The following are a selection of letters received by the World Socialist Web Site on the recent bombings in London.
On “London terror bombings: a political crime”
You are absolutely correct. The atrocities in London are an attack upon the ordinary working people of the city, and in no way help the fight against imperialism or help the masses of the Middle East. They play into the hands of the ruling class. They are a reactionary and useless response to imperialist meddling in the Middle East and Islamic world.
I was appalled (but not surprised) by Tony Blair’s response. These bombings, however destructive of human life, were tiny compared to the destructive power of US and British imperialism in Iraq. When Blair adopted that shocked pose and pretended to be appalled—he is such a bad actor—and condemned those who bombed London, I thought of the massive assault upon Fallujah. The state can always cause far more destruction than any group of terrorists.
Yes, I condemn without hesitation the despicable bombing in London last Thursday. But I also condemn the actions of the British “New Labour” government whose slavish backing for President Bush has created the atmosphere in which such attacks can—and do—take place.
PF
United Kingdom
9 July 2005
What a way to steer the “focus” away from the G8 meeting! Bush needed to paper over the Kyoto agreement, and let the Africa “problem” fade into the background. Now, it’s fight against the enemies of freedom time, once again.
It is well known that there is no way to fight terror, unless you reach the ideological causes of the discontent, if there is one, and solve the problem at the source.
We need a profound investigation of this event, with a public trial of those eventually found responsible. We must not let the US media create yet another fictitious enemy, unless proof positive is provided in open court.
DV
Atlanta, Georgia
8 July 2005
Your analysis of the London bombings echoed my thoughts exactly. In a world that is becoming ever more disenchanted with the war in Iraq and the so-called war on terror, it is critically important to look at these well-placed, well-timed “terror” incidents and figure out who profits the most from them. Regardless of who actually carries out the attack, the blame lies squarely with those (like the US and English governments) who exploit and manipulate these events for their own purposes: to further their imperialist goals around the world and to line their pockets with the returns from the billions of dollars they are “investing” in the war/“rehabilitation” efforts.
SP
8 July 2005
Your article is perfectly said, including what you said and did not say. Later we’ll pause and think of those who live with these horrors on a daily or weekly basis, where bombings are routine, where “collateral damage” is constant, where hospitals are crowded with youngsters who will never own their god-given arm. Again, thanks for a great analysis and commentary.
WB
Fresno, California
8 July 2005
I applaud your immediate and unequivocal condemnation of the terrorist attack in London as a “political crime.” It is indeed a crime, and not only against its innocent victims, but also against the rising voices of protest contesting the terror perpetrated by a desperate ruling class in Iraq and Afghanistan. Those on the left like Respect’s George Galloway, who explain the actions of terrorists as a meaningful response to ruling class violence, a retribution for Fallujah for instance, are playing into the hands of the ruling class and derailing the growing class-based people’s movement that poses the only real threat the G8 gang fears in their Gleneagles fortress.
In fact, I am almost certain that, once again, the fingerprint of the authorities will be found all over this crime scene, for it is very easy to raise a small group of fanatics and arm them with terrorist weapons by any interested government, just as pirates were once used when ships, not cars and trains, were the means of transportation.
It’s a sad, but very old story. In 1880, the terrorists of Narodnaya Volya (People’s Will) plotted a series of terrorist acts based on a letter they received from an anarchist, Nechayev, in jail. For years, Nechayev had peddled the illusion that he had a mass organization of the Al Qaeda variety. He had his own terrorist manual, “The Revolutionary Catechism,” and a great many foolish people, Bakunin not excluded, were caught up in his schemes to their ruin. Folks who don’t learn from history commit a crime too—against their own cause.
Thank you for your principled stand.
AL
Toronto, Canada
8 July 2005
Now would be a good time to read Trotsky’s essay, “Why Marxists Oppose Individual Terrorism”. In these violent days, let us remember that terrorism will never win people to the cause. It is backwards, unthinking and cruel.
CMS
Portland, Oregon
7 July 2005
On “Unanswered questions in London bombings”
Thanks for an intelligent and well-written article. Like you, I see that the London bombings play into the hands of those seeking further militarization of the UK and the US. A “cui bono?” (“Who benefits?”) analysis of the attacks can only lead to the conclusion that no sane Muslim resistance organization would have perpetrated these attacks.
Over the past couple of years, I’ve begun an organized study of state-sponsored terrorism and false flag operations. There are some tantalizing leads along these lines in the matter of the 7/7 bombings.
Perhaps the most important of these, so far, is the admission by a Visor Consultants security executive who stated that there was an “exercise” being run at the very location of the bombings on 7/7. This story has not spread to the mainstream media, probably for obvious reasons.
If you can find out anything more about this exercise and how it relates to your other investigative work, I’d very much like a head’s up. And perhaps so would your other readers of the WSWS. Thanks for your interest in this matter.
RD
Bend, Oregon
11 July 2005
My immediate reaction to last Saturday’s “intelligence,” regarding Birmingham’s security alert, astonished and disturbed even me. I did not trust it. However hard I tried, the haunting faces of Dr. David Kelly and Princess Diana could not be erased from my mind—and this came as quite a shock to my nervous system.
I trust no one in “intelligence,” with intelligence, to tell me the truth anymore—and I am not alone. Humanity needs brains it can trust—the brains of “intelligence” are those I can no longer trust.
RS
West Sussex, England
11 July 2005
On “At least 50 dead in London bombings”
The bombing is too much from the side of the terrorists as it will not help them alleviate the brutality of imperialist powers like the US and Britain. On the other hand, it might give them an opportunity to justify what they are doing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Instead of seeing it as an assault on Muslims, we should see what the imperialists are doing as against human beings. We will have to see it as a political imperialism and find out a political solution, not a religious one.
SN
Kerala, India
10 July 2005