Spanish Train Bombings Renew Terrorist Threat

March 11, 2004 now joins Sept. 11, 2001 as dates no one now living will ever forget.

The sheer horror of watching the aftermath of 10 separate explosions on the Spanish rail network in Madrid brought home the brutal ferocity that is the face of modern terrorism. Listening to reporters on French television and radio and the BBC trying to make sense of the mass slaughter of innocent commuters made one realize just how nebulous and yet how deadly indiscriminate bombings are.

They aren’t mindless—far from it. Earthquakes and hurricanes are mindless for all their destructive power. They are random events—forces of nature. Mass assassinations are the end product of carefully planned and executed force designed to kill and maim as many people as possible. That’s what the carnage in Madrid brought home to Europe and the rest of the world.

The day started normally enough as all four targeted trains passed through the suburban station of Alcala de Henares within 15 minutes of each other at around 6 a.m. (12 a.m. EST). As each train stopped, investigators say, the bombers loaded rucksacks containing about 22 pounds of explosives onboard.

As the trains approached central Madrid, the destruction began. At 6:39 a.m. (12:39 a.m. EST), as the first train drew to a halt inside Atocha station, three bombs exploded in the third, fourth and sixth cars. At least 34 people were killed and many more wounded. Almost simultaneously, four bombs detonated in the first, fourth and sixth cars of the second train about a quarter of a mile from the station. At least 59 people were killed; more were injured. The train was running two minutes late, and investigating authorities believe the bombers intended to simultaneously detonate the bombs on both trains inside the station to maximize their power and severely damage the building.

Two minutes later another two bombs went off in the fourth and fifth cars of the third train as it passed through El Pozo station, before reaching Atocha. At least 70 people were killed and many more wounded. Approximately a minute later, as the fourth train passed through Santa Eugenia station a bomb exploded in the fourth car, killing at least 17 people and wounding dozens more.

Investigators concluded that the devices were all set off by mobile phones. They subsequently found three more unexploded bombs at the station, which were destroyed. Then they began counting the casualties. So far, 202 people are confirmed dead and more than 1,000 injured, many of them critically. Spanish police have arrested 14 suspects.

While Spain mourned its dead, the rest of the world pondered just what the attacks meant, and what an appropriate response might be. The Spanish electorate responded by throwing the conservative Popular Party out of office after eight years in favor of the Socialists, causing an ongoing controversy, as people asked, why? One answer: “Zapatero [José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero the new Socialist Prime Minister] rode a wave of popular anger at terrorism and the war in Iraq,” said Dana Wright Holland, an American who’s lived in Spain for the past 25 years.

She rejected the idea that by threatening to withdraw Spain’s 1,300-man contingent from Iraq the new government was appeasing the terrorists, as some in Congress and Bush Administration officials have charged. “It’s been [the Socialists’] program for a long time—long before the election. After all, around 90 percent of the Spanish people opposed participating in the war in Iraq,” she added. “Plus [the Conservatives] handling of the war polarized people’s positions. Many of them were afraid the government would use it as an excuse to take away freedoms.”

Spain endured 50 years of right wing dictatorship and that fear should not be underestimated. That reality, combined with early and clumsy attempts by the Popular Party to blame the attacks on Basque separatists, swung voters to the left.

The attacks refocused the collective minds of Europe’s leaders on the fact that they too are faced with real and dangerous threats. British officials even admitted that it was no longer a question of “if” the United Kingdom would be attacked, but “when.”

European Union leaders metin Brussels on March 19 and drafted a proposal to appoint a “czar” to coordinate anti-terrorist activities, including measures to be taken in the security field by ministers of transport, justice, foreign affairs and finance. He would work directly under foreign policy and security chief, Javier Solana, who’s also been asked to draw up proposals on how to improve the sharing of intelligence. The proposals were put to a summit meeting of EU leaders the week of March 22.

Europeans and other allies of the United States throughout the world are right to be concerned. An article in the New York Times (reprinted in the International Herald Tribune) pointed out that the reaction of the Spanish government—for whatever reason—fits into the Islamic militants’ strategy of attacking U.S. allies. Their goal is to increasingly isolate the United States, a task made somewhat easier by the “go it alone” strategy adopted by the Bush Administration when it went to war.

Europeans are convinced—rightly or wrongly—that the United States didn’t have the evidence it said it had concerning Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction. They’re also convinced that the crusade in Iraq has allowed Al Qaeda and allied groups to regroup and reestablish their networks, and they see the post-war reconstruction of Iraq as a fiasco. As a result they’re now faced with increasing threats from terrorists, with an America that is distracted by election year politics and appears more than ever unwilling or unable to assist them in coping with those threats. For the most part they blame the Bush Administration for having ignored any advice that might have prevented the situation, and for having compounded it with a woeful ignorance of what it was getting itself and the rest of the world into.

“The problem in Iraq is that people, who had never had any control over their lives before, are now expected to adjust to governing themselves overnight,” said Paul Dumas, a retired French businessman, who has travelled widely, and knows the United States particularly well.

According to a recently released poll from the Pew Institute, while most Iraqis are glad Saddam’s gone, they still want strong internal leadership. The United States and its handpicked governing council don’t qualify. “You need a ‘régime dirigiste’ [an authoritarian government] like the Chinese,” said Dumas, “and you have to deal through local people.” He pointed out that both the English and the French had done just that during the colonial era, and that it had been a successful strategy—at least until the local people sought more power than either nation was willing to grant.

Almost every country that is “democratic” today in fact went through a period of authoritarian rule before full democracy—free speech, press, universal suffrage, rule of laws, etc., emerged. The United States is possibly unique in escaping the “strong hand.” As Americans took charge of their own affairs relatively early, they have steadfastly resisted attempts at being ordered about ever since.

The world needs the United States now perhaps more than ever, but most democratic countries have reached the point where they too are unwilling to be ordered about. Many see the current administration as having a one-sided national political agenda, a tendency to select the facts it likes and ignore the ones it doesn’t, an untoward bias towards the demands of big business and an unfortunate tendency to make promises it doesn’t keep. They’ve concluded that their own safety is being threatened by U.S. actions, and that they will have to choose their own way of dealing with those threats.

“It’s really a shame,” said Dumas, “that America, with all its capacity, its power and its intelligence doesn’t make better use of it.” Terrorism can never be contained by military action alone, unless the United States, the Europeans and other countries want to become police states. It needs to be fought as a social problem as well, by educating and improving the lives of the impoverished young men and women who are willing to blow themselves up. Asked whether a change in the U.S. administration might improve the situation, Dumas replied: “it certainly couldn’t make it any worse.”

Topics Catastrophe USA Natural Disasters Europe