AZNAR’S DEFEAT: A BLOW TO BUSH’S STRATEGY (Islams' Balkan Connection Resurfaces in Spanish Attacks)

Chronicles Magazine ^ | March 17, 2004 | Srdja Trifkovic

[Gritty]

Five days after a series of bombs exploded on Madrid’s commuter trains killing over 200 people Spanish investigators and Western intelligence agencies are said to be almost certain that Islamic terrorists were to blame for the attacks—and not the Basque separatist group ETA, as the Spanish premier and his interior minister had initially declared.

If the attack was indeed the work of al-Qaida or one of its many affiliates, it was singularly successful in achieving its presumed political objectives. Until the morning of March 11 the Popular Party (PP) government of the outgoing prime minister José Maria Aznar looked poised to win the general election scheduled for March 14. The ruling party’s candidate Mariano Rajoy led most polls and the PP had been projected to win the most seats in the 350-member Congress of Deputies (Cortes), and maybe retain its outright majority.

As soon as the suspected Islamic connection became known, however, the mood of the nation turned violently against Aznar, whose support for President George W. Bush in the war against Iraq—hugely unpopular to start with—came to be seen as the cause of the attack. He was accused not only of having unnecessarily exposed the country to danger but also of cynically accusing ETA and minimizing the Islamic connection—exactly in order to avoid that kind of blame. Demonstrations initially staged to protest the attacks soon turned into anti-government rallies, with protesters in Madrid chanting “Aznar, terrorist.” In Barcelona they carried posters of Aznar flanked by Mr. Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair with the caption “We pay the price!”

The mood swing was reflected on March 14 in the greatest electoral upset since Spain returned to multi-party system in the aftermath of General Franco’s death almost three decades ago. The Socialist Workers’ Party and its radical allies easily won a majority of seats in the Cortes with 43 percent of the vote, to the PP’s 38 percent. El Pais gleefully noted that “voters have savaged the politics of Jose Maria Aznar and his successor Mariano Rajoy has paid the price… the decision to take Spain into the Iraq war [has] been soundly rejected by the electorate.” El Mundo called the outcome “an electoral debacle” for the PP, whose “precipitate action” in blaming the ETA caused many Spaniards to doubt its judgement: “The growing likelihood of al-Qaeda involvement renewed the mistrust over Aznar’s grave error in placing himself under the banner of Bush.” Even the conservative press conceded that a decisive factor in the socialist victory was the perception among many voters that Aznar “compromised us in an unjust war in Iraq in close alliance with the US.”

THE CLUES

The clues implicating Islamic terrorists date back to a videotaped message, apparently from Osama bin Laden and released last October, in which Spain was singled out—together with Britain, Australia, Poland, and Italy—as one of the countries that would be attacked “at the appropriate time and place.” (The CIA says that the tape was probably authentic.) In a subsequent wave of deadly bombings in Morocco the Spanish cultural center in Casablanca was hit with particular ferocity: “there are body parts all over the place,” an eyewitness reported from the scene.

A document in Arabic attributed to al Qaeda, prepared last December and subsequently obtained by El Pais, suggested that the network was planning an attack just before the elections with specific political expectations. The 50-page booklet, Iraq al-Jihad, singled out Spain as the weakest link” in the US-led coalition in Iraq, and claimed that it “could not tolerate more than two or three attacks without having to withdraw its troops from Iraq.”

A day after the Madrid attack an al-Qaida affiliate, the “Brigade of Abu Hafs al-Masri,” claimed responsibility in an e-mail message to the radical London-based weekly Al-Quds al-Arabi. It boasted that the brigade’s “death squad” had penetrated “one of the pillars of the crusader alliance” and carried out what it called Operation Death Trains: “This is part of settling old accounts with Spain, the crusader, and America’s ally in its war against Islam.”

The first official admission of an Islamic angle came last Friday, when Aznar’s Interior Minister Angel Acebes announced that police had found detonators and an Arabic-language audiotape with Quranic verses in a van near a railway station on the outskirts of Madrid.The following day, on the eve of the election, came a video statement claiming to be from al-Qa’eda. It described the Madrid massacre as “a response for your collaboration with the criminals Bush and his allies” and demanded an end to “crimes” in Iraq and Afghanistan. The speaker then called on Spaniards to change their policies: “If you don’t stop your injustices there will be more.”

