It's worth recalling when support for the Chechen war was low, Putin initiated a campaign of apartment building bombings in 1999.
Some chatter that there were around 8 shooters, and they walked into the hall and immediately shot 40-50, result might end up with over 100 killed. One of the shooters has allegedly been arrested, ISIS-K or Imarat Kavkaz would be under srict instructions NOT to be taken alive. There's considerable dueling narratives right now
No matter who is actually responsible - Putin will probably blame Ukraine
It looks like US Intelligence warned of this attack in early March.
People at the venue lost all phone and Internet connectivity right prior to the attack. Jamming was being used.
The entire city of Moscow is now on lockdown.
ISIS, through its outlet al-Amaq, just claimed responsibility for the terror attack in Moscow tonight.
People were posting videos while the attack was happening. Where are you getting this information about "jamming" from?
Nearby traffic distribution nodes were likely overloaded which resulted in degraded performance of Telegram and VK services. This is something to be expected when thousands or even millions of people start sending messages all at once, trying to figure out what's happening to their friends and family.
All the videos I've seen are CCTV which were distributed well after the fact. channel 12 from Russia reported the jamming. I'm aware of what a mobile network will do on overload since I used to design and deploy them. It doesn't quite work that way.
In October 2002, Chechen militants took about 800 people hostage at a Moscow theater. Two days later, Russian special forces stormed the building and 129 hostages and 41 Chechen fighters died, most of them from effects of narcotic gas Russian forces use to subdue the attackers.
The false flag apartment bombings were carried out by actual Russian security services - not Chechen assets, or militants.
On an relatedunrelated note, some of Russian agents who took part were comically stupid. If you aren't aware of the Sims vs SIM card mix-up, do yourself a favor and look it up.
Edit: as pointed out below, the Sims vs SIM card was not part of the 1999 false flag operation, but a more recent one (2022). My bad.
I did that on the fly and didn't make a comment a day after. What counts am I wrong on? Most everything has proven to be true. Thanks for the drug recommendation, are you a doctor?
A lot has been said about Call of Duty MWII, but if your theory is correct then we'll have to say that, of all things, its plot was prescient. And i'm not ready for that
The official said U.S. intelligence agencies had gathered information in recent weeks that the IS branch was planning an attack in Moscow. He said U.S. officials privately shared the intelligence earlier this month with Russian officials. The official was briefed on the matter but was not authorized to publicly discuss the intelligence information and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.
...
The Kremlin didn’t immediately blame anyone for the attack, but some Russian lawmakers were quick to accuse Ukraine and called for ramping up strikes. Hours before the attack, the Russian military l aunched (sic) a sweeping barrage on Ukraine’s power system, crippling the country’s biggest hydroelectric plant and other energy facilities and leaving more than a million people without electricity.
Dmitry Medvedev, deputy head of Russia’s Security Council, said that if Ukraine involvement was proven, all those involved “must be tracked down and killed without mercy, including officials of the state that committed such outrage.”
Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, denied Ukraine involvement.
Not seeing anything yet but it can be hard to get accurate news reporting from a country that kills subversive journalists and is in a war. I think most are assuming it's either an internal or external paramilitary group related to the war in Ukraine, or domestic terrorists related to the recent elections, I think targeting a concert is more likely the latter but we'll see which group takes responsibility if any.
The article mentions the US warned of an imminent attack last month and the Russian state dismissed it. Russia also has a history of utilizing false flag operations to start shit, so I’m leaning towards that atm (before more details come out)
That and Kiev/Kyiv have been enlightening since this whole thing kicked off. I’ve got a couple Russian language textbooks but think it’s time to update to some Ukrainian
This would have the opposite effect for Ukraine. It would cause Russians to actually rally around the flag and be more pro war. The Ukrainian strategy has been to just kill Russian combatants and hope they kill enough that Russians themselves start protesting the war on the home front.
The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement posted on affiliated channels on social media. A U.S. intelligence official told The Associated Press that U.S. intelligence agencies had learned the group’s branch in Afghanistan was planning an attack in Moscow and shared the information with Russian officials.
The problem is that, this helps Putin. If we assume he has no regard for human life, then this is a massive opportunity for him. He's made the most out of opportunities like this one in the past.
This attack on innocent lives is a profound tragedy as it is. I wish I could spend more time dwelling on the plight of the victims but my brain won't stop panicking about all the ways Putin can exploit this situation to ruin even more lives.
It's why I couldn't shake the idea that this might be a false flag operation. It's why I can't deny the prospect that perhaps Russian security services didn't do all they could to stop this before it occurred.
My thoughts to the victims and those close to them.
It's why I couldn't shake the idea that this might be a false flag operation. It's why I can't deny the prospect that perhaps Russian security services didn't do all they could to stop this before it occurred.
