Thank you, CNN. The gendarme is looking, or should be looking, for a few good investigators like you.
The concept of "loon wolves" is helpful (and brilliant wordplay).
When causation is mixed it is difficult, sometimes impossible, to identify exclusively one factor. You start out with a beaker of water and a carton of Morton's. Two separate things. But when you pour the Morton's into the water you now have salt water and it is next to impossible to make them separate again.
In Orlando the mixture was Islam, IS, America, homosexuality, Omar Mateen's sexuality, his mental state, who his victims were, his prior violence, his weapons, and massacre. The factors in Nice are Islam, IS, France, Bouhlel's mental state, who his victims were, his weapon, and massacre. It becomes a judgment call. That's what we do here! With Orlando it was my judgment that the availability of guns was a non-factor; Mateen's prior violence was remote to causation. I adjudged Mateen's claim of acting for IS and IS's claim that Mateen acted for IS as non-principal causes. It was my judgment that Mateen's sexuality and guilt/rage at his sexuality were the principal causes, the guilt and rage a product of his religion's, Islam's, condemnation of homosexuality.
In Nice-the CNN report provides all the evidence I have to go on-I was struck when I first heard the news of the attack by the weapon, the truck, immense, impossible to stop, either in the moment or proactively, driven into a crowd of unsuspecting celebrants. 18-wheelers don't kill people, people kill people? It was a weapon of inspired evil, low-tech, I immediately thought of the 9/11 hijackers' weapons. And I thought of the victims, unsuspecting civilians in both cases. Both were suicide missions.
Islam (1) attacks, that is, it is more violent than other religions (2) unsuspecting (3) civilians (4) in suicide missions. Islam learned in its defeats in the Crusades that it could not defeat Christendom with armies. In the centuries since the Crusades Islam has practiced guerilla warfare. They tried conventional war again in 1948, 1956, 1967 and 1973 with the usual results and decided, "If we can't defeat the Jews, fuck this conventional war bullshit."
Muslim men welcome death but they fear, more so than do Christian men, physical pain. Suffering torture, enduring excruciating physical pain, and stoic courage in the face of torture are at the foundation of Christianity, they are how Jesus of Nazareth became Jesus Christ. The Muslim fighter is comparatively "cowardly" to the Christian fighter.
All of those factors are present in Bouhlel's massacre-by-truck in Nice, they "fit" Islam's modus operandi and they point compellingly to Islam as the principal cause. There is a compelling conceptual "link," to use the French Interior Minister's word, that we make intellectually between the Nice massacre and the Orlando massacre and the 9/11 massacre, massacres in general, and Islam. Bouhlel "radicalized very quickly" Minister Cazeneuve tells the world. The point is, you don't have to be a "soldier" of the Islamic State to commit a massacre, being Islamic would provide you the necessary instruction. That link was present in 9/11, but it was not in Orlando, in my judgment. The vast majority of the world's Muslims do not perpetrate massacres, they do not do massacre-think at all. Islam is neither a necessary nor a sufficient cause.
In this context of linkage and causation and judgment, what are we to make of Bouhlel being contemptuous of religion generally? Of not attending mosque? That weakens the link. A link, a fit, is evidence, circumstantial evidence, it is compelling circumstantial evidence. To prove guilt, i.e. to establish causation, circumstantial evidence must be consistent with guilt and inconsistent with any reasonable hypothesis of innocence, i.e. of no causation. In Anglo-American law anyway, not under the Napoleonic code.
In my judgment, IS causation is not established in the Nice massacre.
Radical Islam causation is not established.
Islam causation is not established.
All are present, all are factors, all are in the mix in the beaker. None caused. They were factors of convenience, chosen, like the truck, because they were near at hand, they were what he knew, they were useful.
We then look to other factors. Mental illness. I was struck in the first reports by witness descriptions of Bouhlel having a "smile" on his face as he ran people down. Certainly consistent with radical Islamist causation! They were cheering on the West Bank when the twin towers came down! Consistent also with mental illness.
I can taste the salt in the beaker. I can also taste the water. I know that they are both there. I cannot extract the one from the other after they have been mixed without great difficulty. In my judgment the rank ordering of the causal factors in Mohamed Bouhlel's terrorist attack in Nice, France are:
1(A). Islam.