CUI BONO?

In the past al-Qaeda attacks have not been linked to any obvious short-term political objectives. If the carnage in Madrid was a new departure it has worked: the Socialists are in power now, they were harshly critical of Aznar’s strongly pro-American policy, and they have pledged to withdraw the Spansih contingent of 1,400 soldiers from Iraq. The incoming prime minister, Socialist leader Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, addressing reporters on March 15 left no doubt that Aznar’s “special relationship” with Washington was dead: “My government will maintain cordial relations with all the governments of the world, and of course with the United States,” Zapatero said and reiterated his campaign promise to withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq unless the UN takes charge of the country. Earlier, in a radio interview, Zapatero was scathing about Bush, saying he and Tony Blair should do some “reflection and self-criticism” for the “lies” that led to the Iraq war.

As soon as the news of the Socialist victory reached Washington the Administration warned Spain and other European countries that to waver in the fight against global terrorism would be a “catastrophe,” but Zapatero so far seems unimpressed. Secretary of State Colin Powell said he hoped that Spain’s new leaders would not shrink from our “collective responsibility to go after terrorists wherever they surface.” National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice went a step further by saying that to back down from the fight against terrorism after the Madrid bombs would be to play into the hands of terrorists. She told NBC’s Meet the Press that the world should never fall for “the notion that we would be better off just to sit back” and let the terrorists grow.

The Bush Administration’s fears in this instance are justified: Islamic militants will see the defeat of the Popular Party and the Socialists’ intended withdrawal from Iraq as a victory for their cause that may prompt them to launch more attacks with a short-term political agenda in mind. As a security risk analyst quoted by Reuters pointed out the election upset in Spain will be seen as the first time Islamic militants have toppled a Western government by killing civilians, and that may give them a lot of succour for the future as they plan more attacks.

That the incoming Spanish government has not taken much notice of Washington’s rhetoric was further confirmed by Miguel Angel Moratinos, a former EU Middle East envoy widely expected to be the country’s new foreign minister. On March 15 he declared that Spain’s new priorities will be to restore relations with core Euro-partners, rethink its role in Iraq and leave strategic dialogue with the United States to the EU. He outlined an approach vastly different to the U.S.-centred policy of Aznar. Moratinos told Reuters the international community must acknowledge that the U.S.-led coalition’s policy in Iraq had failed and must change: “We have been very clear about the risk and the threat that we were all facing with this illegal war in Iraq, and unfortunately Spain has paid the price.” Moratinos belittled the idea of a special relationship with the United States, suggesting it had been an illusion. He disputed a suggestion by Polish Prime Minister Leszek Miller that to talk of pulling troops out of Iraq after the train bombings was tantamount to admitting that terrorists were stronger and were right: “We’re not going
to surrender but we want to be much more clever, more sophisticated and more efficient in order to defeat them,” he said.

In other words they’ll surrender. The war in Iraq may have been fought on false pretenses and for all the wrong reasons, but Sr. Moratinos’ Euro-defeatism and Gramscian wishy-washiness is surely not a coherent alternative to Aznar’s silly posturing.

But instead of using the language of warnings and threats the Bush administration would be well advised to use the apparent success of the attacks as the basis for a subtle argument to try and persuade the new Spanish government to remain in Iraq. Rather than advocate the continuity of Aznar’s policy and uphold the demand with the rhetoric of the “Coalition of the Willing”—that would only alienate the Socialists and most ordinary Spaniards alike—Mr. Bush should appeal on Sr. Zapatero to leave the Spanish contingent in Iraq strictly in order to diminish the perception that al-Qaeda has scored a great triumph. That approach admittedly smacks of humility, but a dose of it is exactly what this Administration has lacked so far in its attempts to forge alliances in the “War on Terror.”

A SELF-INFLICTED PROBLEM

Of the two key prerequisites for successful attacks by Islamic terrorists in Spain, the motive—Aznar’s strong support of the U.S. policy—was only one. The other is the existence of a huge and largely unsupervised community of Muslim immigrants in Spain, many of them illegal, their numbers estimated at over a million and growing. The presence of these people is essential in providing the complex infrastructure for the attacks.

