Terrorism

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Chad
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Terrorism

Post by Chad »

Based on this forum and on the market reaction to the Brussels' attacks, it appears the terrorists are losing. The only mention I can find in this forum of the attacks was:

viewtopic.php?f=20&t=7487&p=113639&hili ... ls#p113639

And, this was focused on CNN's sloppy coverage, not the attacks. Everyone appears to be getting used to them, which is bad for the terrorists.

Note: This does not mean intelligence agencies, law enforcement, and certain military operators should be ignoring the threat. It just suggests that terrorism is a long game, which many of the talking heads forget. Especially, those in the neo-con/lib camps. All one has to do is look at the old school European terrorists (IRA, Basque nationalists, Red Army Faction, Red Brigades, etc.) and how they were eventually defeated...time and steady pressure from law enforcement.

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Slevin
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Re: Terrorism

Post by Slevin »

I've lost a lot of my sympathy to these things when I dug more into the political situations worldwide. I feel incredible sympathy for the people of Belgium, they certainly didn't deserve any of this to happen to them. They were just citizens and not involved with anything that should cause this.

But more and more I'm seeing these "attacks" as an outlet response to the terror and helplessness of the situations of these people. Over the past ten years JSOC and the CIA have been continuously infiltrating and abducting/ killing people under the guise of them being "potential terrorists". These people don't live in war zones and they never see a trial (so who knows if they are guilty?). What is the proper response to knowing that at any minute you could be assassinated by a drone you never see coming because you are a muslim priest / activist / said the wrong thing at the wrong time?

To me it seems like this might break certain people, and make them want to show the western world the pain that is being inflicted on them.

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Re: Terrorism

Post by jacob »

Old school European terrorism (say until the 1980s and fading rapidly with the end of the cold war) was largely considered the cost and consequence of doing business as a colonial empire. What Slevin alludes to was largely understood by the general public and so blowback was an expected reaction that the public thought of and treated as a crime rather than a war. In other words, people weren't terrorized by terrorism.

What we're seeing now is a decrease in the risk amplification factor as terrorism over the past few years has become the new normal and the actual odds become better known. The two factors that decrease the amplification factor are increased reporting coupled with an increased number of incidences. If you've never seen a terrorist attack before, you have no idea of the odds, so that one/first event feels like a big deal! However, if they happen regularly, like several times a year, you get a pretty good idea of the actual odds which turn out to be extremely low.

Ironically, then, by increasing the frequency of the attacks and the amount of news coverage, the terror-effect is actually decreased!

Interestingly, given how asymmetric the coverage is when it comes to different events it suggests a potential change in terrorist tactics. For example, in the past half year there has been three terrorist attacks in Turkey the size of which were equivalent to Paris and Brussels. Yet, they were hardly reported on in western media. This creates an increased risk as terrorists might switch their activities to western cities to get the desired media impact. Unintended consequences...

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Ego
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Re: Terrorism

Post by Ego »

Slevin wrote:But more and more I'm seeing these "attacks" as an outlet response to the terror and helplessness of the situations of these people. .....

To me it seems like this might break certain people, and make them want to show the western world the pain that is being inflicted on them.
We know the identity of the bombers. Have any of them experienced what you are talking about?

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016 ... orism.html

There are certainly helpless people out there. They are the ones moving toward Europe and would love to come to the U.S. Seeking a better life.

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jennypenny
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Re: Terrorism

Post by jennypenny »

jacob wrote: For example, in the past half year there has been three terrorist attacks in Turkey the size of which were equivalent to Paris and Brussels. Yet, they were hardly reported on in western media. This creates an increased risk as terrorists might switch their activities to western cities to get the desired media impact. Unintended consequences...
Many think Erdoğan supports ISIS and, therefore, view the bombings in Ankara and Istanbul as infighting more than terrorism. Isn't that why Turkey didn't get their expected spot on the UN Security Council? I think Erdoğan has figured that out as well, and is changing tactics like meeting with the Pope and showing public support for Christian refugees from Syria now. Terrorist attacks in Indonesia get ignored for the same reason IMO.
Chad wrote:All one has to do is look at the old school European terrorists (IRA, Basque nationalists, Red Army Faction, Red Brigades, etc.) and how they were eventually defeated...time and steady pressure from law enforcement.
Has globalization changed that at all? I can't recall a 'terrorist' organization attacking people on three continents before. I agree that localized terrorism is usually defeated by law enforcement and public sentiment (the offended dying off), but recent events feel a little different to me. Maybe it's just the changing face of war?

