Causes For Concern
This BBC report is disturbing on many levels: Indian allegations alarm Pakistan
Pakistan has expressed concern about rising tensions with India following allegations that gunmen who attacked Mumbai this week had Pakistani links.
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari offered full co-operation with India and his government denied any involvement in the deadly attacks.
Wednesday’s gun and bomb assault on India’s commercial capital left at least 195 people dead and 295 injured.
Troops killed the last of the gunmen at the Taj Mahal Palace hotel on Saturday.
As few as 10 militants may have been involved in the assault which saw attacks in multiple locations including two hotels, a major railway station, a hospital and a Jewish centre.
Obviously, there should be solid evidence before you accuse Pakistan of involvement, but a number of Indian officials don’t seem to be waiting for evidence.
While I accept that early reporting is always muddled, to now state that there were only 10 members of the terrorist group involved in the multiple attacks seems to be rather unbelievable. The senior police officials are now being described as being killed in the field, rather than the initial report of being killed at a police station that was attacked.
I have a feeling that truth has once again become a victim in a battle.
10 comments
I don’t believe the reporting from India either. ABC News tonight said that India claims there were only 10 ‘highly trained and heavily armed’ militants and that they planned to kill 5,000 people. Without very heavy weapons, and 5,000 all crammed into something like a locked stadium with heavily armed killers in the bleachers with grenade launchers, mortars & .50 cal machine guns, there is no way 10 killers could even hope kill that many in a major city without some kind of WMD. They would have needed several heavy car/truck bombs at a major event to have even a hope of that, or Pilot licenses and a death wish.
They also showed a large cafe that was apparently very busy, and at least two attackers with automatic weapons and grenades killed only 8 people in about 90 seconds. If it had been my team from Cambodia, everyone in that cafe would have been dead in 30 seconds. So I’m not sure what the Indians mean by *highly trained and heavily armed*.
There are far too many things that don’t add up. Perhaps they are right to call it India’s ‘9/11’. They have that in common, too many details of the official accounts don’t add up. *shrug* Every time I see a news report, the *facts* have changed again.
Maybe Rove got a job as adviser in India, or a PR job. *shrug*
I shudder to think where this could lead Bryan. A conflict that goes wrong between India and Pakistan.. well no need to say how that could end
If it was only 10, that’s a squad with standard light infantry weapons, AKs and hand grenades, no heavy machine guns, RPGs, or mortars. Based on the famous picture of the guy in the blue T-shirt, they didn’t even have body armor beyond possible flexible Kevlar vests that are only effective against handgun rounds.
If they were looking for a body count, there was a UK-India cricket series going on that would have made an ideal target with some long range weapons. It was scheduled well in advance at known venues.
Apparently they highjacked a trawler at some point to transport people into the city. With only 10 people, and some of them already in the city, why risk taking the trawler?
This makes less sense as time goes on, and I still don’t see any real connection to Pakistan. There are a lot of Urdu speakers in India, especially in Kashmir, and Kashmir is the most probable base. There was even a report that some of the people who attacked the hotels were from the UK.
Just as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a major nexus, so too is Kashmir. Until there is a reasonable settlement of these issues, the terrorism will continue, no matter how many terrorists are killed.
There are so many conflicting reports and stories, I just don’t really trust anything coming out of there right now. I’m sure that India is bloviating to bolster it’s desire to nuke Pakistan, and vice versa. I just wish the Corporate media would stop describing every terrorist group as Al Queada or as a branch of Al Queada. Not everthing horribe leads back to Al Queada.
The question that lingers on my mind, however, is why does every news channel have to create a special logo and music to accompany it’s stories?
This was bound to happen. Pakistan and India have been uncomfortable neighbors for a good long while. Now, in between the people who will worry themselves into a frazzle playing the “what if” game, let’s see what really transpires.
The problem is to avoid all of the propaganda coming from the hard right BJP, India’s version of Republican neocons or the Israeli Likud. Instead right-wing Christianists, they are right-wing Hindus, with ties to the Hindu extremist groups that have been attacking non-Hindus [lately Christians] in India. If they gain power in India all of the gains made by having Musharraf replaced in Pakistan will be lost.
You don’t need a country to train 10 guys. There doesn’t need to be any big, elaborate infrastructure behind what happened, all that was needed was an experienced sergeant to train a squad. Anyone with solid experience in urban fighting could have put ten guys together for this operation in a few months. There are plenty of devastated areas that could be used for training.
The Mumbai tourist bureau probably provided all of the maps that were needed, as the points that were struck would be on the simplest maps.
Despite all of the claims of a complex plan, this was actually very simple – shoot and throw grenades at specific points on the route. It was a suicide mission, so the most complicated part, withdrawal after the attack, wasn’t a concern.
Yup. Agree with all that Bryan.
If I’d have trained them, they would have been a hell of a lot more *effective*! Believe me. 🙂 They weren’t even that well trained IMO. Amateurs with guns. Big deal. The USA has millions of them. 🙂
If there were only 10 I can’t believe they lasted as long as they did. Any large US city would have mounted a better initial response. They damn sure wouldn’t have expected to take hits from AKs in their standard body armor. The SWAT teams have the equipment for this type of operation and they would have been rolling within minutes.
Snipers would have made short work of it, as head shots would be the only effective response, but the regular officers would have been working with shotguns almost immediately. Even with good body armor, if you get hit with a 12 gauge slug you are out of action.
Your average LA street gang would have been more effective, and probably escaped, which is why US cities can mount a better response. When you do battle with drug gangs you had better be prepared.
I think the incident says more about the poor state of Indian security forces than anything about the terrorists. It was an expensive lesson, and it shouldn’t be wasted.
It’s not as if there haven’t been terrorist attacks by multiple groups in India for years. There should have been a better response.
Well… I just had a chat with a friend in India (IT guy in Bangalore) and he said he spoke with a relative who is a retired policeman in Mumbai. He said his relative is very angry and others are also because a lot of the damage and even civilian deaths were caused by the police and military. They even used AMR’s (Anti-Materiel Rifles) to shoot through the walls of the hotel to get at the militants.
If that’s true, it’s insane! You don’t use an AMR against a hotel full of civilians! A typical AMR round fired at close range would just about go right through the hotel unless it hit’s something really, really hard and then shrapnel would be a serious bitch! A typical AMR round will penetrate 20-40mm of RHA (rolled homogeneous armor) such as a modern double walled APC, so you can imagine what it would do against an old hotel.
This will get interesting!
My first thought when I saw the fire in that single room at the Taj was a tear gas grenade, which are notorious for starting fires in order buildings.
The pictures of all of those cops and troops standing around with automatic weapons made “collateral damage” almost guaranteed. That’s why police SWAT teams are a better idea than commandos. The police prefer to not kill bystanders while the military shoots anything perceived as a possible threat.
Frankly, the live video I saw looked more like a straight assault than a hostage rescue operation. I have a feeling that hotel staff had more of a role in rescuing people than the police, and I don’t understand why they didn’t use a ladder with a hose on the end or a water cannon to fight the fires. it could have been done remotely in safety. Any reaction by the militants would have revealed them to snipers, if they had put spotters and snipers in place, which doesn’t seem likely at this point.
India is yelling about Pakistan when they allowed a pirated vessel to sail into their port unchallenged and drop off at least some of the attackers. That is pretty damn sloppy work.