I feel like there are two things going on here. First, security theater that doesn't actually work or make anyone safer. For example, the naked scanners and the shoe rules. I think we are all against meaningless, ineffective security measures, except for the contractors making big bucks off of selling those machines.
The second is what we're willing to give up for actual safety. This one is much harder, partly because it's harder to draw a direct connection between security measure A and prevented attack B. It's not like 24 where you have a clear-cut scenario that this guy has imminent information that you have to get in five minutes in order to prevent an attack. Plus a lot of that is kept secret and we never know about it - we rarely hear about the many intelligence successes and the attacks thwarted, we only hear about the terrible failures like today. But for the things that we actually know do work, how far are we willing to take those?
And depending on where you draw the line, you have to accept that you're making sacrifices either way. Are you willing to accept your phone data being available for the government to access with a warrant (and opening up the possibility that they could illegally access it without a warrant) if it means you can safely travel on airplanes? Are you willing to accept the small but real possibility that your child or spouse or parent could be blown up on the way to school or work in exchange for keeping your data secret and inaccessible?
It's always going to be a trade-off. You can't have full freedom AND full security.
That is a fool's argument, imo---Of course I don't want anything, but it's a BIG if in taking away liberties on the slim possibility something awful can happen. I like my rights.
You will NEVER get full security. Ever. It's an illusion, sadly, and I think that is where we won't agree here.
You will never get full freedom, either, though, unless you want anarchy.
Again, airport security is "taking away liberties" and you're ok with that. So it's not a question of whether we should take away liberties for security, it's a question of how many to take.
"The slim possibility that something awful can happen" - you mean that it's a slim possibility it can happen to you. Because as we've seen, the possibility is not slim that a terrorist attack can occur. The odds of it happening to any specific individual are very very slim, but the odds of it happening to anyone are not that slim.
And depending on where you draw the line, you have to accept that you're making sacrifices either way. Are you willing to accept your phone data being available for the government to access with a warrant (and opening up the possibility that they could illegally access it without a warrant) if it means you can safely travel on airplanes? Are you willing to accept the small but real possibility that your child or spouse or parent could be blown up on the way to school or work in exchange for keeping your data secret and inaccessible?
Do you get into your car every day and drive your kids, even though you know that you might get into a car wreck once you hit the road? Because that is more likely than a terrorist attack.
Yes, but I also obey traffic laws, seat belt laws, car seat laws, etc. I accept that I will lose the freedom to drive 100 mph without a seatbelt while ignoring red lights in exchange for greater safety.
That is a fool's argument, imo---Of course I don't want anything, but it's a BIG if in taking away liberties on the slim possibility something awful can happen. I like my rights.
You will NEVER get full security. Ever. It's an illusion, sadly, and I think that is where we won't agree here.
You will never get full freedom, either, though, unless you want anarchy.
Again, airport security is "taking away liberties" and you're ok with that. So it's not a question of whether we should take away liberties for security, it's a question of how many to take.
"The slim possibility that something awful can happen" - you mean that it's a slim possibility it can happen to you. Because as we've seen, the possibility is not slim that a terrorist attack can occur. The odds of it happening to any specific individual are very very slim, but the odds of it happening to anyone are not that slim.
There is a slim possibility it can happen to anyone. I think there were something liek 20 US deaths from acts of terrorism. That is well below even 1%. Well below. You keep throwing out these examples of what I am okay and not okay with in extreme generalizations. Outside of normal security that has been in place for many years (basic security-ie. checking my license to fly on a commercial airline (see not gov owned) or even basic scanners), we are living with a false sense...as is seen in today's events. You may be very well fine and trust in the government/the police/whomever to NOT trample on the Constitution in the name of freedom. I, though, am not.
Do you get into your car every day and drive your kids, even though you know that you might get into a car wreck once you hit the road? Because that is more likely than a terrorist attack.
Yes, but I also obey traffic laws, seat belt laws, car seat laws, etc. I accept that I will lose the freedom to drive 100 mph without a seatbelt while ignoring red lights in exchange for greater safety.
Even with all those laws, you still have no control over other people on the road. Just because YOU are obeying those laws, there are many others that don't. See all the drunk driving fatalities.
ETA: Driving laws are what I like to think of as "common good" laws. If everyone is driving the same direction, as the law dictates, everyone is doing good. There's no suppression of anyone and everyone gets to where they're going.
