Replies to post #14235 on The Black Box

[satorino]

Your analysis has a good logical support, but it is wrong. It was the ETA.
Sat.

[Alex G]

what a senseless tragedy... those trains were packed with students...

as for the perpetrators, looks likely it was ETA

This is from a weblog --

1) It fits their MO. The bombs were made with small quantities, 8-12 kilos, of titadyne and what they're calling "compressed dynamite", which is the standard ETA technique.

2) The operation was within their capacity. To pull this one off you would need a bombmaker, who obviously never got anywhere near the trains; a couple of spies to spend a couple of weeks scouting the ground; a couple of people to transport the bombs; somebody running a safe house or two; and the actual bomb planters. While ETA is weakened and on its last legs, they've got the capability to pull off an operation of this size. They didn't need any specially trained pilots or suicide fanatics or the ability to beat airport security or huge amounts of money or international connections to commit such a massacre. All they needed was a hundred kilos of explosives, a skilled bombmaker, and 15-20 conspirators who may well have been working in several different cells.

3) It fits their recent history. The most significant clue is that on Dec. 24, 2003, they planted a bomb on a train in San Sebastian that was timed to go off when the train reached Chamartin Station in Madrid. Fortunately, the bomb planters were caught and the train was stopped at Burgos, where the bomb was discovered. The MO was exactly the same as in the Madrid bombings except that the bomb was larger, 50 kilos of titadyne, and hidden inside a suitcase rather than backpacks.

On Feb. 9 of this year, an ETA caravan was stopped by the French police near Bordeaux. They were carrying all sorts of weapons and explosives to be passed to a new commando inside Spain.

Then, on the last weekend of February 2004, the police stopped another ETA caravan at Cuenca with more than 500 kilos of explosives that were to be used for terrorist attacks in Madrid.

4) It fits in with the election campaign; general elections are to be held on Sunday, March 14, in two days. ETA has tried to disrupt general elections every time Spain has had them. Most famously, during the 1995 election campaign (April 19), they tried to assassinate Jose Maria Aznar, then PP candidate for Prime Minister. Aznar survived the bombing because of his armored limousine. A passer-by was killed.

5) The story that ETA "always gives a warning" before planting a bomb is simply false. They didn't give a warning when they loaded that bomb on the train in San Sebastian, for example. Or on July 14, 1986, when a bomb killed 12 people and wounded 50 in Madrid. Or on December 11, 1985, when a bomb in Madrid killed six people and wounded 19. Or on October 30, 2000, when a bomb killed three and wounded 66 in Madrid. Or on June 21, 1993, when a bomb killed seven people and wounded more than 30 in Madrid. Or on June 19, 1987, when a bomb killed 21 and wounded hundreds at the Hipercor department store on Avenida Meridiana here in Barcelona.

6) The behavior of Arnaldo Otegui, "leader" of Batasuna, the political branch of ETA. He denied ETA involvement in the bombings and blamed a group of "Islamic activists". Otegui was the first person to publicly float the hypothesis that this was an Al Qaeda bombing, though he didn't say Al Qaeda. Now, I personally don't believe anything Arnaldo Otegui says. You can believe what you want.

7) The facts are that the only other clues linking Islamic terrorists to the Madrid bombings are a) an e-mail from somebody saying he was from the Martyr Abu Hafs Al Masri Brigade, who has claimed to be behind everything from the UN bombing in Baghdad to the Marriott Hotel bombing in Jakarta to the blackout in the US Northeast, falsely, and b) a cassette tape with Koran verses on it found in a van linked to the bombing. That's awfully slim evidence. Also, the fact that Reuters jumped all over circumstance a) makes me extremely suspicious. Reuters is not at the top of my list of most trusted international news services.

[sylvester80]

NEWS: Why Spain thinks it's the ETA
[ed: Clearly the ETA activity right before the Madrid incident points directly to them IMO.]
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4516956/
Recent incidents steer suspicion toward ETA
Suspects linked to group arrested with explosives
By Robert Windrem
Producer
NBC News
Updated: 6:57 p.m. ET March 12, 2004
NBC News has obtained a report a private consultant wrote for German intelligence earlier this year regarding recent evidence of the resurgence of the Basque separatist group ETA. The consultant met with Spanish intelligence and police in preparing the report.

Here are the findings:

On Dec. 17, there was a shootout near the town of La Coruna, Spain, in which a policeman was killed and an ETA operative severely wounded. Police had stopped a car at a checkpoint and found 132 kilograms of explosives — 290 pounds — and were told by the two men arrested that the ETA planned to construct one 90-kilogram — 200-pound — explosive plus additional explosives for an attack on train stations and shopping malls, all planned for Dec. 24, Christmas Eve. The two men, who admitted to ETA ties, were 24 and 26 years old. The plan for the train station attack called for multiple simultaneous attacks on the Chamartin train station in Madrid, which was not among the stations attacked Thursday.

On Dec. 24, Spanish authorities arrested two Basque men, also in their 20s. The first was traveling from San Sebastian in the Basque territories to Madrid on an Intercity train. Acting on a tip from another intelligence agency, the police opened his suitcase and found a bomb. The police then searched the rest of the train and found another suitcase bomb, although this one was missing a fuse. After interrogating the first man, they were able to arrest a second man in Hernani, near San Sebastian. The two suitcases contained 28 kilograms (about 62 pounds) of titadyne, an industrial form of dynamite. Both men identified themselves as ETA. The first man was armed.

The police learned that the train was scheduled to arrive at Chamartin station at 3:12 p.m., and the timing fuse on the first bomb was set for 3:55 p.m. It is not known whether the men planned to leave the bomb on board or move it to another location at the station. The station would have been filled with holiday travelers on their way into and out of the Spanish capital.

Then, on Feb. 29 in the town Canaveras, near Cuenca, about 90 miles southeast of Madrid, police stopped a van headed for the capital and found 506 kilograms (1,111 pounds) of chloratite, an explosive similar to ammonium nitrate. When the van was pulled over, the driver told police that he was ETA and that they should be careful because the van was filled with explosives. He also told them he was following another explosives-laden car that was serving as a scout, warning of possible police activity ahead. As it turned out, that car had been involved in a severe road accident. Police quickly cordoned off that car. In it they found 30 kilograms (66 pounds) of dynamite. Both men were in their early 20s.

Police also found a map of an industrial area near Madrid and theorized the bomb was meant for hotels or publishing houses in the area, specifically the newspaper offices of La Razon and ABC, both strongly anti-ETA. The two men ultimately told police that their entire load was intended for a car bomb, which would have created a crater 100 feet across and could have killed hundreds.

Spanish police believed that ETA planned an attack near the date of Spain's elections, but thought they had foiled it with the Feb. 29 seizure.

Finally, Spanish police learned that ETA planned to blow up eight electrical stations around Madrid on the eve of the wedding of Crown Prince Philippe May 22, hoping to black out the weddings.

Robert Windrem is an investigative producer for NBC News based in New York.