What went before

Wretchard at The Belmont Club offers some real insight into the history of Islam's relationship with the Western World. Wretchard first references a link to a Roger L. Simon article: bq. Roger Simon suggests that time spent in places like Ramallah is never wholly wasted because it provides an accurate, if somewhat cynical perspective of the true state of human nature. Wretchard replies: bq. Mr. Simon is too modest. Time spent living in the Third World is an education without which one's understanding of Terror is sadly incomplete. Long before September 11, the Madrid train attack and the massacre of school children in Beslan they were forshadowed by Operation Bojinka, the LRT train attack and the mass abduction of schoolchildren in Basilan. Never heard of them? That's understandable. bq. Operation Bojinka was a series of planning exercises and dry runs in the Philippines in preparation for the September 11 attacks. Here's how Wikipedia describes it. bq. The term can refer to the "airline bombing plot" alone, or that combined with the "Pope assassination plot" and the "CIA plane crash plot". The first refers to a plot to destroy 11 airliners on January 21 and 22, 1995, the second refers to a plan to kill John Paul II on January 15, 1995, and the third refers a plan to crash a plane into the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia and other buildings. Operation Bojinka was prevented on January 6 and 7, 1995, but some lessons learned were apparently used by the planners of the September 11 terrorist attacks. bq. I can still see the Dona Josefa apartments, where these outrages were planned, in my mind's eye. It's along FB Harrison near a dusty children's playground not far from the city zoo. Wretchard then goes on to outline all of the parts of Operation Bojinka including the recent arrest of one of the perpetrators. He also draws a link between the fondness for school abductions/terrorism and the reports that "25 Chechen terrorism suspects have illegally entered the US from Mexico" This 'nuisance' has been developing under our noses for a long long time and the pustule needs to be lanced, cleaned out and disinfected and sewn shut, never to infect again.