At 14:29 13-9-01 -0700, Jeffrey Miller wrote:
> > The leader of the Green Left expressed concern that NATO's decision will
> > lead to terrorist attacks in The Netherlands.
>
>Why?
>
>Seriously.. if I were going to pick a NATO country to attack, why on
>earth would I pick .nl?[0]
Let's see.
- The Dutch government supports the US, which in itself might already be
enough reason for terrorists to attack targets in The Netherlands.
- Like in so many other countries, there is a US embassy here -- always a
prime target.
- The city of The Hague houses the International Court of Justice.
- Much of the goods that are shipped to Europe go through The Netherlands
(Rotterdam has the largest container port in the world); a few well-placed
bombs could seriously disrupt supply lines to the rest of Western Europe.
- All major oil corporations have large refineries in The Netherlands;
destroying those oil supplies would certainly do quite some harm.
- Europe is moving towards a situation in which each country's military
contributes to European defense with whatever that country specialises in.
In the case of The Netherlands, it is logistics. Eindhoven Air Force Base
(only a few kilometers from my house, and one of the locations where I
work) will become a major hub in European military air transports in the
next few years.
>[0] other than, of course, its not an obvious target and most people in
>the US (my main enemy) couldn't find it on a map
As shown above, there are obviously more targets here than you thought. As
for most people in the US not being able to find The Netherlands on a map:
every few years reports trickle into our newspapers that say that many US
citizens can not even locate *their own country* on a map...
Jeroen
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