Terrorist attack in Paris

[StrangeSox]

You don't actually need to do any of that i.e. Boston Marathon bombings, Ft. Hood shooting. Nobody needs to go to Syria at any point or even leave the US, and more likely they'll self-recruit than be recruited by ISIS (or various other radical groups). You don't need to be very highly trained in using a gun when you're shooting up a crowded theater with no regard for your own life, either (e.g. multiple domestic mass shooters/terrorists at black churches, movie theaters, college campuses).

Edited November 17, 2015 by StrangeSox

[Jenksismyhero]

Honestly, this annoys me very much. The US is a very important and influential global policy player. If the US refuses to come to bat because of our enhanced risk-aversion to violence-via-terrorism (vs our incredible risk-acceptance to every other form of violence), while the problem escalates to crisis for our allies, what standing would we have to ask for any assistance the next time we need their resouces, or airspace, or bases? It's so shortsighted.

 

Are you kidding me? We should accept an increased risk of harm so other countries know we're there with them? Pretty sure 9/11 was a good starting point to the "hey they hate us and want to kill us to!" club. We started the damn club.

[StrangeSox]

I'm seeing bunch of PR language there and not much substance. Seems to me the process is essentially the same - take down information, vet it on the databases we have, do interviews, and that's that. Again, no stopping anyone that doesn't have much of a record to check back at home (how good can that be in a country in the midst of a civil war for 4-5 years now?) and who is now on a mission to come here and either recruit or commit acts on his/her own.

 

Your entire evaluation of the State Department's refugee review process is based on a few sentences in an article from Time. Your understanding may not be comprehensive.

 

Even if it's a 1% increased risk, it's dumb to do it. It's got nothing to do with xenophobia. It's just smart.

 

Focusing on Syrian refugees fleeing ISIS when the attackers were a bunch of Europeans is pretty dumb and xenophobic.

 

After 9/11 we didn't decide against more airline security by arguing "Well there are easier ways to kill people than stealing plans and flying them into buildings!" It was a known risk (much like Syria is now the center of Islamic terrorism) that we acted on. It made sense to do so, as a precaution. Over time can that and should that change? Sure. I don't have a problem with it right now.

 

Hardening airplane cockpits didn't come at the cost of human suffering. The rest is largely security theater that has been exposed multiple times mainly due to luck/attacker incompetence (shoe and underwear bombers).

[StrangeSox]

Are you kidding me? We should accept an increased risk of harm so other countries know we're there with them? Pretty sure 9/11 was a good starting point to the "hey they hate us and want to kill us to!" club. We started the damn club.

 

Are you willing to accept the increased risk of harm of allowing any foreigners into the country? What makes Syrian refugees more of a threat than French and Belgian nationals?

[EvilMonkey]

It was fake, they even know it was made in Turkey.

The passport was fake, but he was finger printed at a refugee entry point. So the terrorist, with a fake passport, was playing the part of a refugee. The validity of the passport is moot, a terrorist used it to get into Europe.

[Jenksismyhero]

Your entire evaluation of the State Department's refugee review process is based on a few sentences in an article from Time. Your understanding may not be comprehensive.

 

 

 

Focusing on Syrian refugees fleeing ISIS when the attackers were a bunch of Europeans is pretty dumb and xenophobic.

 

What the heck are you basing your total trust on? Have you been reading the vetting process manual? We don't know the details at all. And i'm saying there are complete unknowns that NO program could find.

 

And Syria is the epicenter of Islamic terrorism at the moment, is it not? Just like people trying to board planes and blow them up was/is after 9/11. It makes sense to key in on certain people/situations in the moment. Refugees from Japan or whatever don't really fit the profile of people we're concerned about in 2015 from a national security perspective.

 

Hardening airplane cockpits didn't come at the cost of human suffering. The rest is largely security theater that has been exposed multiple times mainly due to luck/attacker incompetence (shoe and underwear bombers).

 

I don't disagree about the theater, but at the start it was a pretty reasonable and understandable change given the circumstances. We didn't argue "there are easier ways to kill us!" as a reason not enhance security to try to make sure it doesn't happen again. It would have been stupid to NOT make security changes.

Edited November 17, 2015 by Jenksismybitch

[bmags]

Are you kidding me? We should accept an increased risk of harm so other countries know we're there with them? Pretty sure 9/11 was a good starting point to the "hey they hate us and want to kill us to!" club. We started the damn club.

 

US Foreign Policy is very active and often creates refugees, refusing to accept any is cowardly and shortsighted. Those countries also took an "increased risk" in offering soldiers in harms way. We are taking screened refugees that are highly unlikely to be a risk.

[StrangeSox]

What the heck are you basing your total trust on? Have you been reading the vetting process manual? We don't know the details at all. And i'm saying there are complete unknowns that NO program could find.