The cyber hacking of the government does... what? for me. What part of the common good is being served if they have record of every single conversation I've ever had with someone else? "Keeping me safe" is nebulous. How is it keeping me safe?
Yes, but I also obey traffic laws, seat belt laws, car seat laws, etc. I accept that I will lose the freedom to drive 100 mph without a seatbelt while ignoring red lights in exchange for greater safety.
Even with all those laws, you still have no control over other people on the road. Just because YOU are obeying those laws, there are many others that don't. See all the drunk driving fatalities.
But we have those laws for a reason, and the police are authorized to restrict people's freedom to drive drunk or speed or blow through stop signs. Again, a balance between letting people be completely free and restricting people's freedom in the name of safety. We don't have total safety but we don't have total freedom either.
Even with all those laws, you still have no control over other people on the road. Just because YOU are obeying those laws, there are many others that don't. See all the drunk driving fatalities.
But we have those laws for a reason, and the police are authorized to restrict people's freedom to drive drunk or speed or blow through stop signs. Again, a balance between letting people be completely free and restricting people's freedom in the name of safety. We don't have total safety but we don't have total freedom either.
Yes, I'd like to start talking about the police and the corruption of the system that unfairly targets some above others. Such as stopping a black woman for a minor traffic violation and she being dead, in jail, 24 hours later.
Do you see where I'm going with this? We live in a world where power corrupts, and humans are fallible.
I agree with this too. None of it will eliminate terrorism, but it could certainly decrease support for it and the willingness of locals to aid and shield terrorists. And honestly, I think that this is part of why we have fewer issues here in the US with communities that are hotbeds of terrorism - Muslim immigrants in the US are much better integrated into society. Not all of that is for reasons that are under our control, of course, but overall I think the US does a better job of this than most European countries.
I honestly agree with this. If you truly integrate you see people as human beings while celebrating your differences.Then maybe we can stop all this senseless violence. I wonder how the US does a better job . Thoughts anyone?
I realize I'm skipping a few pages, so I may later edit if this is redundant or has already been dismissed. But I think it's the First Amendment and the higher level of religious folks and are he impact that has on our societal understandings. Trump voters, KKK, and WBC notwithstanding, we have a culture of respecting religions here. There are a TON of Christians in the US, relative to Europe. And across the spectrum, most of them value religious freedoms, to the benefit of their neighbors of other faiths (who, I assume, also value religious freedoms, particularly as minority religions). Even the non religious in the US tend to understand people of faith a little better than our Eurpean counterparts. The no religious here either grew up in in a house of faith or have good friends or family members who are religious. They see the flaws of religion and faith, but they also understand the appeal. We also had a tone from the top that I believe was more positive than not. In particular, I recall a speech from W, but I imagine Clinton and Bush, Sr. also had good, effective messaging. Obama, too.
Wolf: You know it's a violation of international law to water board. Trump: These eggheads who come up with this...international law...need to see what happened and then they will change their mind.
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh.
He is making us less safe. Just by opening his big, fat, bloated, entitled mouth.
I don't think terrorism by IS in Canada or the US is less likely than in Europe because we are nicer to Muslims. There was a attack in California in the fall. Last year, there was a madman in Ottawa. I think for the most part, we have better Intel and it is more difficult to get into our countries. There was recently a huge trial on a thwarted terrorism plot to blow up a train in Canada. There have been non Muslims recruited to IS Yes, the racism towards non whites is horrific in Europe. The sentiment towards refugees is appalling. However, I see it here too. Not just Trump. How many governors said they would refuse refugees? That's the public response to Muslims. If someone listened to Trump all day and then saw his poll numbers and then wandered into an Is chat room....
saw it on the news so I have no link, but Turkey just said that they knew one of the Brussels terrorists was a threat and told the Netherlands (where he was first) and Belgium, but that Belgium ignored them.
saw it on the news so I have no link, but Turkey just said that they knew one of the Brussels terrorists was a threat and told the Netherlands (where he was first) and Belgium, but that Belgium ignored them.
This is another huge problem with Europe- their intelligence agencies don't seem to communicate well with each other and I feel like they're just now beginning to understand the importance of information sharing.
But if Turkeys claim is true....someone is getting fired.
Post by secretlyevil on Mar 24, 2016 6:20:04 GMT -5
Did anyone see pigs flying?
