The most disturbing thing about Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is definitely the fact that no one who knows him can quite believe that he decided to set off a bomb at the Boston Marathon. Even in retrospect, his acquaintances don’t really see any signs that they might have missed. In the days after the bombing, he still seemed normal. The next morning he went to a friend’s house and played FIFA Soccer on a Playstation for hours. He went to class. He went to a college party. If not for surveillance cameras, he may never have given himself away.
It definitely looks like he was dragged into the plot by his older brother, Tamerlan, who commanded a lot of respect not only because he was effectively the parent, but also because he was a big man who was an excellent boxer. It probably was very difficult to say no to him.
It’s easy to blame the FBI for not keeping better tabs on Tamerlan, but it should be remembered that the concern was about him traveling to Russia and maybe joining Chechen rebels there who are fighting against Russia. Once he came home, he was of less interest to us than to the Russians. In general, the Chechens haven’t had a beef with America. The Tsarnaev family was granted asylum in America, which would normally preclude strong anti-Americanism.
Despite the terrible tragedy, this is a very interesting story. I’d be interested to hear Dzhokhar’s version of events. In particular, I’d like to know what they were hoping to accomplish. Maybe one day, after his trial is over and he is rotting for life in prison, he will talk to someone about why he and his brother chose this path.
The prosecutors will be hell-bent on finding a larger conspiracy. The idea that two young men devised and executed the bombing while living an otherwise unremarkable life would be untenable to many Americans — ideologically, psychologically, and financially. On the other hand, it would be a PR coup for the surveillance industry, which needs to update its excuses to monitor everything and everyone. If the three college friends aren’t actually guilty of anything, there will be charges nonetheless. How does the FBI not secure the college room of their suspect? It’s going to be fodder for the conspiracists if they say that evidence can’t be demonstrated because it was stolen.
We have had a thorough analysis of the upbringing of the Tsarnaev brothers in Kyrgystan, the move to Dagestan and the jump to the US, the opportunities and steps toward becoming a naturalized US citizen, the failures of the integral family, parents who returned to Dagestan, the mother and Tsarlan becoming disappointed (uncle who names them losers) and dousing themselves in the fundamentals of Islam. It’s just a small step to radicalization as I have shown with 100 Dutch citizens going to Syria for jihad and a one-way ticket to paradise. Blow-back US foreign policy. Look at the mess left in Afghanistan and our “double-cross” partner Pakistan. What an immense failure and disaster for humanity.
See the serie of diaries and excellent comments by Alexander, Marie2 and Shaun Appleby.
The latest arrests shows where the allegiance lies of these foreign students invited to study at US universities. The biggest problem is the ambiquity in US foreign policy naming Chechen jihadists “freedom fighters” and our ally one day and persecute/drone them to death the next day. Russia’s FSB did more than necessary and warned the US intelligence community. Twelve years after 9/11, the idiots at DHS, NSA, DCI, FBI, CIA and all its billions spend, just f*cked-up. Add the US Congress to this pile, for the most disfunctional entity ever conceived. Glorifying GUNS as a diety to make American safe, I can hardly continue to express my feelings. America just doesn’t get it!
Today is Liberation Day in The Netherlands – May 5, 1945 – thank you Canada, Polish soldiers and the USA. (flag flyng outside!) Yesterday was remembrance day for the horrors of the Nazi death camps, the suffering and great loss of lives. The Nazi terror ended. One hell of a documentary: The lost train out of Bergen-Belsen ended in Tröbitz (DDR) with 2,500 Jews freed by the Soviet Red Army. The people of this German village took care of this group and the hundreds who died in the following days were buried and the cemetery kept as a monument of hope.
I really enjoyed the collaborative in-depth discussion on this topic, thanks. It seems to me that this act of terror is somehow the polar opposite of 9/11. With due respect for the dead and injured there seems something about the plot, the fugitives and the broader context which is more Kardashians than al-Qaeda.
The banality of the motive and half-understood ideologies of the perpetrators, not to mention the Wal-mart level of sophistication, seems to be perhaps an end point to the twelve years of mild psychosis which has pervaded our domestic politics and foreign affairs.
We know virtually nothing of their lives in Krygystan beyond the report that Anzor worked in the prosecutor’s office for some period and that Uncle Ruslan was in and out of the country. No report that Tameralan ever lived in Dagestan before coming to the US and Dzhokhar and his parents only lived there a few months before coming to the US. The mother was originally from Dagestan but it hasn’t been reported if she left the country when she married or some time before.
We know when they left Krygystan but not why. As they were granted asylum in the US, that would seem important information to me.
We know that financially it wasn’t easy for the family in Cambridge — but not how that compared with their life in Krygystan. Anzor didn’t relocate to Dagestan until late 2010 or early 2011 when Zubeidat filed for divorce and some time later withdrew the petition.
We understand that Tamerlan aspired to be on the 2012 US Olympic boxing team. 2008 wouldn’t have been possible because he couldn’t have become a citizen in time for those games.
Have they taken capital punishment off of the table?
No, it’s not off the table. It’s easily traded for a guilty plea, however.
Part of the “civilized” world, see China, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
Not quite at the same great values as Israel and so many countries in the Western world.
Exceptionalism USA.
Considering Judy Clarke is on the case, I suspect capital punishment won’t be utilized.
FWIW: Maybe because I’m listening to the Avett Brothers, this post struck me as particularly poignant and plaintive and beautifully written.
Doesn’t anyone have any interest in Uncle Ruslan marrying the daughter of Graham Fuller and running the Congress of Chechen International Organizations out of his father-in-law’s address? Or that Ruslan Tsarni spent time working for USAID in that neck of the woods? Or that Tsarni worked for a subsidiary of Halliburton? Or that Graham Fuller was one of the 29 people noted by Sibel Edmonds back in 2008 as being part of some sort of intelligence criminal enterprise but wasn’t able to get down to specifics because the Justice Department forbid her from going public?
I guess not.
I googled “ruslan tsarni graham fuller” and ended up down a rabbit hole.
How about Sibel Edmonds?
Yes, I remember her. I’d feel better, though, if it didn’t seem like she’d gone down the rabbit hole too.
Here’s Fuller’s denial, for what it’s worth.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article9774.htm
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7117
http://letsibeledmondsspeak.blogspot.com/2008/01/sibel-names-names-in-pictures.html
http://www.aclu.org/national-security/sibel-edmonds-patriot-silenced-unjustly-fired-fighting-back-he
lp-keep-america-safe
Several of us here are very interested. Unfortunately those dots either don’t connect to the Boston bombing or too many dots are missing.
Right. Too complicated to open your mind, so ignore it.
Not at all. I’m perfectly willing to go wherever facts and reasonable connections between them lead. Simply noting that at this time, absent an additional fantasy set of dots, can’t get from Ruslan to the Boston bombing.
More about his ex-wife Samantha A. Fuller, daughter of CIA spook Graham Fuller.
Good article by Dave Lindorff on the Craft Intl guys at the marathon. Something smells about this. And there was Taya Kyle, Chris’s widow, giving a speech at the NRA last week.