While General Franco was in power Spain enjoyed high birth rates and was a net exporter of labor. A catastrophic drop in fertility rates has taken place over the past two decades, however. Today’s democratic, liberal Spain is fully integrated into “Europe”—and dying with it. It vies with Italy for the lowest birth rate in the world, and on this form Spaniards will disappear within a century. This has already created a growing labour shortage that is being filled by North African Arab immigrants, mostly from Morocco and Algeria. Many migrate on a seasonal basis, making homes in Andalucía during the summer tourist and agricultural season. Others live in Spain permanently and have created their own kazbah-like neighborhoods, mainly in greater Madrid and in the north, in Catalon industrial cities. They are estimated to account for three percent of Spain’s 40 million people, and may exceed ten percent within a generation.

Twelve centuries ago Spain was the first European Christian country to be invaded by the Arab Islamic armies. The outcome was in considerable doubt at first, and it fought for the ensuing eight hundred years to liberate itself from the invaders. The process was complete in 1492, but the finality of the Reconquista has never been accepted by orthodox Muslims who subscribe to the Kuranic tenet that no land once controlled by the faithful can ever revert to infidel rule. The reversal of the Reconquista has been and remains their long-term objective. Spain’s present experience demonstrates that exactly the same problem is present in every Western country that has allowed mass immigration from the Muslim world. The newcomers have no respect for nor desire to adopt Spain’s culture as their own. They create self-sustained communities that are not only separate from the host-society but also hostile to it. North African Muslims in particular use demography as a political weapon, and export millions of their surplus population to France, Spain and Italy, aware that the bigger the diaspora, the greater the political influence it will exert, and the more concessions they will be able to extort.

Spanish authorities are trying to keep tabs on dozens of Islamic terrorists believed to operate in the country, but they generally face a wall of uncooperative silence within the Muslim community. It was with considerable difficulty and expense that State Prosecutor Balthazar Garzon, known locally as “Superjudge,” compiled a 700-page indictment of Muslim extremists living in Spain and their foreign masterminds. His investigation, and the report published last year, followed allegations that some of the planning for the 9-11 attacks in New York and Washington took place in Spain. Investigators have established that the country was used as a location for laundering money, forging documents, assembling material for attacks—and recruiting helpers from within the immigrant Muslim community. The lead hijacker of 9-11, Mohamed Atta, made two trips to Spain, the second shortly before the 2001 attacks, to meet with al-Qaeda leaders.

One of the 14 suspects arrested shortly after the attacks in New York and Washington was Syrian-born Edin Barakat Yarkas—better known by his alias Abu Dahdah—who was allegedly the head of al-Qaeda in Spain, and the network’s key contact with other cells in Europe. Dahdah and several other al-Qaeda suspects regularly came to pray at Madrid’s main mosque. But the mosque’s chief administrator, Mohammed Sali, set the tone for the reaction of Spain’s Muslim establishment: “We were very surprised when we heard about it. We never would have imagined that there could be terrorist cells here in Spain.”

THE BALKAN CONNECTION, AGAIN

Garzón’s indictment against Dahdah alleged that he had raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for Jihad credit card fraud and armed robberies, and sent a host of young Muslims “to terror training camps in Bosnia, Chechnya and Afghanistan.” In the context of the Balkan connection it is interesting to see who commited the bulk of armed robberies in Spain prior to 9/11. According to a major article in El Pais (“KLA-Linked Gangs Commit 2,000 Robberies in Spain” by Luis Gomez, May 7, 2000) over the past decade Spain has been the scene of thousands of robberies by a group of Albanians connected with the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), and providing it with money:

“They assault business establishments across the country. They carefully plan the strike; they act at night; they take the money from the safe; they depart without leaving tracks and with virtually no witnesses. What is more, they leave their signature: a hole in the ceiling and the implements of robbery left behind, because they do not intend to use the same tools more than once. While there were ten holdups in 1995 and 25 in 1996, there were 160 in 1997, 626 in 1998 and no less than 918 [in 1999]. So far [in 2000] they have already surpassed 2000 robberies.”

