Belgian Raid Kills 2, Said To Avert "Major Terrorist Attacks"

As reported by CNN, Reuters, and other outlets, a raid in the Belgian city of Verviers -- one of several counter-terrorism actions in the country today -- ended in the death of two men, and the capture of a third, who are said to have been planning imminent acts of violence akin to the ones earlier this month in France. From Reuters' coverage: Coming a week after Islamist gunmen killed 17 people in Paris, the incident heightened fears across Europe of young local Muslims returning radicalised from Syria. But prosecutors' spokesman Eric Van Der Sypt said the Belgian probe had been under way before the Jan. 7 attack on French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo. ... Describing events in the quiet provincial town just after dark, he said: "The suspects immediately and for several minutes opened fire with military weaponry and handguns on the special units of the federal police before they were neutralised." ... Earlier in the day, prosecutors said they had detained a man in southern Belgium whom they suspected of supplying weaponry to Amedy Coulibaly, killer of four people at a Paris Jewish grocery after the Charlie Hebdo attack. After the violence in Verviers, La Meuse newspaper quoted an unidentified police officer saying: "We've averted a Belgian Charlie Hebdo."

Comments

Re: And they may have.

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you not notice the part where the third wasn't killed?

Re:Prepare for more

[Anonymous Coward]

And to give you an example you might understand, last week, Islamists killed 2,000 people in Nigeria.

Remind me, how many people has the Westboro Baptist Church killed?

Re:Prepare for more

[HBI]

OK, let's be clear about something here. Hirohito was not an absolute ruler, but he had a lot of clout and the people in the Japanese council were eager to spare him the task of making decisions. Also, they feared for their own status after a surrender. It is of note that ultimately, he was the one who announced to the Japanese people that it was time to lay down their arms. So he did have authority and could have chosen to wield it at any time. It is clear that the atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima shocked the Japanese, but only the second strike at Nagasaki caused them to sue for peace. In this, both the ruling clique and Hirohito himself can be blamed for sitting on their asses and letting their people get firebombed (whether conventionally or atomically) for too long.

That said, the bombs came along with the Soviet invasion of Manchuria and Korea...never forget that that happened almost simultaneously. Truman's decision to drop bombs when he did was partially politically motivated inasmuch as there was an imminent plan for the Soviets to invade Hokkaido, the most northerly Japanese home island. This would have entitled the Soviets to an occupation zone in Tokyo and Japan, and we might have spoken later of "communist North Japan" and "South Japan".

Then, there was the lack of desire to let MacArthur wrap himself in glory in the invasion of Japan itself. Never mind the hundreds of thousands (or millions) of casualties expected.

It was important to the US for Japan to surrender exactly when Japan did, and no later. The answer is never as simple and black and white as we would like.