Lindsey Graham made a lot of sense in his interview this morning on the Today Show. I literally stopped in the middle of my stretching and looked up to make sure it was indeed him.
saw it on the news so I have no link, but Turkey just said that they knew one of the Brussels terrorists was a threat and told the Netherlands (where he was first) and Belgium, but that Belgium ignored them.
The message from Turkey came too late, it wasn't ignored
Lindsey Graham made a lot of sense in his interview this morning on the Today Show. I literally stopped in the middle of my stretching and looked up to make sure it was indeed him.
I wish he was the R nominee. He's BSC with the rest of them, but at least he has a sense of humor and can see the forest for the trees. I don't automatically want to punch him in the face like, well, every other R candidate.
saw it on the news so I have no link, but Turkey just said that they knew one of the Brussels terrorists was a threat and told the Netherlands (where he was first) and Belgium, but that Belgium ignored them.
The message from Turkey came too late, it wasn't ignored
What do you mean came too late? I thought they told the Netherlands a year ago or so?
The message from Turkey came too late, it wasn't ignored
What do you mean came too late? I thought they told the Netherlands a year ago or so?
There seems to have been a communication between embassies last year, but that information remained confidential. The Belgian government seems to have been informed only yesterday. They are trying to find out who communicated which message to whom.
Anyway, we need to work on prevention now. For most of us, it is less important to know who made a mistake - if a mistake was made.
What do you mean came too late? I thought they told the Netherlands a year ago or so?
There seems to have been a communication between embassies last year, but that information remained confidential. The Belgian government seems to have been informed only yesterday. They are trying to find out who communicated which message to whom.
Anyway, we need to work on prevention now. For most of us, it is less important to know who made a mistake - if a mistake was made.
I don't think finger-pointing is necessary helpful, but I do think it's important to learn lessons from mistakes made. This was a huge lesson for the US after 9/11, that our intelligence, defense, and domestic LE agencies were doing an incredibly poor job of information sharing. They have made some massive improvements since then (not to say it's perfect now, but certainly it's much better and there's much more awareness of this as a problem and the consequences of it). From what I've read about Belgian intelligence and other European agencies, they're kind of where the US was pre-9/11 or maybe more accurately in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 - disorganized, undermanned, and reeling from the blow. I realize that working across national borders is more difficult than working across one large country, but I do think there are some critical lessons to be learned.
PARIS — If another example of the failure of European intelligence services to share and act on information about potential terrorists was needed, Wednesday’s identification of the bombers in the deadly Brussels attacks the day before certainly provides it.
At least one of the attackers, Ibrahim el-Bakraoui, had been deported by Turkey to the Netherlands last year with a clear indication that he was a jihadist.
“Despite our warnings that this person was a foreign terrorist fighter,” President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey told a news conference in Ankara on Wednesday, “the Belgian authorities could not identify a link to terrorism.”
By now it is abundantly clear that the terrorists who work for the Islamic State think, cooperate and operate across borders, ignoring national boundaries. The increasingly urgent question for Europe in its struggle against them is, Can it do the same?
The outlook is not promising. On Wednesday there were renewed calls for a pan-European intelligence agency that would effectively share information from different countries. Members of the European Parliament took to the airwaves and print to denounce, again, the lack of coordination.
Yet the hurdles are as basic as national pride and bureaucratic turf protection, with experts pointing out that even within nations, intelligence-gathering agencies — France alone has some 33 of them — have trouble cooperating.
“Is it not in the nature of intelligence agencies to keep the information for themselves?” asked Jean-Marie Delarue, who until recently headed the French agency that reviews surveillance requests from these intelligence services.
“Information is power,” Mr. Delarue said in a recent interview. “In intelligence, one only has enemies, no friends.”
Cross-border cooperation could possibly have helped prevent Tuesday’s attacks. Mr. Erdogan said Wednesday that both the Netherlands and the Belgian authorities had been informed of Mr. Bakraoui’s deportation, since he was a Belgian citizen.
What intelligence services in either country did with that information — and whether they shared it with one another other or neighboring countries — was not immediately clear.
Yet it is certain that the absence of inter-European help was deeply harmful not only in Brussels but also in staving off the massacres in Paris in November.
The Paris plotters slipped easily in and out of Europe, then hatched their plans in one country, Belgium, before carrying them out in another, France. Then one slipped across the border again, taking advantage of the openness that is foundational to the European Union.
“We were victims of solidarity with the European Union,” Mr. Delarue said of the Paris attacks.
