Talk:Attacks on the London Underground

Name change

I propose a change in name of this article to London Underground attacks as terrorism is POV --Vintagekits 23:10, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I support this proposition. -- Pauric (talk-contributions) 23:20, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Object. It would be difficult to rationally deny that the July 7 bombings were terrorism. Nick Cooper 09:01, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

• Agree with Nick. Astrotrain 14:06, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

One small attack doesn't justify using the word terrorism for the whole article though, unless you can prove all the bombs mentioned within the article were with intention to terify, or complying with any of the rest of the definitions. Terrorism, or terrorist is a POV nightmare of a word to use. London underground attacks would be a better title for this article. To go further, I'd suggest that this article should be turned into a 'List of' style page rather than an article as you could pick any place to write an article on the attacks. For example the Europa hotel in Belfast has been bombed more than any other place in the world, yet still doesn't really deserve an article. -- Pauric (talk-contributions) 17:46, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

From the very page you cite:

"On March 17, 2005, a UN panel described terrorism as any act "intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non-combatants with the purpose of intimidating a population or compelling a government or an international organization to do or abstain from doing any act." "

Sounds about right to me. Nick Cooper 18:08, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

In each of those attacks was it the intertion to "cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non-combatants"??--Vintagekits 18:10, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I can't see any of the IRA attacks being intent to injure, apart from perhaps bombs during the 40s or the early 70s, a couple of times when the organisation was under quite secterian leadership. As for the first two, I can't say as I don't know anything about the bombs, bit of a lack of information. To be pedantic, the Brazilian man shot could fall under this article, as there is suspicion it wasn't entirely a misinformation fault. -- Pauric (talk-contributions) 18:43, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Bombs left in public places have the inherent capacity to injure members of the public (i.e. "civilians or non-combatants"), even incendiary devices. The 1976 Wood Green bombing in particular could very easily have resulted in great loss of life, but for a lucky fluke of timing. As regards Jean Charles Menezes, it notable that I did include it in my own page on the subject (in the links - I've actually held off contributing to this page until today), which someone else used as the basis for this page, although they omitted that particular incident. Nick Cooper 21:22, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Stop guessing and stick to facts. I will ask the question again as you avoided it last time - In ALL of the attacks listed on the page was it the intention to "cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non-combatants"? If not then I am going to change the page name as it is POV--Vintagekits 21:55, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Stop being so disingenuous. I did not "avoid" the question at all. Nobody plants a bomb in a public place thinking that it can somehow magically explode or ignite, and yet fail to injure anyone who happens to be in the vicinity. In virtually every bombing incident listed, the placing of the devices in public areas were self-evidently a risk to members of the public or Underground staff. For example, if the train at Wood Green had exploded five minutes earlier or five minutes later there would have been passengers on board and some would have been injured or even killed. It was sheer luck that it was empty and in the process of reversing, but the car it was in was wrecked and had to be partly cut up before it could be removed. It doesn't take a genius to work out what would have happened had people actually been in it at the time. Nick Cooper 22:50, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree the name should be changed, terrorism is a weasel, controversial word that implies POV and is a terrible name for this article. How about Attacks on the London Underground? SqueakBox 21:59, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Agreed!--Vintagekits 12:48, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Except that it's wildly ambiguous. Such a vague name would merit the inclusion of WW2 bombing incidents, criminal damage, vandalism, etc. I see the title has now been changed to "List of terrorist attacks on the London Underground" which is better than the previous "London Underground Terrorism" and the unsuitably vague intermediate name. Nick Cooper 13:54, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

As shown from your own defintion provided from the UN not all the attacks where terrorist therefore the title is POV--Vintagekits 15:20, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