It is curious that no references to the Bosnian training camps and KLA robberies, singled out in Spanish reports over the years, have been made in the English-language press coverage of the Madrid bombings thus far.

Regardless of the outcome of Spain’s ongoing investigation, the tragedy on March 11 in Madrid should be a wake-up call to all Spaniards, regardless of political affiliation, that a new approach to the problem of Muslim immigration and the causes of terrorism is urgently needed. Current terrorist threat to most European countries—including Spain—comes overwhelmingly from the members of the Muslim community. Critical to reducing the chance of a future attack are an immediate moratorium on all immigration from the risk-nations such as Morocco and Algeria, much improved and more rigorous maritime patrols in the Mediterranean, and the sweeping program of deportation of illegal aliens who have done so much to reduce the quality of life in some of the most attractive cities of Europe.

Once it is accepted that “true Islam” does not recognize a priori the right of any other outlook to exist, and that any further Western pandering to the Jihadist ambitions in Bosnia and Kosovo is utterly self-defeating, a pan-European anti-terrorist strategy advocated by Judge Garzon will finally become possible.

[Iris7]

Srdja Trifkovic is one smart son of a gun. Would make a most excellent Secretary of State.

As I would pick Ann Coulter for Attorney General I would pick Trifkovic for Secretary of State.

[Gritty]

Srdja Trifkovic is one smart son of a gun

I agree. I have only recently been following him. He really understands Islam in a strategic way.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Excellent piece!

[Cap Huff]

Thanks for the ping. I had read it earlier. There is a lot of good stuff here, but this one happened to jump out:

"It is curious that no references to the Bosnian training camps and KLA robberies, singled out in Spanish reports over the years, have been made in the English-language press coverage of the Madrid bombings thus far."

I had just posted an item that was about some people arrested in Konya, Turkey who had confessed to training in Bosnia-Herzegovina, as well as Pakistan and Afghanistan.

[Dog Gone]

It vies with Italy for the lowest birth rate in the world, and on this form Spaniards will disappear within a century.

Gulp. I'm not sure I want to see what the world will look like in 100 years. I don't think I'd like it.

[Eva]

Did you see that the name of the Spanish ambassador to the US is on Saddam's Oil bribe list? You have to wonder if Aznar had some enemies within his own administration.

[Boot Hill]

"AZNAR’S DEFEAT: A BLOW TO BUSH’S STRATEGY"

Tactical loss, strategic gain...

I'm not so sure this is any kind of (long-term) defeat or blow to Bush's strategy. Yes, it drives a further wedge between the U.S. and "Eurabia", but it also highlights and defines the differences between us and will, in the end, leave the U.S. (just like after WW-II) as the predominate political and economic force in the world.

--Boot Hill

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Well by 2050 in this country, the minorities will be the majority, anglo's under 50%.

One of my daughters is doing her best , had 6, which is unusual these days.

[junta]

You are not supposed to acknowledge the existance of race unless you accompany it with an admission of guilt to something or another. (If you are white)

[Hoplite]

Srdja Trifkovic is one smart son of a gun.

Um, no. He's a nationalist.

Ergo, he's an idiot.

This latest attempt on his part is just more in a pattern of attribution through disingenous means any crimes perpetrated by Muslims anywhere on the planet to either Bosnia or Kosovo in order to retroactively justify Serbia's actions in those locales, not that Srdja should worry about that, as he's denied himself out of reality with his contortions on the issue of war crimes perpetrated by Slobo's minions.

Not that it's relevant or anything, good ol' Srdja is only one degree of separation away from a cell in one of Europe's prisons, courtesy of his advising Biljana Plavsic during the Bosnian war.

Whatever - I guess we're just looking for different things in a Sec. of State.

[CarryaBigStick]

Bump to read when not exhausted.

[Iris7]

We appear to be on opposite sides of a very deep divide. I see Bill and Hillary's war on the Serbs as totally unjustified and profoundly evil. As far as Carla Ponti and her ilk, hypocrites is too polite a term.

Serb nationalists do not bother me in the least.