“We think there should be cooperation,” he added. “We rely on what the other countries give us. We are dependent on what they give us. And I don’t think the Belgians gave us precise information.”
A former top official with France’s external intelligence agency, Alain Juillet, said that the “big lesson” was to “restore the frontiers and establish better cooperation.”
“There needs to be a permanent liaison with the Belgians,” he added.
But if neighbors with a common language, a long common border and common enemies cannot work together, who can?
Europe has had a “counterterrorism coordinator” for much of the last 10 years, but this fact-finding institution was dismissed as “weak” in a recent French parliamentary report, and as “having no operational capacity to offer.”
In the absence of an effective centralized European counterterrorism agency, it is up to the member states to cooperate with one another. Yet they do so only haphazardly.
There are plenty of databases, for instance, but the information they contain is either incomplete or inaccessible, numerous officials complained.
A fundamental one that contains criminal suspects’ surveillance records — the Schengen Information System, or SIS — is only weakly supported by most of the member countries. The French parliamentary report last month said that the French internal intelligence agency “is the only one that regularly feeds this database,” and criticized “ the very spotty nature of the information furnished by” other European nations
“There is nothing automatic about what goes into the SIS,” said François Heisbourg, a French intelligence expert. He said that a decade of European squabbling over the issue had still not resulted in the creation of a minimal tool, the Passenger Name Record, of airplane travelers.
In addition, European Union rules forbid the use of the SIS system for spot-checks on individuals at Schengen’s borders, according to the parliamentary report.
“On the one hand, there is a tension between the need to cooperate, which is recognized,” said Thomas Renard, a terrorism expert at Belgium’s Egmont Institute. “On the other hand, there is the lack of confidence that the different services have in each other.”
“Everyone knows we need to work together,” he added. “But for each specific case, they will say, ‘We can’t give up the information, because we are still working on the investigation.’”
It is not just the main SIS database that is woefully lacking.
Some 5,000 European Union citizens are known to have traveled to Iraq and Syria to join the Islamic State and other groups. Yet the Europol database “contains only 2,786 verified foreign terrorist fighters entered by E.U. member states,” the counterterrorism coordinator pointed out in a recent report.
“I think the biggest problem lies in the different levels of professionalism among the security services in Europe,” Guido Steinberg, of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, told German public broadcaster ARD on Wednesday.
“We have an enormous number of well-equipped states such as France and Great Britain, to those who are weaker such as Germany, to those who are completely overwhelmed such as Belgium,” Mr. Steinberg said.
Another European database contains 90,000 fingerprints “but there is no search possibility yet,” the counterterrorism coordinator pointed out.
“We must have a permanent exchange on the European level,” Elmar Brok, a European Parliament member close to Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, told ARD Wednesday.
The February French parliamentary report ruefully acknowledged, without citing a specific assault, systematic “gaps in the transmission of information, which, if they had been realized in time, could have forestalled the attack” in Paris.
The cross-border cooperation failures in the case of the November Paris attacks are a telling case study.
Former intelligence officials here said that the Belgians were apparently unaware that the presumed ringmaster of the attacks, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, one of the most wanted terrorists in Europe, was on their soil before the attacks.
Mr. Abaaoud had indeed boasted, both in the Islamic State magazine and to a cousin, about how easy it was for him to slip in and out of Europe.
“These were people who crossed frontiers, and they weren’t even seen,” said Mr. Juillet, the former official in the French foreign intelligence agency.
Bernard Squarcini, a former head of French internal intelligence, asked, “What did the foreign intelligence service give us, what did the Belgian agencies give us?”
There seems to have been a communication between embassies last year, but that information remained confidential. The Belgian government seems to have been informed only yesterday. They are trying to find out who communicated which message to whom.
Anyway, we need to work on prevention now. For most of us, it is less important to know who made a mistake - if a mistake was made.
I don't think finger-pointing is necessary helpful, but I do think it's important to learn lessons from mistakes made. This was a huge lesson for the US after 9/11, that our intelligence, defense, and domestic LE agencies were doing an incredibly poor job of information sharing. They have made some massive improvements since then (not to say it's perfect now, but certainly it's much better and there's much more awareness of this as a problem and the consequences of it). From what I've read about Belgian intelligence and other European agencies, they're kind of where the US was pre-9/11 or maybe more accurately in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 - disorganized, undermanned, and reeling from the blow. I realize that working across national borders is more difficult than working across one large country, but I do think there are some critical lessons to be learned.