The Criticism of Unheeded Warnings

The latest coming out of the Mumbai attacks is that the U.S. warned them a month ago that this could happen.

Although I eventually became no fan of the Bush administration for various weaknesses, one of the most unfair lobbed at them was the fact that they were warned of attacks before 9/11 and did nothing.

My argument is...how many warnings are out there? How many times are warnings made and nothing happens? Even in the post-9/11 world. You have to devote resources, every day, to something that may or may not happen. This, of course, plays right into the hands of those who make terrorism their vocation.

I think, just like any other crime, terrorism is something that can never be stamped out completely. It's entirely too random to predict everywhere, every time. The best you can do is stop what you can and punish those responsible. Plus, try to find an economical way to be on the lookout when threats are made. I think if everything in the known universe is implemented, you still will have bad things happen.

By the way, the warnings remind me of this post, in which a friend related to me events on the subway. The day of the Mumbai attacks, "unsubstantiated" threats concerning the NYC subway system were being made.

Let's make something very clear: this is likely something that's in the works whether it's unsubstantiated or not. But the awful truth is that the NYC subway system is vast, and the busiest stations can be accessed by merely finding a below-the-radar, sparsely populated station and riding the train in (or making a transfer). You would need cops, military personnel, secret service, the works to man more than 400 stations, 24/7, and either search everyone or have the most perfect suspicious mind to figure out who's up to no good.

So even if a warning came in tomorrow and all sorts of homeland security descended on the NYC subways, they would have to enforce a massive inconvenience for everyone, something along the lines of closing down the less-frequented stations and making everyone go into the manned stations, causing human gridlock, stuffed trains, serial lateness. The idea would be, "Well, yeah, it's inconvenient, but we saved lives," but it would only be a temporary solution.

I'm just saying...to prevent any kind of crime is difficult and would require lots of resources.

Religious Tolerance Put to the Test

Last night at work as things wound down, a friend of mine told me about something that happened at the Jay Street/Borough Hall subway stop, a stop in Brooklyn that is close to Manhattan and is a transfer point between the F, A, and C trains.

Arab men and women got on my friend's F train and split up. The men got into different corners and began to pray loudly and the women, dressed in full garb (and sunglasses), were using one of those clicker/counters to count...something. The only real explanation would be that they were counting the number of people. I can't imagine they were counting the number of Jameson Whiskey ads around the car.

Needless to say, the other passengers on the car got off at the next stop.

We're in a very dangerous time. Because there are people who want to kill us, we probably should be on our guard. But New York is a highly liberal area, as much of a target as it is, and it tries its hardest to be tolerant of all lifestyles. The problem is, there's no way to know who is benevolent (which I would assume is most people) and who is not. And when something of this nature occurs on a subway, the New York response is, initially, to be tolerant of it. However, this is a case where people tested this tolerance to the limit.

This is apparently the second time this month my friend has seen this. She wondered if she should have said something, figuring someone probably did. Almost everyone she talked to, including me, said, "Yeah, probably should have."

To anyone who could possibly know better, I'd like to hear a good explanation for this behavior on a train. This goes beyond religion when you step onto a crowded car and make a spectacle of yourself. This is weird and disturbing to most people. This is post-9/11 and I don't think this kind of thing is acceptable. If your religion believes that you must go and, intentionally or not, look like a coordinated reconnaissance team, then your religion needs alterations.

I more than lean on the side that this was a malevolent event.