On the contrary, I would contend that the vast majority were using exactly the same definition and plain logic. Nick Cooper 17:48, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

right - go through each of the attacks and if each one was ""intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non-combatants with the purpose of intimidating a population or compelling a government or an international organization to do or abstain from doing any act." then we can talk - not sure why you would phone is a warning if you intention was to harm civilians!--Vintagekits 18:04, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Plainly "the purpose of intimidating a population or compelling a government or an international organization to do or abstain from doing any act" is a given in every single IRA operation. All devices that didn't actually cause death or injury were placed on trains or in public or staff-frequented areas of the Underground, all of which posed a de facto threat of death or injury to members of of public and Underground staff. It's hardly rocket science. Nick Cooper 18:49, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Remember the criteria you set out yourself - "intended to cause death or serious bodily harm" - be neutral and not be biased in your assesment or were we are just going to have to get a mediator to settle it or of you really want to keep the list I could just remove the sections which are not terrorist.--Vintagekits 22:30, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Also see here--Vintagekits 20:04, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Let's not kid ourselves. We're not talking about bombing trains stabled in sidings in the middle of the night, or incendiaries set to go off when stations are closed. Bombs left in public places cannot be divorced from a potential - and therefore an intention - to cause death or injury to members of the public.

Anyway, I see that the title has now been changed to the woefully misleading "List of attacks on the London Underground" which - as I've already pointed out above, is so vague that it merits the inclusion of everything from WW1 & WW2 bombings to vandalism. I was going to suggest a compromise of "List of paramilitary and terrorist attacks..." but will take a back-seat now and see how things pan out. Nick Cooper 23:18, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Ya, I agree, delete the list completely!--Vintagekits 23:22, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

That's just being silly. It's useful, not least for contextualising the 7 July attacks, which in some quarters were reported in terms which suggested the Underground had never been been bombed by terrorists/paramilitaries/whatever before. 23:42, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Nick (or anyone), please do change the title, just dont re-add the word terrorism and almost anything else will be fine by me, SqueakBox 23:38, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Terrorism

Is a weasel word and I also strongly oppose its inclusion, as it makes the article totally un NPOV, SqueakBox 20:27, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Surely all we need to do is not use terrorism in the title, but then in the particular articles put something along the lines of "often referred to as an act of terrorism" and give references, such as to the many newspapers, articles, etc. This is a practice suggested by Weggie in the Omagh bombing article after Vintagekits removed the word "terrorism". See [[1]]Logoistic

Nick Cooper is the one that wanted terrorism included in the title and provided this reason - "On March 17, 2005, a UN panel described terrorism as any act "intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non-combatants with the purpose of intimidating a population or compelling a government or an international organization to do or abstain from doing any act." if these criteria are proven then and only then should the term ever be used. There is a whole page on the wiki policy about using the term--Vintagekits 19:12, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

As I've said, personally I would favour "Paramilitary and/or terrorist attacks..." and let readers make up their own mind. Just plain "attacks" is far too vague, but I'm not bothered enough to get into the current ball-kicking contest with the title, although plain "Bomb attacks..." is another possible compromise. Oh well, at least Weggie hasn't turned up (probably needs a lie down after my work on Shoot-to-kill policy in Northern Ireland). Nick Cooper 19:48, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Dont like paramilitary, mentioning bombs sounds good to me, agree there isnt an easy solution, SqueakBox 20:00, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

I oppose any reference to terrorism, on this or any other political article, SqueakBox 19:14, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Fair enough, unless someone comes up with a good arguement someone should change the page name. The only thing is that Astrotrain may change it back. I have already changed it once and so has SqueakBox so if someone else does it this time then that shows a clear concensus. In my opinion Astrotrain only changes back to try and wind me up, as one day he just went around following what edits I made and then he would simply revert it - its interesting that he doesnt bother to discuss the issue - that speaks volumes--Vintagekits 19:20, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

I would opose changing the name very strongly to anything including terrorism. The fact that Astrotrain refuses to engage in the talk page while changing the title name against the oppositon of more than one user may show bad faith on his part and I urge him to engage here before changing the name back again, otherwise further action(such an rfc) will have to be considered, SqueakBox 19:37, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Proposal

I started this article some time ago with the word terrorism in it. If you look up terrorism on wikipedia it says

Terrorism is a term used to describe certain violent or otherwise harmful acts or threats of such acts. Most definitions of terrorism include only those acts which are: intended to create fear or "terror", are perpetrated for a political goal (as opposed to a hate crime or "madman" attack), deliberately target "non-combatants", and are not conducted by a "legitimate" government.