 

I think that the State Department is competent enough to spot ISIS agents. If they aren't, it's a moot point because they can flood in through so many points that being concerned about a relatively tiny number of refugees in a flood of foreigners regularly coming into the country is silly.

 

And Syria is the epicenter of Islamic terrorism at the moment, is it not? Just like people trying to board planes and blow them up was/is after 9/11. It makes sense to key in one certain people/situations in the moment. Refugees from Japan or whatever don't really fit the profile of people we're concerned about in 2015 from a national security perspective.

 

Always reacting to the last tactic actually seems like a really bad idea from a security perspective.

 

The people who carried out the attacks in France were mainly French and Belgian nationals. Why shouldn't we focus on them instead of categorically denying refugees flying Islamic terrorism?

 

I don't disagree about the theater, but at the start it was a pretty reasonable and understandable change given the circumstances. We didn't argue "there are easier ways to kill us!" as a reason not enhance security to try to make sure it doesn't happen again. It would have been stupid to NOT make security changes.

 

Making those security changes didn't come at the cost of denying thousands of refugees fleeing civil war and terrorism.

[Jenksismyhero]

I think that the State Department is competent enough to spot ISIS agents. If they aren't, it's a moot point because they can flood in through so many points that being concerned about a relatively tiny number of refugees in a flood of foreigners regularly coming into the country is silly.

 

I trust the State Dept as much as I trust Homeland Security. Will they do their jobs the vast majority of the time? Yes. Will they find everything? Are their processes fool proof? No.

 

 

Always reacting to the last tactic actually seems like a really bad idea from a security perspective.

 

"There are easier ways to come into the country so let's ignore this one" is also a pretty bad idea from a security perspective. Assuming that people X, Y and Z are minimal risks is a pretty bad idea from a security perspective.

 

The people who carried out the attacks in France were mainly French and Belgian nationals. Why shouldn't we focus on them instead of categorically denying refugees flying Islamic terrorism?

 

I sure hope we're doing both.

 

Making those security changes didn't come at the cost of denying thousands of refugees fleeing civil war and terrorism.

 

Again, this would be more persuasive if these people would be dead tomorrow if we didn't allow them in. But they're not. And putting the program on hold in the short term isn't going to create a humanitarian crisis.

[StrangeSox]

"There are easier ways to come into the country so let's ignore this one" is also a pretty bad idea from a security perspective. Assuming that people X, Y and Z are minimal risks is a pretty bad idea from a security perspective.

 

No, it's a matter of "let's not pretend that nothing is being done and refugees come here freely with no checks." Refugees go through a more stringent check than any other entrant. They pose much less of a risk than other groups.

 

 

Again, this would be more persuasive if these people would be dead tomorrow if we didn't allow them in. But they're not. And putting the program on hold in the short term isn't going to create a humanitarian crisis.

 

 

It's already a years-long humanitarian crisis. Putting it on hold for bad reasons will cause real harm.

 

edit:

 

I sure hope we're doing both.

 

We don't have a bunch of governors calling for a travel ban on all people traveling with French and Belgian passports.

Edited November 17, 2015 by StrangeSox

[Soxbadger]

No one can ever tell the future, but if we look at our past the US has already made grave mistakes with regard to refugees at a time of war.

 

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007094

 

Once the United States entered World War II, the State Department practiced stricter immigration policies out of fear that refugees could be blackmailed into working as agents for Germany.

 

Its really up to each of us to determine whether we want to let fear motivate us into changing who we are. To me this isnt about refugees, its about the idea that we are making a change because of our fear.

 

There is nothing wrong with the other belief, I just personally am not going to give into their attempts to change me due to fear.

[StrangeSox]

'Thorough' refugee screening puts Canada at low security risk, says former refugee official

 

The US process is similar to what he describes for the Canadian process

But those familiar with the refugee resettlement process say the concerns are unwarranted. With thorough security screening, potential terrorists are unlikely to be able to enter the country along with asylum seekers.

 

PS: Well, the government has already said that they would be coming primarily, if not exclusively, from three countries: Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey. These are refugees who are either located in camps and that would be particularly in Jordan and Turkey, or in Lebanon, although they are scattered throughout the country, they are registered refugees with UNHCR. We know who these people are and we know when they fled Syria.

 

CO: And how do we know who these people are?

 

 

PS: We know it several ways. For the 25,000, we can identify a lot of refugees who clearly would not fall within the ISIS or Sunni extremist category. The starting point for that would be children and secondly women, particularly women who are now heads of single household families. There are a lot in that position. Secondly, we know a significant number who were the most severe victims of that violence and fled early. Lastly, we know the ones, particularly the ones that fled three and four years ago, when that conflict first started. Some of the first victims who fled were primarily urban, professional, middle-class, who were secular. They were pro-democratic and they opposed the dictatorship of Mr. Assad.

