Deep Currents

The horrific attacks that occurred in Mumbai today–and may still be ongoing–were the first act of spectacular terrorism in quite some time. Not much is known just yet. The Times has a few photos, there are more on Flickr, Metroblogging Mumbai has ongoing commentary, and Dina is one of many local Tweeters who are providing moment-to-moment updates. GroundReport is doing a good job of aggregating citizen reports. Both Wikipedia and Mahalo have constantly updated pages with known facts.

Foreign Policy already has some insightful analysis of the potential causes: it could be a new terrorist group as the “Deccan Mujahideen” claim, it could be the well-known Lashkar-e-Taiba expressing their usual Islamist rage, or it could be the local Indian Mujahideen reacting to the strikes of the Mumbai anti-terror squad. One CNN anchor backs the latter theory: 

…terrorism expert Rohan Gunaratna says that the Indian Mujahideen are most likely to blame, and they are the same group as the Deccan Mujahideen. “No other group has the capability,” he said, emphasizing the group’s strength in Mumbai. He also pointed out that such attacks would have taken months of planning.

Written: November 27th, 2008