In my opinion all the acts described were violent acts intended to create fear and with a political goal (the first two occasions are not really known, The suffragettes wanted women's rights, the IRA wanted the UK to give Northern Ireland and the muslim extremists wanted the UK government to pull out of Iraq), they all deliberately targeted non-combatants (public transport and it's users) and they were not conducted by a legitimate government.

I propose to keep a redirect page from London Underground terrorism to this article. In this article a brief text will be displayed at the top of the page stating something along the lines of "Although these events can be construed as terrorsim, for the encyclopedic qualities of this article these acts are called attacks"

Ysignal 10:06, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Totally disagree, 1. "non-combatants" were not targetted in all the attacks, 2. Who's definition is that - there are 100's of definitions, 3. Is totally POV and therefore not in keeping with WP:NPOV--Vintagekits 13:02, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Words to avoid#Terrorist, terrorism, redirects can state anything and it should be kept but I dont believe we shgould use the word terrorism in this article, SqueakBox 18:33, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Agree with Squeaky. I personally don't like the definition mentioned there, as it more or less says governments can't be terrorists. Although that's getting off topic. -- Pauric (talk-contributions) 19:48, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

He is at it again on the La Mon Restaurant Bombing - I have tried to reason with him but it probably needs someone else tyo step in.--Vintagekits 22:00, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Wood Green date

When first created this page correctly dated the Wood Green incident as being the day after the 15 March 1976 incident at West Ham, i.e. the 16th. This is corroborated by all the usual sources - e.g. Croome & Jackson's Rails Through the Clay, Day & Reed's The Story of London's Underground, etc. For some reason, Vintagekits substantial re-editing of the page at 22:22 on 8 January 2007 resulted in it being erroneously dated as the 14th, rather than the 16th. This would make it the Arsenal/Newcastle match according to Qwghlm's information, although it also means their source is wrong in dating it as the 18th. I am therefore reverting Qwghlm's edit and amending accordingly. Nick Cooper 22:01, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

OK, fine but please add in a reference to the book & page number - as it stands leaving it unreferenced when it previously was runs against WP:CITE etc. Qwghlm 11:33, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

WWII

There are no reference to the bombing during the second world's war! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.51.66.144 (talk) 15:10, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

As the intro states: "This is a list of deliberate attacks on the infrastructure, staff or passengers of the London Underground". Although the Underground did suffer considerable bomb damage during WW2, none of it was the result of deliberate targeting. In addition, the page was originally called "London Underground terrorism" but was changed due to objections to the use of the word "terrorism". Nick Cooper 17:22, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Bishopsgate

Taking "deliberate attacks on the infrastructure, staff or passengers of the London Underground" into account, should this really be on there? It wasn't a deliberate attack on any part of the London Underground. Granted part of it was damaged, but setting off a bomb that size in the centre of London is always likely to cause some damage to the London Underground. It definitely wasn't deliberate targeting of the underground like other attacks. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 15:09, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I would tend to agree. Given that the incident main page states that, "St Ethelburga's church was situated seven metres away from the bomb, and that it was outside 99 Bishopsgate (HSBC), this puts it some 200 metres away from the mainline station. It is notable that the standard reference work on LU stations (London Underground Stations, David Leboff, 1994, Ian Allen Ltd., ISBN 0-7110-2226-7), although even with the explosion in April 1993, it might have been two late for inclusion. Even so, given that the various elements of the Underground station are fairly spread around, and mostly inside the mainline station, a claim that the explosion "wrecked the Underground station" cannot possibly be true. It may be that there was some damge to some parts of the station, but as you say, it wasn't a direct targetting, and so shouldn't really be here. Nick Cooper (talk) 12:38, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll remove it now. Re "wrecked", I only went by what the BBC said. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 14:32, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Bus destroyed

Apparently, the act of "terrorism" has been glorified. The explosion on the bus took off the roof, and probably wrote off the bus from a safety point of view, but wasn't destroyed by the bomb as pictures after the incident clearly show the bus almost whole minus a roof. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.13.184.47 (talk) 19:43, 2 March 2008 (UTC)