[Hoplite]

And I see this as something that extends beyond Bill's tenure in the White House - Milosevic showed his true colors and got on our bad side during Bush the elder's administration, his actions were detrimental to America's long standing goal of a stable Europe, and he finally got himself slapped down unequivocally after ignoring Bush the elder's warning to him over the use of excessive military force in Kosovo, which became our Kosovo policy after it was issued in December of '92.

Relying upon Mr. Trifkovic for information on what's happening in the Balkans is akin to asking a Grand Imperial Wizard for guidance on race relations here in America - something that should be done for amusement purposes only.

[livius]

Good article.

Actually, the Aznar government had been taking steps aimed at dealing with Muslim immigration. It had made a huge number of visas available to Latin Americans, who share not only Spain's language, but a great deal of its culture and, most importantly, are not Muslims.

I wonder if the Socialists are going to continue this policy. They've already been talking about how we have to "do more to understand Muslims," so I doubt it.

[ehoxha]

great article, thanks for posting it. He is a true conservative. No wonder during the Clinton years every attempt was made to prevent his ideas from getting published.

Thanks to FR, His analysis can get widespread attention

Liberals like Clinton and Kerry try everything to discredit him, but to no avail. His insight is simply too compelling

[Iris7]

"Relying upon Mr. Trifkovic for information on what's happening in the Balkans is akin to asking a Grand Imperial Wizard for guidance on race relations here in America"

You express a profoundly Modernist, "liberal" point of view. The "Grand Imperial Wizard" metaphor is the standard big gun "liberal" metaphor for "racism in America" (second only to the "Nazi" slur). Any attempt to derail the "liberal" project in America is named as "racism".

Needless to say, the "liberal project" has made great progress lately, through "Latino emigration", "gay liberation", increasing big government, and the conversion of free Americans into "the masses" by mass media and public school thought control.

If you want historical context, examine the Soviet "problem of the nations".

Current Chinese politics is totally obscure without taking into account the "nationality problem".

The root of the "Islamic fundamentalism" situation is also nationalism, of course.

The Viet Nam war, and why it was lost, cannot be understood without recourse to "nationalism" either. The Viet Nam war was a liberal project aimed at the destruction of Viet Namese nationalism as much as "International Communism", which had nationalistic roots as well. Castro, for example, or Chavez in Venezuela. Chinese Communism is an obvious case. Good old "Socialism with Chinese Characteristics".

American attempts to defuse Afganistan rely on anti-Arab nationalist feeling. Afganistan has many nationalities, and most do not "like" Arabs.

The Iraq situation is one of nationalities also. The "Shiites", essentially identify with Iranians, and want all of the power and real estate (and grind the other nationalities under their heel) because they can muster a majority of the vote. The "Sunnis" identify with the Arabs, and the Kurds don't want either of them.

Perhaps you do not understand the "nationality" concept. It has been under severe attack in the West for centuries, especially since the French Revolution, and the word is used incorrectly here in the United States, as in the "one nation, under God" construct - neither statement being true, of course.

You show the standard "liberal" anti-conservative world view here. Suggest you examine your premises.

[Hoplite]

Suggest you don't go off to the races based upon one analogy - if you prefer, "Relying upon Trifkovic for information on what's happening in the Balkans is akin to asking Karl Marx for guidance on Federal Reserve policy here in America."

Better? Not really, it's not quite as black and white, is it.

The point is, Trifkovic was part of the problem in the Balkans, and is bereft of the ability to provide any workable solution that serves American interests.

If you're looking to joust with a liberal stand-in, you're going to be both sorely disappointed and rudely disabused.

[Iris7]

"Trifkovic was part of the problem in the Balkans, and is bereft of the ability to provide any workable solution that serves American interests."

I am convinced that this is not the case. Instead the officialdom deciding the "American interest" were wildly wrong. Very likely disastrously so.

The decision to bomb the Serbs was a product of a world view so unbalanced as to be insane. Very commonly held world view, of course.

[Hoplite]

I am convinced that this is not the case.

Then you are either ignorant of what the government Trifkovic was a part of did or suffer from the delusion that you can misrepresent the actions of the Pale government.

It really doesn't matter which.