Explosions in London

Sir Auros · Post by **Sir Auros** » Fri Jul 08, 2005 3:31 pm

This is even worse than all the hotels gouging hurricane victims in Florida last year.

angloconvoy · Post by **angloconvoy** » Fri Jul 08, 2005 5:17 pm

Originally posted by The HeartBrend Kid
Don't get all emotional, dude. The extent of my concern was that next weekend's piss-up would be a bit of a damp squib if one of us were dead...

Is it next week already? and you're actually able to make it this time? yay!

Post by **Denyer** » Sat Jul 09, 2005 8:54 pm

http://www.livejournal.com/users/tyrell/154027.html

Chromia · Post by **Chromia** » Sun Jul 10, 2005 2:21 am

Originally posted by Sir Auros
This is even worse than all the hotels gouging hurricane victims in Florida last year.

That's disgusting! Well, hopefully when this is all over, they might find business going elsewhere.....

Xille · Post by **Xille** » Sun Jul 10, 2005 5:32 am

Originally posted by Denyer
http://www.livejournal.com/users/tyrell/154027.html

Fantastic quotes there. Thanks for the link.

Jonin · Post by **Jonin** » Sun Jul 10, 2005 9:44 pm

In the event folks here haven't heard this bit of news yet...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/4668313.stm

Birmingham threat 'real' - police
Aston University
Hundreds of people spent the night at Aston University
Thousands evacuated from Birmingham city centre faced "a real and very credible threat", West Midlands Chief Constable Paul Scott Lee has said.

Mr Scott Lee declined to describe the nature of the threat but said intelligence indicated it was genuine.

He said the decision to evacuate up to 20,000 people from the city centre had not been taken lightly and came after a "very specific threat".

The city centre has now fully reopened to the public.

Four suspect packages were blown up but Mr Scott Lee said they had nothing to do with the intelligence warnings.

The people of Birmingham were in danger last night
West Midlands Chief Constable Paul Scott Lee

"The threat that we responded to was very specific," he said at a news conference. "It was specific about the time and also the locations."

West Midlands Police put up an exclusion cordon around the A38 inner city ring road after the warnings were received.

Mr Scott Lee said: "Bearing in mind the current world climate, the public's safety is our absolute priority," he said. "We haven't had this level of threat before (in Birmingham).

"The people of Birmingham were in danger last night."

Hundreds of people left stranded by the evacuation stayed at Aston University overnight.

At 0500 BST on Sunday bomb disposal experts declared that a suspect package at the Travelodge hotel on Broad Street was not a "credible device".

Police carried out four controlled explosions on a bus in Corporation Street, in the city centre.

The areas cordoned off included the Broad Street entertainment district and the city's Chinese quarter which are crowded with bars, theatres, restaurants, flats and hotels.

Police divert traffic from Birmingham city centre
Traffic was not allowed into the city centre

Speaking on the BBC's News 24 Sunday programme, Home Secretary Charles Clarke praised the response of the police and public in Birmingham.

"There was a serious threat," he said.

"That is why the police acted as they did. I think both the police and the people living in Birmingham acted entirely professionally.

"The police would have been quite wrong if they had ignored the threat which came to them."

West Midlands Police announced they had received intelligence of a possible threat to the area at about 2015 BST.

Initially people were told to be on their guard, and that bars and restaurants were being searched. Motorists were also told not to come into the city centre.

'Fairly normal'

However, about half an hour later, police said the city was to be evacuated.

But on Sunday life was returning to normal in the city centre with shops, bars and restaurants open for business.

A spokesman for the Bullring Shopping Centre told BBC News that he did not think shoppers had been put off from travelling to the area.

"Retailers are all open as normal, people are coming to the centre and the car parks are filling up. It is all fairly normal," he said.

Average figures for people visiting the centre on a Sunday are between 80,000 and 90,000.

I was waiting for something to go on in Birmingham after the London attack, and there it was.
There are some sick people out there that do these sort of things to hurt and kill people, odds are likely high that it was a "Copycat" thing too I figure.