 

PS: It may be modified slightly for this humanitarian program, but what happens now is first of all the United Nations High Commission for Refugees does a major triage and selects people that possibly are available for resettlement. Let me emphasize that's about two to three per cent of the refugees that are there. They primarily look for vulnerability but they also, of course, exclude certain categories of people that might come within what they would call 'exclusion activities.' To put it in English, ones that might have been involved in any way in the conflict itself.

 

That's the first thing they do and then they interview them. Then they refer them to a visa officer who does a one-hour interview and that's where the officer tries to assure himself or herself that the story of the person in front of them is consistent with the story in the file. The third phase of that process is where they are referred for formal security review. That's where their names are run through the databases of the RCMP, of CSIS, of Canada Border Services Agency and other international databases. What would be different, I'm anticipating although it has not been announced yet by the government, is that they will be far more careful with the categories of the person. Less focus on vulnerability and making sure that they will fall into categories of people that from the ground view would have nothing to do with any of the extremist Sunni organization.

 

[Big Hurtin]

2 Air France flights diverted after bomb threats (to Salt Lake City and Halifax). It's not yet known if threats are were credible.

[Swingandalongonetoleft]

2 Air France flights diverted after bomb threats (to Salt Lake City and Halifax). It's not yet known if threats are were credible.

Doubt it. There was another incident on a Spirit Airlines flight from Baltimore to Chicago; a woman saw a middle eastern looking guy watching the news on his phone before takeoff and she "like literally thought that the plane was like gonna blow up, it was like the scariest moment of her life."

Plane turned back to the gate, the passenger and (presumably) those he was travelling with were escorted off the plane by police, and the flight was delayed for 3 hours as passengers and luggage were re-screened. The 4 passengers were questioned and released after it was concluded that watching the news on one's smart phone was unlikely to take an airplane out.

 

After something like Paris happens, people take on this sheep mentality that anyone or anything might be a terrorist out to get them- for some reason this is amplified if you throw air travel into the equation. Obviously people who look even remotely middle eastern (whether they are or not) are the primary beneficiaries of this mindset, but even that tree over there looks like it's up to no good, better keep an eye on it in case it's a terrorist!

 

This is an example of the terrorists winning. It's pathetic.

Edited November 18, 2015 by Swingandalongonetoleft

[EvilMonkey]

Doubt it. There was another incident on a Spirit Airlines flight from Baltimore to Chicago; a woman saw a middle eastern looking guy watching the news on his phone before takeoff and she "like literally thought that the plane was like gonna blow up, it was like the scariest moment of her life."

Plane turned back to the gate, the passenger and (presumably) those he was travelling with were escorted off the plane by police, and the flight was delayed for 3 hours as passengers and luggage were re-screened. The 4 passengers were questioned and released after it was concluded that watching the news on one's smart phone was unlikely to take an airplane out.

 

After something like Paris happens, people take on this sheep mentality that anyone or anything might be a terrorist out to get them- for some reason this is amplified if you throw air travel into the equation. Obviously people who look even remotely middle eastern (whether they are or not) are the primary beneficiaries of this mindset, but even that tree over there looks like it's up to no good, better keep an eye on it in case it's a terrorist!

 

This is an example of the terrorists winning. It's pathetic.

Well, I seem to recall a government slogan, "See something, say something". Some people take that literally.

[RockRaines]

Well, I seem to recall a government slogan, "See something, say something". Some people take that literally.

Its not like bystanders have ever thwarted a terrorist attack or anything before..

[StrangeSox]

All middle-eastern men watching things on their phones are obviously suspicious and possible terrorists.

[Jenksismyhero]

Doubt it. There was another incident on a Spirit Airlines flight from Baltimore to Chicago; a woman saw a middle eastern looking guy watching the news on his phone before takeoff and she "like literally thought that the plane was like gonna blow up, it was like the scariest moment of her life."

Plane turned back to the gate, the passenger and (presumably) those he was travelling with were escorted off the plane by police, and the flight was delayed for 3 hours as passengers and luggage were re-screened. The 4 passengers were questioned and released after it was concluded that watching the news on one's smart phone was unlikely to take an airplane out.

 

After something like Paris happens, people take on this sheep mentality that anyone or anything might be a terrorist out to get them- for some reason this is amplified if you throw air travel into the equation. Obviously people who look even remotely middle eastern (whether they are or not) are the primary beneficiaries of this mindset, but even that tree over there looks like it's up to no good, better keep an eye on it in case it's a terrorist!

 

This is an example of the terrorists winning. It's pathetic.