1(B). Mental illness.
2. IS.
3. France.
The concept of "loon wolves" is helpful (and brilliant wordplay).
When causation is mixed it is difficult, sometimes impossible, to identify exclusively one factor. You start out with a beaker of water and a carton of Morton's. Two separate things. But when you pour the Morton's into the water you now have salt water and it is next to impossible to make them separate again.
In Orlando the mixture was Islam, IS, America, homosexuality, Omar Mateen's sexuality, his mental state, who his victims were, his prior violence, his weapons, and massacre. The factors in Nice are Islam, IS, France, Bouhlel's mental state, who his victims were, his weapon, and massacre. It becomes a judgment call. That's what we do here! With Orlando it was my judgment that the availability of guns was a non-factor; Mateen's prior violence was remote to causation. I adjudged Mateen's claim of acting for IS and IS's claim that Mateen acted for IS as non-principal causes. It was my judgment that Mateen's sexuality and guilt/rage at his sexuality were the principal causes, the guilt and rage a product of his religion's, Islam's, condemnation of homosexuality.
In Nice-the CNN report provides all the evidence I have to go on-I was struck when I first heard the news of the attack by the weapon, the truck, immense, impossible to stop, either in the moment or proactively, driven into a crowd of unsuspecting celebrants. 18-wheelers don't kill people, people kill people? It was a weapon of inspired evil, low-tech, I immediately thought of the 9/11 hijackers' weapons. And I thought of the victims, unsuspecting civilians in both cases. Both were suicide missions.
Islam (1) attacks, that is, it is more violent than other religions (2) unsuspecting (3) civilians (4) in suicide missions. Islam learned in its defeats in the Crusades that it could not defeat Christendom with armies. In the centuries since the Crusades Islam has practiced guerilla warfare. They tried conventional war again in 1948, 1956, 1967 and 1973 with the usual results and decided, "If we can't defeat the Jews, fuck this conventional war bullshit."
Muslim men welcome death but they fear, more so than do Christian men, physical pain. Suffering torture, enduring excruciating physical pain, and stoic courage in the face of torture are at the foundation of Christianity, they are how Jesus of Nazareth became Jesus Christ. The Muslim fighter is comparatively "cowardly" to the Christian fighter.
All of those factors are present in Bouhlel's massacre-by-truck in Nice, they "fit" Islam's modus operandi and they point compellingly to Islam as the principal cause. There is a compelling conceptual "link," to use the French Interior Minister's word, that we make intellectually between the Nice massacre and the Orlando massacre and the 9/11 massacre, massacres in general, and Islam. Bouhlel "radicalized very quickly" Minister Cazeneuve tells the world. The point is, you don't have to be a "soldier" of the Islamic State to commit a massacre, being Islamic would provide you the necessary instruction. That link was present in 9/11, but it was not in Orlando, in my judgment. The vast majority of the world's Muslims do not perpetrate massacres, they do not do massacre-think at all. Islam is neither a necessary nor a sufficient cause.
In this context of linkage and causation and judgment, what are we to make of Bouhlel being contemptuous of religion generally? Of not attending mosque? That weakens the link. A link, a fit, is evidence, circumstantial evidence, it is compelling circumstantial evidence. To prove guilt, i.e. to establish causation, circumstantial evidence must be consistent with guilt and inconsistent with any reasonable hypothesis of innocence, i.e. of no causation. In Anglo-American law anyway, not under the Napoleonic code.
In my judgment, IS causation is not established in the Nice massacre.
Radical Islam causation is not established.
Islam causation is not established.
All are present, all are factors, all are in the mix in the beaker. None caused. They were factors of convenience, chosen, like the truck, because they were near at hand, they were what he knew, they were useful.
We then look to other factors. Mental illness. I was struck in the first reports by witness descriptions of Bouhlel having a "smile" on his face as he ran people down. Certainly consistent with radical Islamist causation! They were cheering on the West Bank when the twin towers came down! Consistent also with mental illness.
I can taste the salt in the beaker. I can also taste the water. I know that they are both there. I cannot extract the one from the other after they have been mixed without great difficulty. In my judgment the rank ordering of the causal factors in Mohamed Bouhlel's terrorist attack in Nice, France are:
1(A). Islam.
1(B). Mental illness.
2. IS.
3. France.
