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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: KLP who wrote (34966)	3/16/2004 10:18:53 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 793917

from Mideast on Target. To the point, I thought: The Spanish Fly by Elliot Chodoff The election victory of the opposition Socialist Party in Spain three days after the terrorist bombings in Madrid, is a victory for global terrorism with dire potential consequences for the rest of the Western democracies. It matters not at all that the leaders of the incumbent Popular Party contributed to their own defeat by prematurely blaming the Basque separatist ETA for the attack, damaging their own credibility in the last days before the election. Equally unimportant is the fact that the election was the legitimate expression of Spanish popular will. Democracies, leaders and electorate alike, can make decisions which may be perfectly legitimate but carry a potentially heavy price tag to themselves and others alike. It doesn’t even matter much whether the Socialists pursue a global antiterror policy as they promise or become soft in the fight against terrorists ( and given the Socialists’ claims that the war in Iraq is imperialist aggression, we would bet on the latter). The terrorists’ coordinated attack in Spain earlier this week was a concerted effort to achieve a multiple level victory: high casualties in a country which supports US policy, with a special interest to Islam, and in a sensitive period in its domestic affairs. A sufficient number of bombs was set to guarantee a shocking, tragic outcome even if they didn’t all detonate. With the explosions, the terrorists achieved their first objective, high casualties, and this permitted them to declare a demonstrative, symbolic victory. Spain, which in addition to being a Westtern European democracy, is still considered by the Islamic World to be Muslim land, was successfully attacked. To this historical constant was added the correct assertion that an American ally had been struck a painful blow. But the real terrorist victory is in the perception, which will be skillfully manipulated, that Western democracies can be politically influenced by successful terrorism. No matter what the true reasons were for the Socialist victory, terrorists will be able to credibly claim to their supporters and potential recruits that their attacks have changed the course of Spanish government. This will translate into redoubled efforts to exert control over other democratic nations, not only through changes in government policy, but now through redirecting the national course by changing voting patterns. The value of pre-election terrorist attacks has been enhanced significantly by the Spanish election results, and it is likely that the electorates of other democracies will be forced to pay dearly for the freedoms of Spanish democracy.