Either way, we're definitely numbing to it like we do with so many other atrocities. I haven't watched Brazil in a long time, but aren't there frequent explosions in that film that barely register with the characters? (I need to watch that movie again. It was scarily accurate on so many things.)

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Re: Terrorism

Post by chenda »

Sinn Fein IRA were not militarily defeated, essentially the government negotiated with them and a deal was struck.

Dragline
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Re: Terrorism

Post by Dragline »

@ Chad -- I hope you are right.

U.S. media and politicians are still completely irrational about it, given the exceedingly low probability of it affecting any one individual. Actually, I should say that they are quite rational in stoking irrational fears so as to increase their viewership and power.

If we treated bee stings and lightning the same way (which are more likely to kill you), we'd have exterminated all the bees by now and have lightning rods on every street corner. And have spent a few hundred billion in the process.

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Slevin
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Re: Terrorism

Post by Slevin »

Dragline wrote: If we treated bee stings and lightning the same way (which are more likely to kill you), we'd have exterminated all the bees by now and have lightning rods on every street corner. And have spent a few hundred billion in the process.
:lol: Haven't we been? Is CCD the result of a secret government war on bees (for our benefit, or course) ;) ?

Chad
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Re: Terrorism

Post by Chad »

Another point that no one talks about is al-Qaeda. They have basically been defeated. Yes, some of ISIS can be claimed as former al-Qaeda, but they left for a reason. The same will happen with ISIS. It just takes time.
jennypenny wrote: Has globalization changed that at all? I can't recall a 'terrorist' organization attacking people on three continents before. I agree that localized terrorism is usually defeated by law enforcement and public sentiment (the offended dying off), but recent events feel a little different to me. Maybe it's just the changing face of war?
That's a valid question. Though, I'm exceedingly suspect at how much the terrorists outside of the Middle East are actually part of ISIS. Most are probably as connected to them, as I am to the Steelers. Sure, I'm a big fan and may have gotten a communication or two from them, but I'm not really part of them. (Yes, I know there are a few actual terrorists in Europe who were part of ISIS, but not many.) I do not actually consider the people who carried out the attacks in Garland, TX or San Bernadino, CA to be really part of ISIS. I know I'm kind of playing with semantics here.

Surprisingly, I haven't seen Brazil. I need to watch it.
chenda wrote:Sinn Fein IRA were not militarily defeated, essentially the government negotiated with them and a deal was struck.
True, but they were not negotiating from a position of strength. They had been hit rather hard by the police over the years, which impacts recruiting, desire, ability, etc. Most wars, including full scale wars, don't end in unconditional surrender.
Dragline wrote:U.S. media and politicians are still completely irrational about it, given the exceedingly low probability of it affecting any one individual. Actually, I should say that they are quite rational in stoking irrational fears so as to increase their viewership and power.
Sadly, it's true. I have to deprogram my father and grandmother every time I go home.

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fiby41
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Re: Terrorism

Post by fiby41 »

1 @Slevin:

Stop saying war caused it all.

How many terrorists America's attack on Vietnam produce?

Out of half a million Kashmiri Pandits chased out of the Valley, how many became terrorists?

2 If you think IS wants your attention, and that by numbing yourself you are somehow reducing the impact, you are flattering/ giving too much importance to yourself. By numbing yourself you are yielding to it, not resisting it.

The way it works according to IS publications/propaganda material and the way 'tis always been done is in history:

1 attack in Brussels; now for every suspected terrorist police has to have a dedicated task force of 15 people tapping his phone, following him, spying on him, digging up his history, putting together enough shit against him to detain him etc etc. Multiplied by each countries police working with little coordination.

This over-stretches the state machinery and puts pressure on public resources.

Total cost: 1 AK47, home made bombs and Quran.

3 Ego: They are second generation from non-European parents so they were denied European identity. They couldn't have had "Belgian" identity either on linguistic basis (French/Danish) or ethnic (country is already divided along French and Flemish lines) They were exposed to the Islamic identity and latched to it.

4 Attacks in Indonesia were merely symbolic in nature because Indonesia manages to be secular on paper despite having 94% Moslem majority.

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jennypenny
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Re: Terrorism

Post by jennypenny »

I understand that the fear of being killed by a terrorist is irrational and over-hyped. OTOH, that doesn't mean that terrorism doesn't affect people or has very little impact beyond the few people directly harmed by terrorist acts. It has lead to significant changes in the way we travel, the security we must pass through when entering certain buildings, the amount of cameras that capture our movements in public places, the amount of physical cash we can possess without suspicion, the types of searches we do online, the amount of personal data collected as a matter of course, the level of proof required for search and seizure, and the way we interpret of "free speech" (in the US at least).

