What's Up Doc?
The Daily Mail reports:
An Iraqi junior doctor and a brilliant neurologist working for the NHS are among the suspects being quizzed over the series of bomb attacks across Britain, it emerged today. ... The junior doctor has been named as Bilal Abdulla, who is said to have completed his medical training in Baghdad. The suspected ringleader of the Al Qaeda car bombers is a brilliant neurologist working for the NHS. Saudi Mohammed Asha, 26, was arrested with his 27-year-old wife, who was in traditional Muslim dress, on the M6 in Cheshire on Saturday night. ... Tonight it has been revealed that a third man, aged 26, arrested in Liverpool, was also reported to be an Indian doctor who works at Halton Hospital in Cheshire. ... One of the two men who drove a blazing Jeep Cherokee into the terminal building at Glasgow airport on Saturday afternoon is also thought to be a doctor. It is believed he worked at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley, four miles away.
Although the involvement of an Iraqi doctor is going to be portrayed as proof the attacks were blowback for the war in Iraq, the apparent ringleader was a "brilliant" Saudi neurologist, and an Indian doctor. None of these men were poor. Nor were they "uneducated". As medical doctors they were applied scientists with a greater amount of training and education than 99.9% of the journalists who will report on the incident. The plotters did not share a single nationality, though they may in the end share membership in a single organization: al-Qaeda, led by that wealthy Saudi, Osama Bin Laden, ably seconded by a medical doctor, Ayman_al-Zawahiri, who speaks three languages: Arabic, French, and English, with degrees in behavior, psychology and pharmacology and a Masters degree in surgery. Why if one didn't know better one would think Britain under attack by a transnational organization led by the cream of the dissident intelligensia of the Islamic world. The heads, in fact, of a strand of radical Islam that bids fair to lead their faith. They are smart; and probably smarter than our public intellectuals, whose minds they can lead around by the halter.
It's also interesting to note, that for these Doctor Kill Dares, their ideology easily trumped the Hippocratic Oath. "Do No Harm" was replaced by "Kill as Many as Possible" and as painfully as possible. Nor did the prospect of endangering their position, jeoparadizing their families and educational investment seem to faze them. No sirree. It'll take a lot more than a little welfare to pacify these dudes.
posted by wretchardthecat at 7/02/2007 05:00:00 PM
16 Comments:
Or maybe instead of being attacked by a transnational organization they are being attacked by a religion that has been attacking the west for 1300 years...you know I am jus saying.
I wonder was Mohammed a Radical?
mack down…the idea that there exists something called Moderate Islam.
None of these men were poor. Nor were they "uneducated".
I'll bet they didn't live in a ghetto, either. So, what's the motivation? First, the Left said that it was the uneducated poor who were making up the bulk of terrorists. When they were proven wrong, the Left then said it was the fault of the UK for allowing (or forcing, depending on how radical the Leftist) middle easterners to live in ghettos.
Now we have MDs in England who probably live in London neighborhoods like Mayfair or Kensignton. Yet they attend Finsbury Mosque, dream of shari'a law, and plan on blowing up a lot of stuff.
Why?
Because they like it.
I looked long and hard for any evidence to justify the characterization of Dr. Asha as "brilliant". Other than graduating first in his medical class in Jordan, the dude doesn't have any major publications or grants. He botched a terror operation; does that look good on a C.V.?
Why the Islamic World's best and brightest, the doctors and civil engineers, etc. are waging war against the West which is high risk?
Because they think they can win. And run the West. Be the new Caliph.
Weakness invites attack.
Stephen,
My theory on why people of this intellectual caliber and socioeconomic do these kinds of things is because life and death struggle gives them a sense of purpose that they cannot get anywhere else. I also think it's true that the poor and disaffected are more easily sucked into this mentality because they already have little to live for in this life, and they may already be angry (not to mention they are typically less educated and able to think critically).
And yet I think the thread that runs through the poor and the rich, the educated and the uneducated alike is the need for a purpose and sense of meaning in life. For some, Islam fills that void, and for fewer, it is radical Islam.
All this being said, I have no idea how we counter such things on a tactical or strategic level.
On a somewhat lighter note, perhaps it's comforting to know these intelligent men of science weren't able to use their skills to create a worthwhile bomb. It brings to mind the stereotype of doctors typically making lousy investment decisions. High intelligence and skill in one field (fortunately in this case) don't guarantee success in another.
Doctor arrested in Queensland, Australia Dr Mohammed Asha, 26, and his wife, 27 were arrested at Brisbane Airport on a tipoff from Britain. He had been a registrar at a Gold Coast Hospital in Australia. Asha had a one-way ticket to India. (SMH). They're here.
