Fact: Bank robbing and kidnapping are usually local problems, dealt with by local police forces. Fact: I seriously doubt Bin Laden was cowering in a room because the FBI were looking for him. Fact: The above post is nonsense. Terrorism =/= bank robbery or kidnapping
Great news As others have said, it won't be the end of Al-Qaeda and it probably will cause an attempted backlash from the terrorists, but overall this does seem great news from a symbolic point of view.
When I say "idea" I mean the personal idea that people perceive him to represent. Not specifically Al-Qaeda. Believe me, I know there are plenty of people ready to fill his shoes and kill people. It's kind of my job. I'm not naive. You're just assuming they are happy he's dead and celebrating it. I'm not denying the fact that many are very happy he's dead, though. Whereas I'm assuming they are happy that they feel they can put a terrible moment in time behind them(a little piece of it anyway). Or they just feel that justice has been served. Thus celebrating. I'm just saying there is some disconnect mentally between the death of a human and justice being served. It's not like they are cheering at a lynching...
On interesting thing is, what is this going to mean for the budgets that were placed to capture terrorists, with osama gone there's no public face. Osama has been used to stir the people the last decade, giving rise to a lot of private donors that want to find Osama, with him gone they are going to disappear, making it just a little easier for the terrorists to operate. The same goes the other way however, with Osama having many followers that donated to terrorism as a support to him personally. are these going to vanish as well? This is going to have quite a bit of long term consequences that are impossible to judge at this point.
Celebrations are a bit tasteless, for sure, but this man epitomised Islamist hatred of the United States for the better part of the last decade. When (and yes, on this auspicious occasion Godwin's Law has taken a break) the world found out that Adolf Hitler had shot himself there were street parties across the UK. They weren't just celebrating his death, they were celebrating what must surely herald a serious setback to the enemy in the war - much as this death will surely prove a setback to the Al Qaeda 'brand' and hopefully hasten the end of the War on Terror. Interesting to have buried the body at sea, though. I would have thought just a little bit of evidence should be available sometime soon...
Are you inshock with this. I we all knew this in the first place and I'm sure there is a lot more there as well. They most probably all playing cards and gambling there too. My only problem with this who gave him the money and the power in the first place we always forget this. Politics is a dangerous game. We have to remember there is good and bad in every country in the world. Terrorism is a cowards way though and they deserve what they get but they are played by the super powers of this world and a lot of us are too proud to accept this fact Terrorism will never stop, because of the way these so called super power countries are playing them
It is also worth noting that a lot of Osama's popularity and 'cult status' was the fact he gave up a life of wealth and comfort to live a life of poverty and hardship while fighting for Islam. It is rather ironic he was found living comfortably in a purpose built compound/mansion in the middle of a city. I doubt that it will bother his followers though.
You know, that argument would have sounded so much more powerful if you had said: Fact: since then we have had no more kidnappings/bank robberies. Apparently people are still willing to try their luck --even when the odds are obviously crap. And Cei is right: terrorism is a very different game. Its objective is not to take the money and try to get away with it, but to stay engaged in the conflict. Think of it as an extreme form of attention seeking, like serial killers do. For them, the chase is actually part of the game and the thrill. They want the whole cat-and-mouse game. For a terrorist leader, his worst nightmare is if people stop looking for him. Terrorism has a lousy retirement plan.
One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. Governments have short memories but they are nothing if not pragmatic. Bin Laden was once the enemy of our enemy, and hence our friend.
Pics or it didn't happen! But seriously, DNA or it didn't happen. Supposedly they did take some but they confirmed his identifiy through 'facial recognition techniques': SEAL grunt:"Sarge. is that Bin Laden?" SEAL sarge:"Is he an a-rab?" SEAL grunt:"Sir yes sir!" SEAL sarge:"Does he have a beard?" SEAL grunt:"Sir yes sir!" SEAL sarge:"Does he have a towl on his head?" SEAL grunt:"Sir yes sir!" SEAL sarge:"Then shoot that a-rab in the face, it's Bin Laden!" But seriously again, there's a lot here that doesn't add up. The first thing being that the American special forces/intelligence agencies managed to carry out an operation of this kind without blowing their cover.
What else can we make an exception on? Torture? Sure, why not. Right to a speedy trial? OK Being able to put any one in jail forever because they president says so? Sounds like a good idea International law? Yeah, defiantly need an exception to that one. The law exists not to protect us from terrorists (nothing can do that), but to protect us from our own worst instincts. When we start making exceptions we hurt only ourselves. Terrorists cannot destroy our society, only we can do that and so far I would say we've done a damn fine job of it.
I'm obviously glad that he's no longer a threat, but I think the active celebration of anyone's death is wrong. Bit worrying the response of a couple of american based forums I'm on.
I wonder if the guy who shot him now has it on his cv. If this had happened just after 9/11 it would have had more effect. Almost 10 years on he has not had an active roll for some time other than a few videos. I just wonder what the retaliation might be.
I don't much care, to be honest. The only thing that it'll do is make Obama's re-election campaign easier, and get a replacement for Osama that isn't six foot tall, on dialysis and damn near dead without the assistance of bullets. Won't make any difference, really.
Now this is a bit worrying read on :- http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...-chemical-and-nuclear-attack-on-the-West.html
Just the other day I was reading something about a few years back when some other al Qaeda guy said if OBL was ever captured or killed they'd detonate a nuclear bomb in Europe. Im sure they cant actually pull that off though As has been mentioned though there might be some retaliation from al Qaeda. Anyway glad to see the mother****er finally got what he deserved.