It could be argued that some of those changes are the result of irrational fear. Daily reminders of how life has changed do provide a negative feedback loop. In my more cynical moments though (of which there are many ;) ), I think terrorism provided an excuse for certain agencies to implement changes that were already in the planning stages, a la Emmanuel's 'don't wast a crisis' theory.


@Chad--You have to watch Brazil. And remember it was made in 1985. I've been watching it this afternoon. Gilliam nailed it.

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Re: Terrorism

Post by Dragline »

ffj wrote:What's that old expression? "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter" or something to that effect. Here's a story many haven't heard about or discussed: https://theintercept.com/2016/03/08/nob ... served-it/
It's Americans that are not aware of these stories. There's almost no US media coverage, because it does not fit the "we're under siege"/"we're always the victims" narrative. Sounds too much like "The Empire Strikes Back" for the American leadership/psyche.

Most people outside the U.S. know these stories quite well. Helps the propaganda to recruit the next round of freedom fighters/terrorists.

BTW, there is no way to prevent all terrorist attacks short of creating a totalitarian state where everyone spies on each other. Britain tried and has a public camera for every 30 or so people now to show for it.

You might as well try to prevent all crime. And on that score, your neighbors, co-workers and family members are more likely to do you in than people you don't know.

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Re: Terrorism

Post by jacob »

@jp - Uhm, I don't know if I'm pointing out the obvious here, but that's exactly how the terrorist-strategy works. IIRC it was Bin Laden's officially stated goal to use low cost attacks to cause a high cost defense and thus make continued imperial operations (<=what we on our side euphemistically call globalization) too expensive. This is how asymmetric warfare works. Same reason Rome ultimately feel. Cheap to attack---Expensive to defend.

Because of the risk amplification factor of the novelty of those attacks it was initially quite easy to create a shift towards the preference of the fearful/closed-mind and tilt society more towards a security state. This response is well known and this is why historically we've seen many false flag operations to induce a desired policy change when a true flag operation didn't conveniently materialize.

The fear-response coupled with the institutional nature of society does the rest. So because people's psychology played along (see Haidt), the strategy worked. What's interesting is that while many saw exactly what was happening (because it's classic playbook), it was nevertheless inevitable because 1) The fear of a historically ignorant public; 2) Rahm style "management by crisis" by people who saw how to use this new situation to increase their power. For example, the Bush administration deliberately tried to link 9/11 to Iraq in order to generate public support for its nation building doctrine i.e. Project for the New American Century.

It is, however, not inevitable that the asymmetric strategy always works. Cooler heads could ultimately prevail and some of the massive cost (in dollars and hassle) could be wound down/back again. This could come with public experience. For example, it's becoming increasingly clear that preventing terrorist attacks is a really hard problem to solve. (Case in point ... too many events that obviously weren't prevented, despite massive efforts)

There are two factors that makes detection hard. 1) It's extremely hard to "connect the dots" because there are very few "terrorist patterns" compared to a huge number of "innocent patterns". 2) False positives are very costly. In the problem space, terrorism is a case where the number of true positives << false positives; and total positives << total negatives. It's a needle in a haystack that also have a bunch of needle looking metal in it. Super hard. Compare this to another surveillance problem which is detecting credit card fraud. Here the two factors are very different. Fraud is relatively common so there are many fraud patterns compared to normal "shopping patterns" and false positives are really cheap because it's essentially just a phone call to the credit card owner asking if they really bought those spurious items.

Another way to understand why the two cases are very different it's the fact that terrorists don't want to be found whereas credit card owners do want to detect fraud.

It's possible that even if the public miss the finer points of why these are two entirely different kinds of data mining problems, they will at least become heuristically aware of it as in "hey we're spending $500 billion/year on this but it's obviously not working very well...".

Ultimately, though, this is a problem that needs solutions! It's only going to get more frequent with private drones (already) and ground-robots, like self-driving cars.

I think the main issue is, to put on my cynical hat, that the best solutions are 1) not that expensive (so there's nobody who can profit by suggesting them); 2) unlikely to get some careerist promoted to to head of department. I'm very sad to note this...

Indeed, consider what worked in terms of airline security. It wasn't a bunch of techmology scanners, which have been repeatedly defeated, by intrepid journalists, etc.

It was 1) Beefing up and locking the cockpit doors; (say a one time cost of $400?); 2) Putting a secret air marshal on every flight (say $500/flight?); 3) Installing the meme in the passengers that hijackers should henceforth be fought to the death. (free/priceless).

