Praying and paying homage to the departed in Terror brutal attack

The Burning TAJ

The list of the Departed

World Reacts

14,499 WAS THE number of terror attacks worldwide in 2007, compared to 11,156 in 2005. Almost 43 per cent— about 6,200—occurred in Iraq, where 13,600 fatalities—60 per cent of the worldwide total—were reported in 2007, according to the US National Counterterrorism Center’s Country Report on Terrorism 2007.

1795 WAS WHEN the word terrorism was invented, in connection with the French revolutionaries who executed their enemies. But terrorism as we know it today is hought to have taken its roots after the Arab-Israeli Six-Day War in 1967. After the Israelis occupied the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the PLO hijacked planes. They raided the Olympic village in Munich, in 1972, killing 17 Israeli athletes.

1,111 PEOPLE KILLED in terrorist attacks in India this year till November 24, two days before the Mumbai terrorist attacks.

$430 BILLION IS the amount that the US Congress has spent since 2001 on military and diplomatic efforts in support of the Global War on Terrorism.

1 BILLION DOLLARS is what it would cost the world to stop one catastrophic terrorist event, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal Doubling the Interpol budget and allocating one-tenth of the IMF’s yearly financial monitoring and capacity-building budget to tracing ter rorist funds would cost about $128 million annually.

22 FOREIGN NATIONALS DEAD, AMONG THEM

5 ISRAELIS,

5 AMERICANS,

2 EACH FROM CANADA, AUSTRALIA AND FRANCE,

AND

ONE EACH FROM SINGAPORE, JAPAN, GERMANY, THAILAND, ITALY AND THE UK

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Some questions about the terror attacks

Source REdiff.com

November 28, 2008 11:50 IST
Last Updated: November 28, 2008 14:16 IST
Some unanswered questions about the terrorist attacks in Mumbai need to be answered. If you wish to add questions to this list, please do e-mail questionsterror@rediffmail.com and we will post the most relevant questions here.

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How many terrorists were there? Did they number 20 as Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh told a press conference on Thursday? Or did they number many more? If two or three terrorists attacked the CST, how many terrorists were present at the Taj and Trident? Did the CST terrorists drop a grenade/explosive device at Dockyard Road on the way to the station? Or was someone else responsible for that act of terror which claimed three lives?

The terrorists are said to have set up control rooms at the Taj and Trident hotels, a Cabinet minister told PTI on Thursday. When were these bookings made? A detailed investigation into the bookings made at both hotels in the months, weeks and days before the attacks may reveal the names of suspicious guests who registered there.

Military sources tell rediff.com that there was no way the terrorists could have carried so much ammunition with them when they assaulted the two hotels with their guns blazing. They believe the ammunition may have been stored earlier in rooms at both the hotels, perhaps on the higher floors.

If some of the terrorists had registered at the hotels earlier, could these men/women have left along with the guests who were released? Did the police record the identities and addresses of the guests who were released from both hotels?

Indian Hotels Chairman Ratan Tata indicated on Thursday that the terrorists had intimate knowledge of the Taj, its service corridors, its layout. Does this mean that they had a mole inside the Taj? Or more worrying, did a couple of them work there at some point of time? Did they have drawings of the layout of the two hotels?

If the terrorists were Pakistani, how did they have such an intimate knowledge of the terrain? The two or three cowards who attacked the CST on Wednesday night made their way from the CST through a road on the left side of The Times of India building towards the Cama and Albess hospital/Azad Maidan police station, a route that is known only to true-blood Mumbaikars. Were they locals? Or did they conduct extensive reconnisance of the likely routes of escape?

These same two or three men, who are said to have commandeered ATS Chief Hemant Karkare’s [Images] police Qualis after shooting him, Additional Commissioner of Police Ashok Kamte and Inspector Vijay Salaskar, revealed similar familarity with the road outside the Esplanade Court, making an easy U-turn towards the Metro cinema junction rather than head on the road towards the CST. How did they know this if they were Pakistanis?

How did those men, whose images have appeared all over the world, get to the CST from Colaba where they are said to have landed by boat? Did they take a taxi? Or did they have local transportation? Did they come by a suburban train, which could explain the firing on one of the suburban train platforms? Who left the grenade on the Gitanjali Express, which killed a Bengali mother?

The terrorists are said to have done extensive reconnisance of the city. If they are Pakistanis, how did they get earlier entry to the city unnoticed? Did they come in by boat? Or did they use other routes to escape notice?

Such an operation could not have been conducted without extensive training and preparation, possibly on models of the Taj and Trident or Chabad House/Nariman House. Could this have been achieved at the rudimentary training camps hosted by the Lashkar-e-Tayiba in Pakistan occupied Kashmir? Or was it a more systematised operation conducted by a State agency in a hostile country?

How did they know Chabad House/Nariman House, which even long-time residents of Colaba — the area in South Mumbai where the Taj, the Leopold Cafe [Images] and Chabad/Nariman House are located — are unfamiliar with? The choice of this target indicates precision thinking — it is doubtful if the Lashkar strategists are capable of such deep strategy — and again points the needle of suspicion at a government intelligence agency in a nation inimical to India or renegades within such a bureau.

