To elm's point, when has the attribution, analysis, or interpretation of a terrorist threat *not* been at least somewhat corrupted by the government's pre-selected, desired policy response?
Who you want to shoot determines who you say shot at you (or bombed you). There was a startling tolerance of allowance of muddying of waters in media and Congress during the US war in Iraq about the identity and alignment of insurgents assaulting US forces in Iraq and inflicting casualties and vice versa, former regime affiliates, Sunni Islamists, Sadrists, pro-Iran Shia. The Bush Administration wanted to work with pro-Iranian politicians like Chalabi and SCIRI on the political level, yet wanted to maximally attribute insurgent impacts to Iranian design and facilitation, to keep buttressing the case for a hostile policy against Iran. Khobar Towers has been variously blamed on Iran, and AQ. Terrorist groups are at times given false, undeserved credit for things they don't do (but might or might not claim), if they happen to be the terrorist group du jour.
Even at the grassroots, the constituency for pure truth in labelling and attribution and response is not very strong. Constituencies are polarized between believers in harsh responses, who don't care much about precision, getting the right people and only the right people and will trust their government is protecting them by attacking enemies widely and don't mind erring on the side of getting the innocent with the guilty - and in times of stress and fear, this faction grows to supermajorities. And on the other hand, those simply skeptical of forceful solutions or unwilling to risk any harm to the innocent - and the most influence these have to speak and be heard and "raise questions", but never come close to binding any governments or publics to their strict ROE.
I doubt Putin thinks that ISIS-K didn't do it - as you saying an ISIS attack is bad for him politically but a Ukrainian attack is "good" for him politically so he is just going lie.
As I recall, immediately after 9/11 the wingers were keen to blame the whole thing on Saddam Hussein (with a minority wanting to blame Iran) but Bush gave in to the FBI's information and admitted. Thereafter, there were lots of wingers running around saying (or grumbling and muttering) that Saddam Hussein was involved somehow. In the end, the Bush administration also wanted it to be Safdam Hussein, so they got out of Afghanistan as soon as possible, then they made some shit up about Saddam. Putin wants to fight the Ukrainians so he's going to blame the Ukrainians, just like the Rs wanted to blame Saddam and there we went and Putin seems no different.
After the lots of people wondered how "we could have been fooled" and the simple answer is they wanted to be fooled. It was obvious before the war that the wingers were desperate to go after Saddam, and the stories they were telling about Saddam were obvious bullshit, but "respectable elites" rolled over for it anyway. Again, not seeing how Putin is different, and I don't see how it's confirmation bias when you know the story you're telling is obvious bullshit but you just go ahead and lie anyway. That's more like "cynical exploitation".
To elm's point, when has the attribution, analysis, or interpretation of a terrorist threat *not* been at least somewhat corrupted by the government's pre-selected, desired policy response?
Who you want to shoot determines who you say shot at you (or bombed you). There was a startling tolerance of allowance of muddying of waters in media and Congress during the US war in Iraq about the identity and alignment of insurgents assaulting US forces in Iraq and inflicting casualties and vice versa, former regime affiliates, Sunni Islamists, Sadrists, pro-Iran Shia. The Bush Administration wanted to work with pro-Iranian politicians like Chalabi and SCIRI on the political level, yet wanted to maximally attribute insurgent impacts to Iranian design and facilitation, to keep buttressing the case for a hostile policy against Iran. Khobar Towers has been variously blamed on Iran, and AQ. Terrorist groups are at times given false, undeserved credit for things they don't do (but might or might not claim), if they happen to be the terrorist group du jour.
Even at the grassroots, the constituency for pure truth in labelling and attribution and response is not very strong. Constituencies are polarized between believers in harsh responses, who don't care much about precision, getting the right people and only the right people and will trust their government is protecting them by attacking enemies widely and don't mind erring on the side of getting the innocent with the guilty - and in times of stress and fear, this faction grows to supermajorities. And on the other hand, those simply skeptical of forceful solutions or unwilling to risk any harm to the innocent - and the most influence these have to speak and be heard and "raise questions", but never come close to binding any governments or publics to their strict ROE.
I doubt Putin thinks that ISIS-K didn't do it - as you saying an ISIS attack is bad for him politically but a Ukrainian attack is "good" for him politically so he is just going lie.
As I recall, immediately after 9/11 the wingers were keen to blame the whole thing on Saddam Hussein (with a minority wanting to blame Iran) but Bush gave in to the FBI's information and admitted. Thereafter, there were lots of wingers running around saying (or grumbling and muttering) that Saddam Hussein was involved somehow. In the end, the Bush administration also wanted it to be Safdam Hussein, so they got out of Afghanistan as soon as possible, then they made some shit up about Saddam. Putin wants to fight the Ukrainians so he's going to blame the Ukrainians, just like the Rs wanted to blame Saddam and there we went and Putin seems no different.
After the lots of people wondered how "we could have been fooled" and the simple answer is they wanted to be fooled. It was obvious before the war that the wingers were desperate to go after Saddam, and the stories they were telling about Saddam were obvious bullshit, but "respectable elites" rolled over for it anyway. Again, not seeing how Putin is different, and I don't see how it's confirmation bias when you know the story you're telling is obvious bullshit but you just go ahead and lie anyway. That's more like "cynical exploitation".
elm
par for the course for vladdy
After what Russia did to Chechnya, there will never be forgiveness. I'm concerned they'll say the same of America, after the dust settles in Gaza.