Pakistani Taliban: Not Responsible for Boston Bombing

No one has yet claimed responsibility for yesterday's twin bombings at the finish line of the Boston Marathon. The FBI's investigation is ongoing but no suspects have been named. At least one terrorist group, however, is actively denying involvement.
The Pakistani Taliban, an insurgent group focused mostly on the Pakistani state but which claimed responsibility for a failed bomb attack in New York nearly three years ago, has denied any involvement in the bomb blasts at the Boston Marathon on Monday.
The group is responsible for many of the suicide bombings and terror attacks that have wreaked havoc on this South Asian nation for years. It does, however, regard the U.S. as an enemy and helped train Faisal Shahzad, the Pakistani American who confessed to engineering a botched bombing attempt in New York's Times Square in 2010.
So the spitballing continues.
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So the spitballing continues.
The one common denominator in all the "homegrown Jihadi" terror plots so far has been FBI agent provocateur leadership.Perhaps their special needs brothers in the BATFE were trying to get in on the game.
FBI Agent: Hey kid! Wanna learn how to make a bomb? It's totally easy! And you'll be able to punish those evil infidels for supporting Israel and invading Iraq and stuff!
We will just give them "non working bomb parts" whatever those are.
The C4 is actually semi-dry Gak.
I am starting to think this wasn't Islamists. It wasn't a suicide bombing. No one is calling to take credit for sticking it to the great Satan. I bet this is either a lone nut like the unibomber or Eric Rudolph or some splinter group associated with occupy wall street. I don't think it was tax protestors or militia types. They would have blown up a government office not a public event.
Trash cans were involved, right? So you have a person who throws away a Coke, and another who throws away some Mentos.
I'm just speculating.
I think the bombs were a bit more powerful than that. I think they were made and planted in the trashcans.
This is Boston.
Irish Spring.
Irish Spring. Or gay porn?
No one is calling to take credit for sticking it to the great Satan
It's possible that they have changed their tactics.
Or maybe it a lone qroup of Arabs, not associated with Al Queda or the Taliban, whose family were killed in drone attacks? Or blowback from our involvement in Malawi?
The more this goes on, the more I am convinced that it is something like that, not some crazed Americano.
The Taliban are not claiming responsibility. And if you are pissed at the US government for bombing you, what is the point of blowing something up and then never telling anyone why? If it were that, someone would have taken credit by now. It is not "blowback".
It might be a lone group of Islamists. If it is, we could be in for some more attacks. The only reason Islamists wouldn't be bragging about it is because they have other attacks in the pipeline.
The only reason Islamists wouldn't be bragging about it is because they have other attacks in the pipeline.
This, or if it's a lone group seeking revenge for drone attacks, then maybe they want to protect their family from more of the same?
I know you don't want it to be blowback, John, but it very well could be. It's the only thing that makes sense to me right now. Although I really expected to see this in France first, and not here. But if I were the French, I would be on high alert.
This, or if it's a lone group seeking revenge for drone attacks, then maybe they want to protect their family from more of the same?
No. That doesn't make sense. And if they were pissed about drone attacks, you would think they would attack a military base or something. Not a marathon.
you would think they would attack a military base or something. Not a marathon
Right, like they really have a chance of pulling that off, and causing mass casualties of civilians.
Yeah, our military bases are so secure. Not like some nut didn't shoot 30 people in one a couple of years ago.
They would totally be able to pull that off. Or at the very least they could go blow something up in Fayetteville or Killeen where the entire town is nothing but military and you know you will kill a ton of service members and members family. The fucking last place you are going to do that is downtown Boston.
Sorry dude, you are starting to sound like MSNBC praying it was the Tea Party. This attack doesn't fit the profile for blowback.
It was the paleolithic dieters who are against endurance racing as being against the way humans evolved.
I was thinking cyclists. They hate runners clogging up the bike paths.
Could be. They certainly turned on Lance Armstrong after he ran that marathon. The Tour de France will have to beef up their security after this. We could have a cyclist vs runner feud that will make the East Coast vs West Coast rapper feud look like a walk in the park.
West Coast is the best coast.
East Coast, West Coast...what about this coast - the Midwest!
There is this great running/cycling trail near where I live. There is flat out open hostility between the serious cyclists and the serious runners.
"on your left!"
I'm pulling for it to be something totally off the wall, along the lines of "Girl Scout Troop leader blames poor cookie sales to health nuts" or some such narrative twisting galactically stupid 'reason', just to watch the blinkered partisans twisting themselves into pretzels to explain the political advantages, and why this makes 'the other side' look bad.
Which can be conveniently ignored, other than to have your more loony acquaintances self identify by speaking authoritatively using recycled talking points six months after the fact.
It might be someone like the unibomber with a set of beliefs so detailed and off the wall that neither side can really latch onto it. Considering that no one has tried to take responsibility for this, I am leaning towards that explanation.
Haven't you heard? The Unabomber was a right-wing extremist. QED.
Bruce Schneier, the guy who gave us the phrase "security theater" to describe the TSA and airport security, wrote a must read on the Marathon bombings.
http://www.theatlantic.com/nat.....on/275014/
It'd be easy to feel powerless and demand that our elected leaders do something -- anything -- to keep us safe.
It'd be easy, but it'd be wrong.
