Terrorism in Spain

A few weekends ago, I took a trip with some friends to Segovia, as I’ve already written before.

While we were sitting in the train station, waiting for our train back to Madrid, the three of us saw a “Spain’s Most Wanted” poster. I remember looking at that poster, and I recall the three of us having a conversation about the people on the poster. They were all members of the ETA, Spain’s terrorist group. The ETA, found in the northern region of Spain near the French border, seeks the region’s independence from Spain, claiming they are a separate ethnic group than the rest of Spain and the southern part of France. Many of the violent terrorist attacks which occur in Spain are traced back to the ETA and their “struggle” against the government.

Looking at the photos of the highly sought-after terrorists, my friends and I discussed how utterly normal these people looked. There were five men and one woman in this poster, and none of them looked anything like the typical terrorists we Americans (and one Australian) were used to seeing. These terrorists looked like they were in their late 20s, early 30s, with a slight bohemian flair. The men wore scraggly beards and some had longer hair, their look overall reminding me of what some big fan of grunge music from the 90s might wear on an everyday basis. None of them looked evil, crazy, or anything short of alternative, really. I specifically recall staring at the photograph of the woman, who looked like any other Spanish chick on the street. She had a slight smile on her face, and I remember thinking how easily she could have been someone I’ve met on the street or in a cafeteria somewhere.

I hadn’t given much thought to the poster, or the people on the poster, again until Tuesday, when the main headline in my free morning paper (as well as the other papers) was about the capture of Txeroki, the military chief of the ETA. When I looked at the photo, it somehow seemed familiar, as if I’d seen this man before. Turning to read the story jump, I saw another face, one I recognized immediately: the woman whose photograph was among those in the poster we’d seen at the Segovia train station. The pair was operating out of a stolen vehicle in southern France and was detained because of the plates on the vehicle, which were not the up-to-date plates many countries in the EU have switched to. In the vehicle, officials found plans for several civilian attacks during the coming months, as well as notes about the group and its operations.

In thinking about the situation, I’ve come to realize that I’ve fallen into the belief that a terrorist somehow has a distinct look. When we think of terrorists in America, we (or at least I) picture an Arab man with a long beard, long hair and wearing a turban, as those as the terrorists we deal with. They are strangers to us, speaking another language, having different cultural customs, and living in places very dissimilar to our front yards and back porches. For the people of other countries, terrorists could be their neighbors, their co-workers, or any old acquaintances. When dealing with issues of national security, their priorities don’t always lie in protecting their national borders or sending agents to deserts across the world to look for the biggest threat to their country. Sometimes, the biggest threat is literally next door.

So the search is different, and even more difficult. How do you begin finding your biggest enemy when chances are great that they’re in country? How do you keep the population safe without infringing on their rights? One surely can’t go Big Brother on the entire country in order to find the enemy. When the enemy is in your house, how do you keep everyone safe without becoming paranoid, distrustful of everyone, or tyrannical?

I pity the fool(s) who has (have) to find the solutions to these problems. Leaders of the world, here is my message to you: Good luck.

For more on the arrests: here.