklahoma City Bombing was the deadliest prior to the September 11 attack killing and injuring hundreds of people. As with any other acts of terror, the purpose of all the bombings was to express dislike of the government's policies and actions. The Oklahoma City Bombing was for vengaence, in its case, the perpetrators Timothy Mc Veigh and Terry Nichols said that the purpose of their bombing was to avenge the Waco Seige. In the case of the Olympic bombing, the purpose was merely to express dislike of the government. In the perpetrator's own words: ", the purpose of the attack on July 27 was to confound, anger and embarrass the Washington government in the eyes of the world for its abominable sanctioning of abortion on demand." The responses of the governments concerned are similar and naturally towards anger against the acts. Similar to the Queen's and the UK Prime Minister's response to the London Bombings, President Clinton expressed his anger with the perpetrators of the bombings by saying: "We will spare no effort to find out who was responsible for this murderous act. We will track them down. We will bring them to justice ("Centennial Olympic Park Bombing", 2006)." Because all these are acts of terrorism, there are natural similarities. But from the nature of rebellion, and the party involved, differences usually rise. In the said US bombings, the terrorists were acting on their own, with no help from any huge organization. Their purposes were not founded on anything deep other than a mere distaste of the way the government was governing and implementing its policies: the Oklahoma City Bombing, with the perpetrators personal desire to avenge a seige and the Olympic bombing with the perpetrator's desire to embarrass the US government. As with any other personal undertaking without the backup from a firm group, capturing the perpetrators is enough to end the possibly impending war founded on that cause. It is theorized that the capture of the perpetrators of the Oklahoma City Bombing ended the anti-government militia to which these perpetrators were involved. In the same way, the capture of the Olympic Bomber ended that case. Such is not the case with the London Bombings. The perpetrators of the London bombings were associated with the Al Qaeda either directly (the Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attack) or by mere inspiration. In the London Bombings, the capture or in this case, the death of the bombers could either incite hate towards the Al Qaeda, the group that claimed the responsibility for the attack, or incite inspiration among the Muslim group and among sympathizers to the cause of Al Qaeda. Either way, it does not end the war (Gomez, 2005). Blame could easily be targeted to single or unorganized terrorists compared to organized ones like the Al Qaeda. In the Oklahoma and Olympic Bombing, it was easy to point the fingers and put the responsibility of whatever casualty that the action incurred towards the perpetrators themselves. Only little blame is usually put on officials. In the case of the Oklahoma bombing, President Clinton blamed the media for "spreading hate" ("Oklahoma City Bombing", 2006). In the London bombing, no matter what, the blame would always be towards the government. In cases of organized terrorism, prevention is always the key and this, based on popular belief is always the responsibility of the government. Any successful attack attributed to actions by organized terrorists would imply a lapse in security measures and in intelligence capabilities of the government (BBC News, 2006; Reynolds, 2006). Aside from the cause, the characteristic of the government involved has some implications regarding the handling of such circumstances. The United Kingdom, despite its participation in counterterrorism as indicated by the presence of their troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, had always been lenient, allowing the exercise of freedom and giving refuge and benefits to terrorists or suspected terrorists (The Middle Eastern Media Research Institute, 2005). In addition, the fact that there had not been an incident of suicide bombing in UK prior to the London incident ("7 July 2005 London Bombings", 2006) unwisely made the authorities complacent probably thinking that giving probable terrorists their refuge in the country would save them from such attacks. It has been reported that two of the London bombers have already been implicated in past terrorist plots and had been coming back from Pakistan. But these two terrorists were not placed under surveillance (BBC News, 2006; Reynolds, 2006). Whether or not the London bombings could have been prevented if there were doubts over UK's safety, we will never know. But one thing is certain: not placing the two terrorists under surveillance did not save UK from the bombing. The United Kingdom and United States both express outward derision over terrorism and participates in counterterrorism in a similar way but handles such circumstances differently. In response to the Oklahoma Attack the United States was very quick in passing new laws. In 1996, the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 was passed ("Oklahoma City Bombing", 2006). The United Kingdom had not been used to domestic terrorism, which made them very complacent ("7 July 2005 bombing", 2006). But the London Attack surely gave them lessons. Surely there is now increasing security measures in UK and increasing alert levels. They may not be as hyper in combating terrorism compared to US very warlike ways but their activity is still commendable. Their increased vigilance as a result of the London bombings, added to their natural calm in handling situations as exemplified in how the government and the people handled the incident in London on July 7 would be a perfect recipe in countering violence (Simpson, 2005). In the present situation involving terrorism, it would be tempting to counteract with more extreme violence that is attempting to over power the forces of terror with more terror. We must remember that terrorists now are acting on their ideals as we are with ours and with statements of both sides as basis, one retaliation could lead to more retaliation until there is no end to this war (Simpson, 2005). But I am not saying that in countering war, we should not fight. Given the concerns of both parties, and in facing the dilemma caused by impending retaliation and thus more casualties (Gomez, 2005), in countering violence both calm and vigilance are the keys. References "7 July 2005 London bombings". (13 Aug 2006). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 14 August 2006, from: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.phptitle=7_July _2005_London_ bombings&oldid=69378297 BBC News. Resourcing blamed over July bombs. (11 May 2006). Retrieved 14 Aug 2006, from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4757915.stm "Casualties of the 7 July 2005 London bombings". (6 Aug 2006). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 14 August 2006, from: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php title=Casualties_of_the_7_July_2005_London_bombings&oldid=67999561. Gomez, E. (19 Jul 2005). WORLD VIEWS: London bombing fallout: Did Blair's policy provoke attacks; don't blame all Muslims; how is a British Muslim extremist made; and more. World Views: A digest of International News and Culture. Retrieved 14 Aug 2006 from http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgifile=/gate/archive/2005/07/19/worldviews.DTL Reynolds, Paul. (11 May 2006). Analysis: Missed chances but nobody blamed. Retrieved 14 Aug 2006 from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4763097.stm Mohammad Sidique Khan. (14 Aug 2006). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 14 August 2006, from: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.phptitle=Mohammad_Sidique _Khan&oldid=69662426. "Oklahoma City bombing". (14 Aug 2006). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 14 Aug 2006, from: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.phptitle=Oklahoma_City_Bombing &oldid=69585359. Report of the Official Account of the Bombings in London on 7th July 2005. (11 May 2006). Retrieved 14 August, 2006 from: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/11_05_06 _narrative.pdf Reynolds, Paul. (11 May 2006). Analysis: Missed chances but nobody blamed. Retrieved 14 Aug 2006 from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4763097.stm Simpson, John. (31 Aug 2005). London bombs need calm response Retrieved 14 Aug 2006 from, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4671577.stm. The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). (12 Jul 2005). Arab Media Reactions to the London Bombing - Part II: 'The Attacks Were Anticipated Due to British Leniency to Extremists Acting in Britain'- 'Expel Extremism Today'. Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies (C.S.S). Retrieved 15 August 2006, from: http://www.intelligence.org.il/eng/eng_n/july_g_05.htm Read More