It makes him look weak, distracted, and unprepared. People might think his attention and army is spread too thin with the war in Ukraine.
Seems like a really shitty false flag operation to me.
US security services have notified Russia of an impending attack, they notified US citizens there to about large gatherings
Gunmen went in calmly, shot at people for 1.5 hours without being stopped, then calmly walked back into a car and drove off.
IS claimed responsibility immediately
Russia claims it arrested the same gunmen in the car that was already identified and look at that, they went straight for the Ukraine border, an impossible to pass war zone. Uh huh...
Didn't a lot of western countries warn their citizens to not attend any public gatherings in Moscow a couple of weeks ago due to an imminent Isis attack?
From what I have read, Russian government is already trying to blame Ukraine. Deepfakes where secretary of nsdc of Ukraine takes responsibility for the attack are being shown on Russian TV. Medvedev said in his tg that they will punish “Kievan regime” if it’s responsible for the attack.
If you can't show empathy for murdered civilians just because of their nationality, are you really any better? This was a concert hall, not a military base. Think about what you are tacitly endorsing here...
It could be. It certainly tracks with the separatists' move into guerilla tactics later in the second Chechen war.
Out of any time for them to start striking again, this would be it. Russia is stretched thin in manpower and supplies, and their attention is very focused on Ukraine and the West. Their ability to dump resources into the southern Caucus to tamp down a potential Chechen War #3 is definitely going to be limited. And coupled with the completion of Putin's sham election, it sends a very strong message against Russia's outward facade of "unity".
Why would they attack random civilians instead of pulling a Wagner move towards the Kreml? Russia already showed that they wouldn't have much of a resistance to show for it.
What, is Kadyrov not a lapdog anymore? He would seem to be the first hurdle, not a later one. Of course maybe he’s dead or something, idk, i haven’t checked tiktok in a long time.
They might have beards, hard to tell from the footage I've seen.
May be Islamic terrorism or a bad ol' fashioned Russian false flag. I doubt Ukrainians or Ukrainian supporting people would do a random terror shooting, they like to be more targeted and the shooting was at random people. There was a foiled group of Islamic terrorists arrested earlier this month, maybe another group.
Yeah, Ukraine hasn't done anything civilian targeting attacks so i highly doubt it was them. They know how important optics are when it comes to getting international support.
It was a cease fire proposal - you have to start somewhere. But Russia and China think it’s better to use Gazans a political pawns in the upcoming US elections, so surprise, surprise - some would disagree.
US warns Russia for planned terror attack in Moscow
Russian government and Putin specific either ignore it for the reason the west is fooling them because would fit narrative for the war in Ukraine. Or
Russian government is just incompetent to do anything with that information. Or they know and deliberately don't do anything with it to link it to Ukraine (even though the perpetrators are IS). Since this was also done in 1999 to blame the Chechnyans, it would fit the profile.
Either way it will be Soviet style lying. The incompetence will be wiped under the rug. The deliberate holding back information and not adequate precautions will not be easily to be proven, yet it creates the narrative for the mobilisation. Fear is Russia's weapon of mass destruction, the lies are the instruments to fire those weapons.
“Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth. Sooner or later, that debt is paid.”
A thing that’s really annoying to me about this is they don’t specify what the gunmen looked like and specifically what rifles they were carrying. IS has claimed responsibility, but if it was a bunch of Russian dudes with brand new AKs, it’s far less likely it was actually the IS, and was just an FSB op. Granted the FSB could have supplied brand new AKs, but far less likely to be IS if it was just some Russian commandos
I don't see an upside for Putin in this. Given how many years he's been in power anything bad that happens falls on him for failing to prevent it, there's hardly anyone else left to blame. He'll probably fire a few people to look as if he's doing something.
they've been known to recruit remotely, I think. and if it was someone from afganistan, i imagine they would source weapons locally. why would the guy go through the trouble/risk of smuggling a rifle and ammo? that makes no sense.
As if the worst foe of the Islamic state right now is the Russian Federation .. very suspicious especially when many embassies warned their citizens to leave Russia just a week ago because they had Intel about major terror attacks coming to Russia.
The Islamic State has plenty of reasons to hate Russia, such as their continued cooperation with the Assad government and Iran, the Chechen Wars, their military campaigns in Afghanistan... just to name a few. You don't need to be "the worst foe" to be targeted by ISIS, as many of their attacks have shown.
When it comes to foes Israel, US, France, UK, Germany, Netherlands; KSA, UAE should top the list.
unless someone else is pulling the strings and using them to advance their geopolitical agendas. terror attacks abroad have almost no impact on rallying support in the regions they want control over.