What do they really want?
I dont find it shameful to admit that terrorism used to be something so far removed from my life as Iraq. Infact, when an Indian friend in Singapore expressed shock and sympathy for the victims of 9/11, it angered me. She had never felt a thing for the hundreds who die in the Kashmir valley every year. Why was she being so tearful abt Uncle Sam's fate? Afterall, she had not lost anyone she even knew.

Mumbai has changed that. There's a lump in my throat every time I read a story abt it. I always travel by the locals when I'm in Mumbai. Yes, it could've been me or anyone I love.

Back in Bangalore, companies are sending out disturbing security instructions: Avoid public transport, avoid hanging around crowded public areas. It makes me smile. Where are we headed? Is it really possible to stop this madness? Can any police in the world prevent bombs from being planted and at least a few of them from exploding?

I take a BMTC bus around 6:30 pm everyday. Its usually packed. And its a bloody soft target (there are even softer ones, if only you look hard enough). Sadly, there's little that can be done abt it. Any amount of intelligence effort or prior information cannot prevent it as for every move there's a countermove. For every act of prevention, there's another act of innovation. Hell, you dont even need to "innovate", just  "observe".

Unfortunately, terror has no logic. TOI is carrying this madly absurd theory to explain it all. If they really wanted to kill Gujjus, isn't it obvious where one has the greatest probability of finding them? Or does terrorism work on the basis of "kill target, plus kill innocent, hence arouse anger"?

But isnt everyone (who dies) innocent? What do they really want? And can anyone ever do anything to stop it? May be I have a limited capacity to rationalise, but the silence is chilling.

Update: myrch states an interesting perspective in his post about Israel and its current offensive against Lebanon. He writes:

...the situation is complicated, and its history does entail a long list of offensive maneuvers; Arabs attack Israel, Israel attacks Arabs, Arabs attack Israel, etc. The fact that attacks have been wrought by both sides does not persuade a reasonable person to conclude Israel and its Arab neighbors are equally wrong. This sort of lazy thinking is regrettably common. If Israel and the Arabs are equally wrong, I doubt Jordan and Egypt would have signed peace treaties with Israel, tenuous as those treaties are at the moment.

I agree. And I do feel Israel is justified, to a certain extent, simply because it faces hostility for just existing. 

What if India gave up Kashmir and allowed a democratically elected govn to be installed there? Is that the panacea we're looking for? Would that end all Pak initiated terror?