Early on Thursday morning, the television channels spoke about an exchange of fire between the terrorists and the police near the Liberty cinema (which is close to the Metro cinema/Cama hospital, but situated on an inner road). There was even fear expressed that these terrorists would enter the Bombay hospital, but nothing was heard about them thereafter. Where did they go? Were these two/three terrorists the same men who took over the police Qualis and shot at people near the Metro junction? Or have they escaped?

The police say the two men, who took over the Qualis, grabbed the Skoda that was halted at a police road block near the Girgaum Chowpatty [Images] beach. One of them was later killed by the police. Where did the other man go? Is he the Ismail, the Lashkar terrorist who is appparently singing like a canary to the police? Or is he someone else? If these are the two of the three terrorists who attacked the CST, what happened to the third man seen in photographs and video captures? Where did he vanish?

Another terrorist is said to be in custody. Where was he captured? What has he told the police?

The Times of India reported on Friday morning that wellknown food critic Sabina Sehgal-Saikia’s cellular phone recorded activity in the Raigad area, which is located across the sea from the Taj, where she was staying on the night of the attacks? Nothing has been heard from Saikia for over a day, so how did her phone reach Raigad? Could one of the terrorists have escaped under the guise of a guest to the Raigad area?

Could some of the terrorists have come by boat from the Alibag-Murud Janjira area in Maharashtra’s Raigad district, rather than from Pakistan? Boats ply through the day from the Alibaug area to the Gateway of India, and it would be easy for terrorists to use this mode of transport rather than high-speed boats which would have attracted the Coast Guard’s attention.

If the attacks were restricted to South Mumbai for logistical reasons, who was responsible for the explosion on the taxi near the Santa Cruz airport in northwest Mumbai, which is located at least 25 km from Colaba?

Uttara wants to know:

If the terrorists are interested in something, how come they have not made any demands in spite of having taken so many hostages? If they kept the hostages for so long, they should have started negotiations also. This indicates that they have some other, larger ultimate objective. What is that, and has it been investigated?

The Deccan Mujahideen [Images] may or may not be a valid front. Has the Andhra Pradesh police and security forces started investigating that? What are the results of that?

Has there been any additional discussion on the terrorists who might have escaped into Bombay city, apart from these three locations? If the dead terrorists had blueprints of the major areas in the city, it means that they might launch an attack on these locations after the Taj, Oberoi and Colaba encounters are over. Have the police been investigating this, and has there been any safety precautions? The names of these places should be circulated, and civilians asked to refrain from going to those locations, so that casualties can be at a minimum. When will this be done?

Ravi wants to know:

Why did the terrorists not blow up the full building itself? What can be the reason for this? I do not believe that they do not have the ammunition for that or planning. I believe if they wanted they could have done it.

Winnie wants to know:

What is the Navy doing around the Colaba area? Why is it not monitoring or keeping a check on what goes on in the seas just below its nose?

Why doesn’t Mumbai have enough fire ladders or other equipment which can put out fires like the ones set at the Taj?

Even in a terrorist attack why are most of our constabulary seen with antique rifles and without bulletproof attire?

Why are civilians seen in and around the affected areas in spite of a curfew call?

Why do the best hotels in Mumbai have such pathetic security?

Govind wants to know:

Are the CCTV records of the hotels available?

Assuming such large quantities of weapons had been pre-stored in the hotels, is there any security system to search these bags while being taken to the hotel?

Are there any missing hotel staff after the attack?

Rajendra wants to know:

How come the terrorists were able to fight for more then 40 hours? This is very clear that all these people got the arms and weapons ready on site in advance. Isn’t this a question on the qualification and intelligence of our police and all other security agencies?

Sujoy wants to know:

Manmohan Singh [Images] has claimed that this terror attack has been executed by external forces. What proof has the government got in order to make such a claim? Every time a situation like this happens, the government of India makes such claims and then they give no proof to anyone, especially the common people who are always kept in dark.

Vinu wants to know:

When the commandos of the navy and the army are there why were ATS officers involved in the operation, who are ill equipped and lost their life? The man who ordered this should be held responsible for the death of bright officers and must be procecuted.

Lokesh wants to know:

Why the BCCI does not organise India-Pakistan cricket matches on neutral grounds? How many Pakistanis return after the match? How many sneak through on a tourist visa?

Why cant we have a centralised SSN (Social Security Number) system in India?

Amit wants to know:

Whether there are terrorists holed up in other parts of Mumbai and surroundings, as they were inside those targeted hotels? What action is necessary for those hiding terrorists in other parts, right now unknown to us?

How did they procure AK-56 rifles? What action is necessary which need to be taken for controling smuggling of these weapons inside Indian territory?

Are we planning to carry out operations inside Pakistan where the terrorists’ headquarters are firmly believed to be located, if Pakistan cannot capture those responsible and as we have every right for pre-emptive action?

Whether we will take help of the Pakistan government and other countries in conducting such secret operations inside Pakistan to capture terrorists, as the United States is doing presently inside Pakistan if their weak system cannot achieve this?

Will military training be made compulsory for a few years for every Indian citizen as we even did not have a small division of NSG available in Mumbai, and as we face a situation like Israel facing terrorism from all geographical directions? 6. What will be done to improve on all aspects of our defence, through strengthening our economy? How India will be again made an economically attractive place? 7. Will there be a separate agency to carry out regular security checks at all places over fix intervals, as this incident reveals that we have the enemy within to whom we are not reaching?