So free of charge ... here's a cheap solution I believe would work much better than the vast surveillance state we've built over the past 15 years.

I'm basically gonna steal the airplane solutions.

1) For large events, hire people with concealed weapons. This does not need to be full time experts. People/private citizens could be deputized. If 1 in 10 people at an event were carrying, a lot of mass shootings would be quickly defeated. Note that this needs to come with the meme that response is anti-terrorist/mass-murder only ... not the current "this guy punched me in the face so I'm gonna wave my snub nosed revolver around to defend myself".
2) For something like trains, buses, ... hand out bulletproof vests (free to use). People could use them or not .. similar to seat belts. Also, see 3.
3) Install baffles or whatever to deflect blast waves. I'm sure something could be done here as part of city landscaping. E.g. if the streets were not at the same level as the side walks, car bombs would be less effective.

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Re: Terrorism

Post by jacob »

Dragline wrote: BTW, there is no way to prevent all terrorist attacks short of creating a totalitarian state where everyone spies on each other. Britain tried and has a public camera for every 30 or so people now to show for it.
However, given the nature of the data-mining problem, it is possible to prevent practically all dog-poop crime. And so it was done.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk/7369543.stm

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Re: Terrorism

Post by Dragline »

Nothing like powerful and intrusive technology in the hands of low-level busybody bureaucrats. Surveil early! Surveil often!

I think DS #2 is going to be in trouble soon if he doesn't start cleaning up after the Chihuahua.

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Ego
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Re: Terrorism

Post by Ego »

ffj wrote:What I would like to see is some practicality about the situation. Oppressed people resort to guerrilla tactics, so if the nation through their collective silence is o.k. with our government's actions, then keeping out people with an ideology that would seek revenge shouldn't be that controversial. I don't think we have the luxury of becoming too philosophical about this growing problem.
ISIS has been very clear about what they want. Why is it that we in the west do not believe what they have consistently told us? Why do we ascribe to them the "oppressed people" narrative when they have consistently and clearly stated different reasons?

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc ... ts/384980/

Western liberals find it impossible to fathom that anyone actually believes that nonsense so they search for what they (can) believe to be the real reason. Western conservatives on the other hand know people who believe things that are not all that different - maybe they believe it themselves - and know the believers to feel oppressed by liberals who think they are crazy for believing it.

The oppression theme fits our worldview.
Last edited by Ego on Thu Mar 24, 2016 6:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Terrorism

Post by jacob »

@ffj - In Europe the Muslim immigrants largely faced a homogeneous population(=very strict/uniform rules wrt fitting in) with a generous welfare system. Consequentially immigrants where cordoned off and put in ghettos for two or three generations. This kind of cultural isolation makes the kids more susceptible to develop a teenage like fascination of joining a[ny] cause; especially if it involves shooting guns and blowing shit up. This---teenage stupidity---is the source of EU home grown terrorism. Youthful enthusiasm to join a crazy cause with terminal consequences. It has been a huge policy fail.

This [European] practise has not been adopted in the US to the same degree. The US is a nation of enterprising immigrants. People are expected to make their own way. If they fail, it's their own personal fault rather than being blamed in not being identical to the culture. IOW, in the EU, culture overrides personal responsibility. In the US it's the other way around. So if immigrants fail in Europe, they are apt to blame society and then run off and join a cause.

The US should indeed learn from the EU lessons. It's hard to understate just how stupid it would be to single out Muslim communities for surveillance/carpet bomb distant relatives/people of the same religious0colour. It would be repeating the EU mistakes all over. Given the EU experience, following the recent Cruz/Trump proposals would be insane. The smartest approach is to keep the focus on the individual! In particular, ultimately, the best way to end terrorism is to give people some lawns to mow.

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Re: Terrorism

Post by Tyler9000 »

Ego wrote: ISIS has been very clear about what they want. Why is it that we in the west do not believe what they have consistently told us? Why do we ascribe to them the "oppressed people" narrative when they have consistently and clearly stated different reasons?

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc ... ts/384980/

Western liberals find it impossible to fathom that anyone actually believes that nonsense so they search for what they (can) believe to be the real reason.
Great article. Thanks.

I agree -- the degree to which people wish to project "real" motives onto Islamic jihadists that contradict the jihadists' own stated goals never ceases to amaze me. Not every violent act in a completely different culture can be rationalized by a modern western worldview. The intellectual piousness of it all betrays a remarkable arrogance and exposes a weakness that terrorists are more than happy to exploit.

