Glorietta 2 Bombing: A Message In A Box?

``The idealist argument -- that a country that pursues only its physical and economic security will lose its moral foundation -- is not a frivolous argument. At a certain point, the pursuit of security requires the pursuit of power, and the pursuit of power is corrupting. At the same time, pursuing justice without a sufficiently large sword will get you whipped.”-George Friedman, Stratfor

Our deepest condolences and sympathies to those affected by the recent blasts in Glorietta 2.

Coming across the news reports, numerous speculations or accusations had been made as to who or which party has been responsible for such dastardly act. Of course, the easiest part is to fingerpoint, the hardest part is to produce evidence supporting such allegation.

Most of the missions undertaken by terrorists are about political missives or symbolisms which it desires to project or convey to the public or to their constituents. Usually deaths and destructions are merely associate collateral damages or part of the props of which the culprits or perpetrators use to highlight their message.

Take the case of the infamous Sept 11, the said essence of such undertaking was to send a message to some ideological religious factions that the perceived impregnable state of the US was actually “vulnerable” to attack, and simultaneously should have stirred as a rallying point for similar religious ideological upheavals in some parts of the world.

According to Stratfor’s Fred Burton (emphasis mine), ``Among its primary objectives in carrying out the 9/11 attacks was sending a message of empowerment to the Muslim people and sparking a general uprising that would culminate in the rebirth of the Caliphate. While the envisioned uprising did not materialize, it has become increasingly obvious that al Qaeda's message of empowerment and the call to jihad has resonated strongly with some people.

``Another objective of 9/11 was to spark an American retaliation -- a goal in which al Qaeda obviously succeeded. The U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq have been viewed by many in the Muslim world as aggression against Islam, and for grassroots militants (especially those of Generation Y) this is reason enough to act.”

Put simply, if a mission was specifically designed to transmit a particular message then the underlying tactical operatives had been thoroughly acquired as to signify its context.

Said differently, the targets was not picked out of the blues or by mere randomness, the Glorietta 2 attack was deliberately determined, planned and executed like any high profile terrorist projects over the past years in order convey a particular message directed to a specific audience.

For instance, it took Al Qaeda’s 9/11 about two years for realization. In the same frame, it is highly probable that the Glorietta 2 project had taken some considerable time period for gestation. The implication that anyone could have pulled out such events randomly for specious political goals runs on the lines of politically biased and logically incongruent arguments. If the latter had been the truism then evidently Metro Manila bombings would have been a regular fare or subjected to daily if not weekly bombings.

To the point that if the objective had been simply to scare off investors, then the potential targets could have been instead the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas or the Asian Development Bank, the NAIA, Export Processing zones or even the Philippine Stock Exchange.

Or why not Boracay or known beaches or tourism spots where foreigners frequent as the Bali bombers targeted in 2002…if foreigners had been the target? This apparently isn’t so.

Now using the same line of reasoning we ask why Glorietta 2? Why NOT the other malls or marketplaces?

Given the security complacency arising from the recent nonevents, our two cents tells us that these areas had been equally vulnerable if such had been their premeditated goal.

On the other hand, if the objective was allegedly to create a “martial law” atmosphere, then simultaneous terrorist activities all over the metropolis ala the Rizal Day December 2000 irrespective of the quality of the targets would have been more plausible to paint the appearance of concerted destabilization or to portray the inability of the administration to secure the premises of its sovereignty, most especially within its natural domain, the Malacañang. Hence, the required police or military state.

For a martial law planner, the more the incidences, the better, as the degree of casualties won’t be much of a concern relative to the scale of attacks. But this doesn’t look so, as the large number of casualties appears to be part and parcel of the design.

Yet, a one-off event like Glorietta 2 unlikely justifies the “purported” mission. This is not 1972, where communists groups were at the fringes waiting for the opportunity to pounce on the metropolis for control, from which the administration had sufficiently used an alleged internally generated ambush to secure a mandate for 14-year dictatorship. Meanwhile, the residual rabid Communists regimes of today are fast decaying societies so much so that the progressive counterparts have “opened” their economies and culture to a much globalized world. In short, there exists no conditional resemblance to 1972 to rationalize such actuations.

The allegation of employing political diversion is a probable motive but seemingly not a compelling one, unless one has become so desperate as to distort their values to exact tributes of blood from the populace. And this applies to both political camps. Political diversion or destabilization can always come in different forms or avenues without the necessary bloodletting especially from the vulnerable public, from which we ask anew why Glorietta 2?

Lastly we must not forget that the executioners of the plot are risk takers, in other words, success of their mission depends on the continued secrecy and the effective precision implementation by the participants involved in exchange for a desired goal.

As risk takers they require calculated action. And perhaps these incorporates operational procedures such as detailed planning, surveillance, logistics and resource mobilization, role modeling to actual execution. Any miscues would have given them away to the web of intelligence of the authorities or to the mall securities. A single deviation jeopardizes the entire project or diminishes the efficacy of their mission.

This runs in contrast to the common perception brought about by media reporting-bombers don’t just walk into malls and casually explode themselves to thy kingdom come. These are not suicide bombers. Nor do they walk in liberally unchecked by the security to deliver their package and leave. That would look too easy and would be seeing these happen all too frequently.

Nonetheless, it is unlikely too that such misdeed could represent as vindictive action against the owners of the property. The risks and logistics involved are simply too high in order to attain an “emotional/egotistical” outcome.

Of course, we could be wrong about all of these. But the likelihood is that the architect/s of such despicable act is one/are those that bears some malevolent ideological underpinnings against the local elite from which their message appears to be directed at. As to what benefits was gained or would be gained is simply beyond us for now.

But as the recent event shows, politics like the markets appear to function somewhat similarly in the sense that people can easily attribute causes to events to the point of absurdity or incredulousness.