Where did these idiots come from?

In the wake of the dastardly acts that have ravaged South Mumbai (and thank God, my parents are safe. My first thought was to ring them up. That was a scary few moments, let me tell you..), I have actually given some thought as to who might be behind these attacks. Let me "analyse" from what I have actually heard on the news. This incident began around nine thirty, IST, and for the first time in Indian history, we have had an urban "guerrilla" style attack. These terrorists, who number around twenty to twenty five in number, managed to hijack a police vehicle and go berserk in front of the Metro cinema in South Mumbai. What seems to have happened is that this group of "well trained" terrorists used the sea and landed at two different rendezvous points- at Sasoon, Colaba and somewhere close to the Gateway of India. Now, they split up and a few went to the CST, some went over to the Leopold Cafe, which is frequented by tourists and also to two hotels, The Oberoi/Trident ( The Trident is a separate hotel) and the Taj Mahal Palace. A few of these gunmen were shot dead- these were the ones who hijacked the police vehicle.

Now that's all background info- what I am interested in is how this attack differs from the ones we had previously, and clearly, while Mumbai has braved several attack on its soil before, like the train bombings in 2006 and the 1993 blasts/riots, this one was different in many ways from these previous attacks. I must say that these are my own inferences and not taken from any website or so. We have here a terrorist attack. I classify these attacks into two types : Conventional and Non conventional. Conventional terrorism is which I define to be terrorism that is carried out by a suicide bomber. This is something that crops up in the news very often, the bomb blasts that periodically rock Baghdad, the bomb blasts that we have had in India, the USS Cole incident, the London and Madrid bomb blasts, the Bali blasts to name a few. Here the terrorist walks into a crowded area and triggers the device, in the process killing himself and many others around him. Non conventional terrorism is something that is unexpected, the use of a new kind of weapon- such as the hijacked planes during 9/11 and now these shootings and blasts in Mumbai. Now I am assuming that apart from insurgencies into Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Kashmir, terror elsewhere has been solely restricted to bombings. It seems that somehow or the other, people who had been actively engaged in war, such as Afghanistan, Iraq and the tribal areas of Pakistan are the ones with the "know-how" of actually using automatic weapons and rocket launchers and grenades and all that. This is an important point that I will allude to later.

Logistically too this operation was streets ahead with respect to the usual bomb blasts you may find about. Because the way this was carried out showed an almost "military" precision. While the shootings were random and directed to kill anyone in sight, the method of these guys moving about wasn't. They were planned to the tiniest detail. Right from food to the amount of ammo they need, their landing points... It was as meticulous. Over the past year, attacks in India have become very sophisticated. The blasts in Ahmedabad and Bangalore were actually planned in Sanpada, Navi Mumbai and the terrorists used remote triggers to actually detonate these bombs. The perpetrators were Indians who were well off( I mean many Singaporeans would be happy to have their salary, mind.. Rs 100,000 a month!!). The Bangalore blasts were a rehearsal for the Ahmedabad blasts. Many of the bombs though, didn't go off thankfully. It was once again aimed at hitting the diamond centre in India, an attempt to sabotage the economy. Now coming back to our subject, these terrorists used the marine route- they came from the sea into Mumbai. This is not something new to Mumbai. Unfortunately the underworld used the same method to actually begin the 92 blasts. Moreover, these waters are, I reckon, trade off points in drug smuggling and trafficking of all sorts of contraband. It seems to me that the underworld has no doubt helped the terrorists enter Mumbai using their smuggling routes. In the usual case, explosives are made somewhere in a remote location and then put in car and driven into the target area. This doesn't seem to be the case here. But why did they do it?

The motive of the attack is still unclear. Western media has labelled this as an attack on the western peoples. The Indian media has called this an attack on India- more so, its credibility as an investment centre. But this multi pronged attack cannot have solely just one motive. This is a culmination of all that the extremists hate; the extremists in this region, that is. The jewish element in the Nariman House, the Westerners at the Leopold Cafe and at the hotels, and attacking India and Indians at the same time. What more could a terrorist organisation want? This was a chance to show that the threats issued by the Indian Mujahideen were not hollow (No one ever said they were, but no one expected open warfare. If you ever hear the word terrorist attack, you would go, "Oh! What did they bomb??"- You wouldn't actually say, "They shot how many people???"). This is therefore another major thing- that these extremists were given professional help. They were trained well too as many good police officers found out to their cost, not to mention the NSG and the army and navy and the RAF (the entire lot of 'em!). This was a fidayeen attack of a different dimension- it was prolonged and not something that happened in an instant like a bomb blast. Fighting is still going on at the Oberoi as I write this- I have to check out about the Nariman House though. Oh- the fighting is still on at the Oberoi; The Trident is now clean according to NDTV. What I mean to say is that yes, you can have sleeper cells in India, but you will have neither the finances nor the know-how to create munitions of this calibre. It has to be done overseas- or there has to be some connection with the Underworld, Al Qaeda or the LeT and the Indian Mujahideen (which already has links with the LeT) and sleeper cells in India. By sleeper cells, I mean places where potential terrorists can be identified and taken over to training camps, either in Pakistan or Afghanistan. They are also centres of hate, places where negative propaganda can be spread. This sleeper cell is most probably Indian in nature- though some media reports are actually saying that these are British citizens of Pakistani origin.

So here comes my point- These terrorists were young- they should have been brainwashed and this usually occurs in the sleeper cells around the nation. I am pretty sure that there are centres of terror being preached in Mumbai. I actually was in Andheri, a long while ago, and it was during these blasts that a few kids were actually lauding the blasts, saying that this is what happens to those who do not worship Allah. I am not saying that all Muslims are bad- quite the contrary- I have some really good Muslim friends, and they are great blokes to hang around with. All I am saying is that there are places that spread the word of hate in places we least expect it. There is no doubt that there was outside help and there must have been an underworld link to this as well, simply because of the stealthy manner they were able to hijack a boat and come into Indian waters. Their training methods also suggests that they were trained abroad- they fought like commandos.

From this all I can say is that everything seems to be working against us- the terrorists want to hurt India for it is becoming a major player in the region, economically and culturally. They want to hurt the West and Israel as well. And they found all those factors in South Mumbai.

All I can say is that our security personnel have been fantastic. The NSG, the Army, the Navy, the RAF, the ATS and the police have bravely fought against mindless hate.

UPDATE: Looks like my assessment is partially correct. The terrorists were supposedly trained by the Pakistani army. The weapons and the boat were supplied by the Mumbai Underworld, not to mention that they used smuggling routes to get these terrorists into Mumbai. This bit of news (in bullet format, here on BBC) came on the NDTV live stream. This issue though did warrant a mammoth post...