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Re: Terrorism

Post by fiby41 »

Ego's link:

ISIS follow the Qur'an to the letter and this is how history of Islamic expansion been like throughout.

Calling it un-Islamic not only offends but also shows how west sees itself through its lens of intellectual arrogance. It projects its values on unwilling cultures while misappropriating to itself whatever is worth emulating after severing its links to original culture.

This is how the sacred is secularised as is the case of Yoga, Yog Nidra becomes lucid dreaming, exactly step for step Chaitanya becomes esotericism, ISIS becomes un-Islamic etc and it is still going on.

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Muslim are not the problem. Islam and its core teachings are the problem.

-
Communal frenzy around Trump is motivated by xenophobia, and not anti-terrorism. So there is nothing to stop it from turning into all-out racism quickly.

-
I don't think rise of far-right* will change anything even a bit. Same thing will continue as they do now.

*for lack of a better word. Trump with his protectionism is anything but far-right.

_

Practical solution:

In they long run we are all doomed if current demographic/population growth trends continue. Germany's census dept is the only one which has officially stated that it'll be a Muslim country by 2050.

Whole of continental Europe and India will be Muslim majority by 2050.

So, if its all doomed why fight?

But if you want to fight, here is what you can do (for Europeans and Indians):

1 Pick up your local religion and stick to it. Identity with it. Atheism, agnostic, secularism is okay as long as you are vocal and obnoxiously in-your-face about it

2 Start converting Muslims.

3 Marry Muslim of the opposite sex and convert them to your religion, and/or discourage them from practicing their cult

4 Have as many children as. possible. After FI, put all your money and frugal skills to work to sustain maximum number of progeny. Fulfilling their basic subsistence needs and keeping them alive is good enough.

5 If you can't do 4, then at least educate yourself about the true stories of the example set forth by Mohammed and how this political ideology brought down cultures from Egyptian, to Zoroastrian Persia (Iran) to how 2/3 of Europe was under Islamic rule within 100 years after the death of Mohammed, to how violently it wiped off Buddhism from Afghanistan, Xinjiang, Bengal, Indonesia.

6 Preach the threat Islam possesses to civilized society

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Re: Terrorism

Post by jacob »

Tyler9000 wrote:
Ego wrote: ISIS has been very clear about what they want. Why is it that we in the west do not believe what they have consistently told us? Why do we ascribe to them the "oppressed people" narrative when they have consistently and clearly stated different reasons?

Western liberals find it impossible to fathom that anyone actually believes that nonsense so they search for what they (can) believe to be the real reason.
Great article. Thanks.

I agree -- the degree to which people wish to project "real" motives onto Islamic jihadists that contradict the jihadists' own stated goals never ceases to amaze me. Not every violent act in a completely different culture can be rationalized by a modern western worldview. The intellectual piousness of it all betrays a remarkable arrogance and exposes a weakness that terrorists are more than happy to exploit.
There's no reason both explanations can't exist simultaneously. The official reason and what is actually happening. Every time there's trouble/instability in the ME, someone tries to declare a caliphate. This is not a novel idea that IS came up with; they've just gone further because they were able to use people from Saddam's old military command structure (mostly Sunnis) which the US disbanded shortly after the invasion. Establishing a caliphate provides a public narrative (yes, western intellectual word) in the same way that the public narrative in the west is to bring "freedom and democracy".

What happens on the ground in both cases? The previous power structure is replaced with a new power structure, the oil fields are taken over quickly and the oil starts flowing again to fund the war, and a the civilian population suffers collaterally.

When I see a bird that engages in all the typical duck behaviours, I call that bird a duck no matter what that bird calls itself. For all intents and purposes, this is still the Iraq war. If there's anything that troubling for the western mind/narrative, it's the fact that the ME doesn't organize itself by the Westphalian system---that is, the lines Europe drew on a map prior to WWII and then supported according to which dictator offered the better business deals. The problem is that without a strong man to contain the various "tribes", the usual "enemy of my enemy is my friend"-logic doesn't line up. What we have more is a clusterfuck where the enemy of my enemy is also my enemy because there are more than just two interests on the ground after Iraq disintegrated and pretty much all the surrounding factions got engaged.

I think the biggest mistake being made in the west is the focus on terrorism as the main issue instead of just thinking of jihadists as a currently popular (thanks to the media) "character class" in the Great Game of the ME. (it was the terrorism narrative that made it possible for Russia to successfully enter the war on Syria's side, something they couldn't have done if the actual Western goal which was to oust the Syrian leader had also been the official goal.)

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