I'm just glad nobody got hurt from this one.

Ultimate Weapon · Post by **Ultimate Weapon** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 4:40 pm

Israelis Knew of London Bombings in Advance

Visiting minister Netanyahu warned away from areas bombed.

British Army Radio quoting unconfirmed reliable sources reported a short time ago that Scotland Yard had intelligence warnings of the attacks a short time before they occurred.

The Israeli Embassy in London was notified in advance, resulting in Finance Minister Binyamin Netanyahu remaining in his hotel room rather than make his way to the hotel adjacent to the site of the first explosion, a Liverpool Street train station, where he was to address and economic summit.

http://www.antiwar.com/blog/index.php?id=P2206

Jetfire · Post by **Jetfire** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 5:09 pm

Originally posted by Ultimate Weapon
Israelis Knew of London Bombings in Advance

Visiting minister Netanyahu warned away from areas bombed.

British Army Radio quoting unconfirmed reliable sources reported a short time ago that Scotland Yard had intelligence warnings of the attacks a short time before they occurred.

http://www.antiwar.com/blog/index.php?id=P2206

So the only site you can get this is a blog which actually says it's a "uncomfirmed source"? You really are stupid.

The Israeli Embassy in London was notified in advance, resulting in Finance Minister Binyamin Netanyahu remaining in his hotel room rather than make his way to the hotel adjacent to the site of the first explosion, a Liverpool Street train station, where he was to address and economic summit.

Your perchant for taking quotes out of context is astonishing.

So the Israeli minister knew of the bombings but was only kept safe after one had gone off.

It's quite clear after a explosion a minister, who comes from a country most targeted by terroism, would be kept safe as protocol. A explosion on the underground is a strange occurance. It doesn't mean they knew in advance but just took it suspiciously as many people naturally did.

Ultimate Weapon · Post by **Ultimate Weapon** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 5:21 pm

Originally posted by Jetfire 2.1
So the only site you can get this is a blog which actually says it's a "uncomfirmed source"?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1438238/posts

It doesn't mean they knew in advance but just took it suspiciously as many people naturally did.

Why did the British public not get the warning?

Post by **inflatable dalek** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 6:29 pm

The Birmingham evacuation was actually quite scary at the time... Though a few explosions would probably do wonders for the architecture.

angloconvoy · Post by **angloconvoy** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 7:24 pm

Originally posted by Ultimate Weapon
Why did the British public not get the warning?

Maybe because we have threats fairly regularly and you can't hugely disrupt the nation on a daily basis. That's when terrorists win.

Disclaimer here being that I haven't read the links, but assuming there's any merit whatsoever in this "warning".

Incidentally, I was in a security alert today at london bridge. As soon as it was done with, you'd never know it'd happened at all. Is no one getting the "we're british" point yet? We're still a stauncher people than you'd think from seeing our mundane day to day.

Halfshell · Post by **Halfshell** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 9:03 pm

Originally posted by angloconvoy
Is no one getting the "we're british" point yet? We're still a stauncher people than you'd think from seeing our mundane day to day.

On a related note, for those with sigs turned off, Denyer's current quote rocks:

"It's hard to panic the British. They've dealt with the Blitz, the IRA, the Silurians, the Zarbi, the Daleks, the Cybermen..."

And anybody whose seen Shaun of the Dead already knows the traditional British approach to a crisis: Go down the pub.

Ultimate Weapon · Post by **Ultimate Weapon** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 9:44 pm

Originally posted by The HeartBrend Kid
On a related note, for those with sigs turned off, Denyer's current quote rocks:

"It's hard to panic the British. They've dealt with the Blitz,

Who started the Blitz?

Between 1940 and 1945, nearly one-hundred German cities with a total population of 25 millions were destroyed or devastated in a bombing campaign initiated by the British government. Destruction on this scale had no other purpose than the indiscriminate mass murder of as many Germans as possible quite regardless of their civilian status. It led to retaliatory bombing resulting in 60,000 British dead and 86,000 injured.