He is absolutely right about terrorism being harder than it seems. It is really hard to build a bomb. It is also hard to find people who are willing to be terrorists and are also not crazy, incompetent or both. For every Carlos the Jackal, there are a hundred Padias or Richard Reids who are basically retarded. And even the smartest terrorist generally only gets off a few or in the case of suicide bombings one great attack. From a leadership perspective, terrorist soldiers are a very rare resource that is quickly used up.
He's also 100% right that it's impossible for anyone -be it government or whomever-to guarantee our safety without fail. In a free society that's part of the price we pay in order to maintain our liberties.
"But we need to be vigilant not to weaken the very freedoms and liberties that make this country great, meanwhile, just because we're scared. "
We will never be completely safe. There has always been the odd terrorist bombing.
And even in unfree societies, it doesn't work all the time.
The only way this makes sense if it's someone from the middle east. They have every reason(I'm not justifying it, I'm just trying to say they have reasons to want to kill us) to do this, and to do it in the manner that they did, high profile event, kill as many random people as possible.
Why would anti-tax people blow up a marathon, and not a government office? That makes no sense at all.
I would be shocked if it were tax protestors or militia groups. We have had them bomb something, and it was a federal building not a sporting event.
It is either a rogue AQ cell or a lone nut like Eric Rudolph. Don't forget Rudolph blew up the Olympic Park in nearly an identical manner. I think the nature of the attack points towards someone like Rudolph or the unimbomber more than it does AQ. Why would AQ give a shit about the Marathon? They would just bomb the subway or a bus and have just as much or more effect.
Why would AQ give a shit about the Marathon? They would just bomb the subway or a bus and have just as much or more effect
Because of all the video coverage?
Any bomb will give you tons of coverage. The subway bombs in London got just as much coverage as this. If you just want to kill and terrorize people, you can do that on any rush hour morning.
I read a statistic that said the Boston Marathon is the second largest sporting event after the Super Bowl in the US. Growing up in Boston I can tell you that Patriots Day is a giant farking zoo anywhere near the Green Line, and the massive crowds of people extend from Fenway up to Midtown. They actually had moved the end point of the marathon a few years ago so they could build bigger grandstands for the finish line.
As far as national attention goes, the Boston Marathon is an internationally recognized event, so clearly whoever did this wanted to get some big time press.
^THIS^
exactly - anyone looking at the dates (is probably) off their rocker. It's the event, not the date that's important.
I'm just trying to be an armchair detective here John, and keep aside any bias.
What about this. The Jihadists do this, and keep quiet about it, hoping that it gets blamed on any American group, so that law makers overreact again, and further divide Americans, so that we eventually erupt in civil war and start killing each other?
That would actually be pretty ingenious on their part.
I might add to that, reading comments around the web about this, even at the liberal sites, it is clear that the biggest fear coming out of this, is not fear of the terrorists, but of our very own beloved Congress critters.
Maybe. I don't think the jihadists really care about how divided Americans are. I don't think they think that deeply. They want to kill and terrorize and die a martyr's death. They are not particularly complex thinkers. Even Bin Ladin really didn't think that deeply. He basically thought that if you killed enough Americans, Americans would demand that the US get out of the middle east leaving him clear to wage war against Israel and the Saudi Royals. That was it. That was the big plan behind 9-11.
It is the same here. If it was jihadists, it is ones based in the Boston area. This is a big event, but it is only a big event in Boston. If you have never been to Boston, you would have no idea this is such a big deal. It is a regional event. It is not the Super Bowl. Whoever did this, has some knowledge of Boston and wanted to screw with Boston in particular. If you wanted to screw with the country at large, then you blow up a commuter train or some random baseball game so that everyone knows this could happen to them.
Have you considered the possibility that state actors may be the culprits?
Whatever Mike. Our own government is far too incompetent to keep something like that secret. Also, if it was a government false flag, they would have caught and produced a patsy by now. And no foreign government is going to be dumb enough to risk a US bombing campaign in order to conduct a pointless bombing that advances no interest and would do nothing but make them a world pariah if they were caught being behind it.
Has anyone heard speculation regarding the type of explosives used in the attack? The authorities certainly know by now and that would tell us a whole lot of information about who the perpetrator(s) are/were.
It seems that the explosions were relatively small for what could have been contained in a backpack. That suggests either a rushed job/limited materials, or intent to limit damage. Neither of those points suggest Al Qaeda. My money is on lone Islamic student(s), a lone right-winger(gay marriage, abortion, guns, taxes?), a lone left-winger(frame the right wingers, harm the lizard people, Koch-something...) or just a plain-old lonely nutball(40-50, socially awkward, feels victimized).
Contrary to what Bruce Schneier thinks, I believe the logistics of this type of attack are quite simple. Back in the days of BBSes, one could find manuals detailing how to make the kinds of shrapnel-loaded anti-personnel explosives seemingly used in the Boston attack. I assume, without verification, that such materials are even more common and easy to follow on the internet. The hard part is finding someone willing to overcome the innate aversion to defying authority and harming others.
What worries me, although not greatly, is the absence of a claim of responsibility. That makes me think the person is not boastful, therefore somewhat calculating and intelligent, and likely to strike again. Once again I have to say that just doesn't sound like an Islamicist of any stripe.
News is now reporting that it was a pressure-cooker loaded with shrapnel and gunpowder. That suggests quite a low-level of sophistication. Whoever did this doesn't know much about explosives, chemistry, or probably even firearms.
That probably excludes any right-wing groups. Say what you want, but the militia guys know how to blow shit up. This was either a lone whackjob, some islamic students, or, maybe, a lefty.