Tim Blair has blanket coverage. They're here.
wretchard:
Let's not overestimate the brainpower of men from al-Qaeda. As a rule, they are very well educated. That doesn't mean they are smart; it means they are book smart.
Islamists generally lack street smarts or empathy. Or imagination. They share with other fanatics a desire for utopia, as is shown in the article I was a fanatic.
One ought not forget that when Czarist agents infiltrated anarchist ranks, the collective IQ of the anarchists went up. Indeed, one of the inherent problems with infiltrating al-Qaeda is that any infiltrator may inadvertently increase the effectiveness of its terrorist acts if only because an outside mind would probably be more imaginative.
I wonder how they had self-medicated prepratory to their "operation" to give themselves courage and to be able to function while being on fire.
This should impact calculation on the 'Moderate Muslim' theory. While I'm sure there are indeed moderate Muslims I think we are deluding ourselves, most likely consciously, as to the actual prevalence of moderation. I Googled numbers and there are reportedly 1.2 to 1.6 billion Muslims world-wide. People beat the 'moderate' drum because the opposite is very disconcerting.
Alexis - Let's not overestimate the brainpower of men from al-Qaeda. As a rule, they are very well educated. That doesn't mean they are smart; it means they are book smart.
Islamists generally lack street smarts or empathy. Or imagination. They share with other fanatics a desire for utopia, as is shown in the article "I was a fanatic".
That's a rather dumb take on smart people. Because people are religious or utopian (like the Jewish Bolsheviks) and willing to kill remorselessly to achieve their objectives without empathy or "street smarts" - does not make them any less formidable.
Ask our guys in Afghanistan and Iraq. They will tell you they face a thinking, nimble, adaptable enemy that in many ways has shown genius as they have stalemated and finessed us in many ways in Iraq.
You use the argument "book smart" vs. "street smart". If street smart beats learning, 1 out of every 4 black men in America wouldn't have a prison record, and well-learned groups would be poor.
Street smarts are oversold. Islamoids are underestimated in both their evil and their brains...
These men are from the same socioeconomic background as many from the political left. They are all educated at the same institutions that instill in them the disdain for western civilization. One group expresses this disdain through secular leftism, the other choose their own religion. Albeit the most virulent, radical strain of said religion. So of course the oath to "do no harm" is ignored in favor of something "higher." Factor in the elitism practiced and instilled in students at these exclusive institutions along with the lowly way non-believers are looked upon by adherents of Islam and it all makes quite an interesting result.
Just a thought. Or thoughts.
Amazing, really. Were they those "stupid" black people who got herded into concentration camps, took off their shoes because they were told to, found themselves killed by Zyklon B in the gas chambers, and then got incinerated? Or could they have been Cedarford's favorite insanely intelligent utopian bookworms?
Empathy is essential to winning a war, for war is not merely a test of strength but about getting an intuitive sense of what the enemy will do at any given time, just as a rancher will know where a cow will hide her calf. Fanaticism can go only so far. No amount of fanaticism will win a wrestling match against a strong opponent if the fanatic is weak and unprepared. And no amount of strength will mean anything if one is blind, that is, unless one is so foolish to put a strong blind prisoner into a position where he can crash the pillars of a temple! Our enemy's lack of empathy is our asset. Let’s use it against him.
Of course, if Cedarford truly had empathy for his enemies, he would understand that Judaism at least as presently constituted is flatly incapable of ruling the rest of humanity or even attempting to do so. Jews are a fractious and argumentative lot who are marginally capable of ruling themselves! Three rabbis, four opinions. Sure, the United States would not have gotten nuclear weapons if it hadn’t been for Jewish scientists and particularly one Hungarian-born Jew named Leo Szilard. But he was one of those rare men who combine book learning, imagination, street smarts, and a hatred of Nazis. (Now, how many folks from al-Qaeda read science fiction, let alone write it?)
And actually, the most highly regarded Jews aren’t rich. The hidden strength of market dominant minorities is that they don’t value money as much as they value learning.
Cedarford, I have a recommendation for you. Don’t eat fugu. Leave that delicacy for someone else.
The problem I see is that Britain has imported as many terrorists as they can lay claim to, have no plan on expulsing them, and the US has difficulties in discerning radical Britons and moderate Britons. Perhaps it’s time to call the whole allies thing off before their infection takes over the US as well, though we seem as manic in our gathering of Hispanic, anti-American hate mongers.
Our Mexicans no speaka da Engleesh, so how the hell are they gonna follow a bomb diagram? AND they are much too much in love with their rides to ever 'splode them. Although they do have a headstart on the macho mustaches.
"if Cedarford truly had empathy for his enemies"
... or anything bearing a vague resemblance to an IQ ...
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