 

So the best course of action is to not do anything and pretend this stuff doesn't happen/doesn't exist, right? I mean I agree with you to a point, people overreact. But when it comes to things like air travel, where hundreds of lives are at risk, i'm fine with people being overly cautious. It's been proven over and over again that the TSA basically sucks at what they do (http://www.today.com/news/can-tsa-find-hid...dercover-t56626), so I'll happily take an extra citizen-response that may avert a disaster.

Edited November 18, 2015 by Jenksismybitch

[StrangeSox]

I wonder how long you'd appreciate that "extra citizen-response" if you were the one being dragged off of your flight for questioning because you were watching the news on your phone.

 

The best course of action is to stop the collective pants-wetting. Having a plane brought back to the gate because someone was watching TV while being brown is not "being overly cautious," it's being hysterically paranoid.

[Jenksismyhero]

I wonder how long you'd appreciate that "extra citizen-response" if you were the one being dragged off of your flight for questioning because you were watching the news on your phone.

 

The best course of action is to stop the collective pants-wetting. Having a plane brought back to the gate because someone was watching TV while being brown is not "being overly cautious," it's being hysterically paranoid.

 

Unlike you my concern over offending someone doesn't trump my concern for my own safety and the safety of my family. You may be right and she may have completely overreacted, I don't know, I didn't see what she saw. However, I'd still rather be safe than sorry and that's the mentality we should all have.

[OmarComing25]

Even if ISIS started successfully pulling off attacks in the US, you'd still be much more likely to die driving to work than in a terrorist attack. Precautions are good, but you have to draw the line somewhere.

[Big Hurtin]

The ones I was talking about were apparently clean. The threats though, were external. Basically the traditional bomb scare, i.e. there's a bomb at / on such-and-such.

[StrangeSox]

Your concern for your safety should be rational and reasonable. Just by getting on a plane, getting into your car this morning or walking down the street, you're taking a far greater risk than your potential to be killed by Islamic terrorists. If you have a gun in your house, the risk that poses is exponentially higher than the risk of being killed by ISIS. There are so many bigger risk factors in your life that you accept on a daily basis.

 

Jumping at every shadow or every possibly middle eastern person is terrible both for yourself and for the targets of your paranoia. It is reacting exactly how ISIS wants people to react, and it makes for very poor decision-making, policy and strategy. We shouldn't accept, as a society, that any middle eastern person can be singled out as a "potential terrorist" every time someone else wets their pants with unfounded fear. We should not all have the mentality that merely looking middle eastern is cause enough for suspicion. That's stupid and paranoid, not safe.

[Swingandalongonetoleft]

So the best course of action is to not do anything and pretend this stuff doesn't happen/doesn't exist, right? I mean I agree with you to a point, people overreact. But when it comes to things like air travel, where hundreds of lives are at risk, i'm fine with people being overly cautious. It's been proven over and over again that the TSA basically sucks at what they do (http://www.today.com/news/can-tsa-find-hid...dercover-t56626), so I'll happily take an extra citizen-response that may avert a disaster.

The TSA is definitely a problem. There are many lines of work out there that won't let gross incompetence and general ineptitude stop you from having a long and successful career; the TSA should not be one of them in this day and age. But we're in for a hell of a time if any dumb b**** can turn a plane around because all the tarrists are playing Angry Birds on their iPhones.

[Jenksismyhero]

Your concern for your safety should be rational and reasonable. Just by getting on a plane, getting into your car this morning or walking down the street, you're taking a far greater risk than your potential to be killed by Islamic terrorists. If you have a gun in your house, the risk that poses is exponentially higher than the risk of being killed by ISIS. There are so many bigger risk factors in your life that you accept on a daily basis.

 

True, but in those situations, i'm generally in control of what happens. In a plane or on a train i'm at the mercy of what other people do or don't do. I can live with the results when it's based mostly on my choice.

 

Jumping at every shadow or every possibly middle eastern person is terrible both for yourself and for the targets of your paranoia. It is reacting exactly how ISIS wants people to react, and it makes for very poor decision-making, policy and strategy. We shouldn't accept, as a society, that any middle eastern person can be singled out as a "potential terrorist" every time someone else wets their pants with unfounded fear. We should not all have the mentality that merely looking middle eastern is cause enough for suspicion. That's stupid and paranoid, not safe.

 

So basically the "if you see something, say something" mantra is a bunch of nonsense and we shouldn't do anything. That's what you're saying here. The terrorists have won! because we're more aware of our surroundings and we think slightly different now than we did 30 years ago. If brown people were being reported 100 times a day, I would agree with you. But those events of people being wrongly suspected of something are rare. It's not some huge epidemic. After basically all these attacks over the years, nothing in my day to day life has changed, and it's the same for 99.9% of people out there.