Krasnogorsk Mumbai. Two similar, different terrorist attacks
Mohammed Kasab at Victoria Station, where he and another terrorist first threw a couple of grenades into the crowd and then opened fire on people with machine guns
Similarities
Both attacks (despite who the actual customers were) have a religious background. In Mumbai, terrorists from the Deccan Mujahideen organization (an organization possibly associated with Al-Qaeda) operated; in Krasnogorsk, terrorists swore allegiance (according to unconfirmed information) to ISIS (banned in Russia).
In both cases, the main goal was the classic, unfortunately, random destruction of the largest number of innocent civilians.
Terrorists Abdul Rehmad Bada and Abu Ali captured on CCTV at the Taj Mahal Palace, Mumbai, 2008
And here we come to probably the main similarity between both attacks - the method of killing civilians. In both attacks, the terrorists used mainly firearms. weapon. It is too early to say what caused the death of the majority of victims in the Crocus City Hall building - small arms fire or a fire that started due to the fault of terrorists, but one thing is for sure - terrorists used small arms fire to make their way into the concert hall and in the concert hall itself At first they fired randomly at the spectators.
In Mumbai, the terrorists had grenades (8 each) and improvised explosive devices, but just like in Krasnogorsk, the largest number of victims were people who came under machine gun fire.
Footage taken by one of the eyewitnesses of the attack in Krasnogorsk. Terrorists shoot unarmed people at point-blank range in Crocus City Hall
Both attacks involved money. The Pakistanis who attacked Mumbai were promised large sums of money to be paid to their families after the attack and, consequently, their deaths. The Tajiks who attacked Crocus City Hall were promised... to pay themselves, that is, they themselves had to receive the money. And here we come to the differences in the actions of terrorists.
Differences
The terrorists who were being trained to attack Mumbai were prepared in several stages. Those who performed best at the first stage of preparation were sent for additional training. It also included Hindi lessons - you had to be able to communicate well with the locals. Subsequently, this was useful to the terrorists, since at the first stage of their attack they calmly moved around in a local taxi. They also shaved before the attack and were dressed in ordinary “European” clothes.
The boat from which terrorists landed in Mumbai in 2008
There was nothing like this in Krasnogorsk. Footage of the detention of the suspects and their first interrogations in hot pursuit show that some of them speak Russian with difficulty, and one of them does not speak Russian at all. Judging by the testimony of the manager of the hostel where the suspects lived, which appeared online, one of them, the youngest terrorist, who spoke Russian best, communicated with the manager for all of them. Also, none of them refused to have a beard with a shaved or trimmed mustache.
A car stopped in the Bryansk region by suspects in a terrorist attack in Krasnogorsk
Would the need to learn the language and shave off the terrorists' beards have stopped them? Naturally not. Would this make it more difficult to prepare for a terrorist attack? Probably yes.
For the ten Pakistanis who attacked Mumbai, getting to the city itself was a separate task, risky and dangerous. The terrorist attack might not have taken place at all: they had to travel by boat, and if it had not been for an Indian fishing trawler captured along the way, things could have turned out badly for them. Actually, the landing in the city was subsequently carried out from the water and in the dark.
Investigative actions are still underway regarding the Krasnogorsk terrorists. Information appears, then is refuted - and this has happened several times already. In particular, they wrote that all of them are already citizens of the Russian Federation - this information has now been refuted, and the legality of their presence in the country is being checked. But be that as it may, it is already clear that they lived quietly in the country, one of them definitely worked, and they calmly moved in the personal car of one of the suspects. They arrived at Crocus City Hall on it, and when leaving the parking lot, they hit several people running out of the building on it, and they were detained on it in the Bryansk region.
Indian Army soldier outside the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel, Mumbai, 2008. At first, Pakistani terrorists more than successfully resisted local security forces
In Mumbai, terrorists, divided into several groups, aggressively and skillfully confronted the police. Here, however, you need to understand that some police officers in India do not have firearms at all. Their weapons are a uniform, a bushy mustache and a long bamboo club. The first police officers who tried to counter terrorists with firearms were armed with real rarities from the Second World War - Webley revolvers and SMLE bolt-action rifles. In general, even with the start of the confrontation at the Taj Mahal Palace hotel, where one of the groups took hostages, the situation did not get any better; the local security services acted ineptly and clumsily.
The first special forces units are preparing to enter Crocus City Hall... but by this time there were no terrorists inside. They had no intention of fighting with law enforcement officers, much less dying.
Judging by what we see now, none of the terrorists were going to die in Krasnogorsk, and in general they didn’t want to die...
And here we gradually approach, probably, the main difference between the two attacks - their finale for the performers themselves.
In Mumbai, terrorists were going to die. None of them should have survived. The capture of Mohammed Kasab alive was an accident and the result of the heroic act of police inspector Tukaram Omble. Approaching the wounded terrorist to check if he was alive, Omble received several bullets in the torso and head, but being mortally wounded, he managed to grab the barrel of the machine gun, which allowed his colleagues to detain Kasab.
The Krasnogorsk riflemen were not going to die. This, apparently, justifies the nature of their actions. They shot at people on the move, but did not linger too long. They finished off the wounded, but sometimes they were content with the fact that the person had already fallen to the floor. One got the feeling that the main thing for them was that there were no people behind them who could interfere with them, and the speed of their actions. They clearly had no intention of entering into a confrontation with the police. When special forces were unloaded at the burning building, and the media were reporting about hostages, shooting and possible negotiations, all the attackers were already driving a used foreign car towards the Bryansk region, hoping to escape alive and unharmed.
Photo from social networks of one of the suspects in the attack on Crocus City Hall, who lived and worked in the Ivanovo region... well, where would we be without MMA
That is, martyrdom, paradise and houris are no longer so seductive. And to shoot infidels and get away with impunity, and even get money for it, is a new goal for terrorists.
And in this regard, the fact that all the direct (again, unverified data) perpetrators have been detained is very good. This will make potential successors to the work of the Krasnogorsk riflemen understand that it will not be possible to shoot and set people on fire in the capital of Russia and get away with impunity. And martyrdom may not happen either. No money, no freedom, no paradise, no houris. And here we can say for sure that all the actions of our security forces after the terrorist attack itself were much more competent than those of their Indian colleagues. The result, as they say, is obvious - all the suspects were detained and even almost unharmed.
When the realization came that it would not be possible to shoot infidels with impunity. On the left is one of those detained on suspicion of attack on Crocus City Hall, on the right is the wounded Mohammed Kasab at the police station
Now all that remains is to pray for the victims, wait for the results of the official investigation and hope that appropriate conclusions will be drawn from the situation and measures will be taken.
Information