'It is one of the greatest triumphs of modern emotional engineering that, in spite of the plain facts of the case which could never be disguised or even materially distorted, the British public, throughout the Blitz Period (1940- 1941), remained convinced that the entire responsibility for their sufferings rested on the German leaders.' Advance to Barbarism, F.J.P. Veale.

'It may be Inconvenient History but England rather than Germany initiated the murderous slaughter of bombing civilians thus bringing about retaliation. Chamberlain conceded that it was "absolutely contrary to International law." It began in 1940 and Churchill believed it held the secret of victory. He was convinced that raids of sufficient intensity could destroy Germany’s morale, and so his War Cabinet planned a campaign that abandoned the accepted practice of attacking the enemy’s armed forces and, instead made civilians the primary target. Night after night, RAF bombers in ever increasing numbers struck throughout Germany, usually at working class housing, because it was more densley packed.' The Peoples’ War, Angus Calder. London, Jonathan Cape, 1969.

'Hitler only undertook the bombing of British civilian targets reluctantly three months after the RAF had commenced bombing German civilian targets. Hitler would have been willing at any time to stop the slaughter. Hitler was genuinely anxious to reach with Britain an agreement confining the action of aircraft to battle zones. Retaliation was certain if we carried the war into Germany. There was a reasonable possibility that our capital and industrial centres would not have been attacked if we had continued to refrain from attacking those of Germany. We began to bomb objectives on the German mainland before the Germans began to bomb objectives on the British mainland. Because we were doubtful about the psychological effect of propagandist distortion of the truth that it was we who started the strategic bombing offensive, we have shrunk from giving our great decision of May 11th, 1940, the publicity it deserves.' J.M. Spaight, CB, CBE, Principal Secretary to the Air Ministry, Bombing Vindicated.

'The attack on the Ruhr was therefore an informal invitation to the Luftwaffe to bomb London. The primary purpose of these raids was to goad the Germans into undertaking reprisal raids of a similar character on Britain. Such raids would arouse intense indignation in Britain against Germany and so create a war psychosis without which it would be impossible to carry on a modern war.' The Royal Air Force, 1939-1945, The Fight at Odds, p. 122. Dennis Richards, Her Majesty's Stationery Office.

CounterPunch · Post by **CounterPunch** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 9:47 pm

I don't think Brend really meant to discuss the historical accuracies of who started the bombing campaigns in WW2, he was merely quoting an off the cuff remark.

Halfshell · Post by **Halfshell** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 9:50 pm

Originally posted by Ultimate Weapon
Who started the Blitz?

You're a cock.

With too much time on his hands.

And no concept of... well, social skills, by the seems of things.

Galvatron91 · Post by **Galvatron91** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 9:53 pm

Yes UW...we get it, you're a Nazi sympathizer...everyone is aware of this.

What's that...is that a clock I hear ticking away?

Halfshell · Post by **Halfshell** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 9:57 pm

Originally posted by Galvatron91
What's that...is that a clock I hear ticking away?

No, it's a cock ticking you off...

Ultimate Weapon · Post by **Ultimate Weapon** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 9:58 pm

Originally posted by Galvatron91
Yes UW...we get it, you're a Nazi sympathizer...everyone is aware of this.

What's that...is that a clock I hear ticking away?

The blitz was not terrorism! It was retaliation! So I do not see how they can be lumped into the same category!

Galvatron91 · Post by **Galvatron91** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 9:59 pm

Originally posted by Ultimate Weapon
The blitz was not terrorism! It was retaliation! So I do not see how they can be lumped into the same category!

Do you ever possess a basic understanding of real history or do you merely read the "nazi approved" literature?

Ultimate Weapon · Post by **Ultimate Weapon** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 10:01 pm

Originally posted by Galvatron91
Do you ever possess a basic understanding of real history or do you merely read the "nazi approved" literature?

As opposed to the "allied approved" literature? Propaganda works both ways. Besides the quotes I listed are not from Nazis at all.