Truck attacker kills dozens in Nice, driver shot dead

Truck attacker kills dozens in Nice, driver shot dead

Reuters
By Michel Rose

3 mins ago



EARLIER STORY: PARIS, July 14 (Reuters) - At least 30 people were killed and 100 injured in the French Riviera city of Nice late on Thursday when a truck plowed into crowds watching a fireworks display on France's Bastille Day national holiday in a criminal attack, a local official said.

The driver, who drove at high speed for over 100 meters (yards) along the famed Promenade des Anglais seafront before hitting the mass of spectators, was shot dead, sub-prefect Sebastien Humbert told France Infos radio.

Humbert described it as a clear criminal attack, although the driver was not yet identified. Residents of the Mediterranean city close to the Italian border were advised to stay indoors. There was no sign of any other attack.

Almost exactly eight months ago Islamic State militants killed 130 people in Paris. On Sunday, France had breathed a sigh of relief as the month-long Euro 2016 soccer tournament ended without a feared attack.

"Dear Nicois," local mayor Christian Estrosi tweeted, "The driver of a truck appears to have killed dozens of people. Stay at home for the time being. More news to follow."

Regional newspaper Nice Matin quoted its reporter at the scene saying there were many injured people and blood on the street. It published a photograph of a damaged, long-distance delivery truck, which it said was riddled with bullets and images of emergency services treating the injured.

Damien Allemand, the paper's correspondent, was quoted as saying: "People are running. It's panic. He rode up onto the Prom and piled into the crowd ... There are people covered in blood. There must be many injured."

Social media carried images of people lying apparently lifeless in pools of blood.

U.S. government agencies have received constant reports of Islamic State threats to attack France and those threats are regarded as current, a U.S. security official said. However, two U.S. officials said they had no information at this point about whether militants were involved in the Nice incident.

CNN said it has spoken to a witness, identified as an American pilot, who saw the truck ramming the crowd. The witness said the driver mowed people down, accelerating as he hit them. The witness said there was only one person in the truck.

Local mayor Estrosi has warned in the past of the risk of Islamist attacks in the region, following Islamic State bloodshed in Paris and Brussels over the past 18 months.

French President Francois Hollande, who was in the south of France at the time, had hours earlier said a state of emergency put in place after the Paris attacks in November would not be extended when it was due to expire on July 26.

"We can't extend the state of emergency indefinitely, it would make no sense. That would mean we're no longer a republic with the rule of law applied in all circumstances," Hollande told journalists in a traditional Bastille Day interview.

Jesus Christ. Are we witnessing the beginning of the end?

Iamtdg said:

Jesus Christ. Are we witnessing the beginning of the end?

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No but it is coming to the point that countries that are attacked need to band together and decide to squash the vermin that are doing this.

If that takes some collateral damage, so be it. This shit is getting out of control because they have been allowed to get away with it.

We bomb one dipshit, shoot another, there is some other fuck who takes his place. This shit cannot continue.

And let me say, if it is some loon, I take it back. But it sounds like a calculated terror operation.

boozeman said:

No but it is coming to the point that countries that are attacked need to band together and decide to squash the vermin that are doing this.

If that takes some collateral damage, so be it. This shit is getting out of control because they have been allowed to get away with it.

We bomb one dipshit, shoot another, there is some other fuck who takes his place. This shit cannot continue.

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100% agree. We have to get past this whole "but, we are targeting a religion" bullshit. That religion and a ton of its followers are targeting and killing people in bulk. Fuck them and fuck their religion. I don't care anymore. Annihilate the threat at any cost.

boozeman said:

And let me say, if it is some loon, I take it back. But it sounds like a calculated terror operation.

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I'm not taking shit back. Even if this one wasn't, there are dozens that are. There is plenty of reason to end this threat before it gets worse.

Iamtdg said:

I'm not taking shit back. Even if this one wasn't, there are dozens that are. There is plenty of reason to end this threat before it gets worse.

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It is not much different between our own domestic terrorist situation.

Is it a loon or something bigger?

If it is the loon, get rid of it. And that's cool.

But if this is directly linked to the IS, then I would hope it would be game on.

boozeman said:

It is not much different between our own domestic terrorist situation.

Is it a loon or something bigger?

If it is the loon, get rid of it. And that's cool.

But if this is directly linked to the IS, then I would hope it would be game on.

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You would hope, but that will never happen with a bleeding heart in office. Will. not. happen.

They're now reporting 73 dead and 100+ wounded.

Unbelievable. It's time for our countries to band together and exterminate this human garbage. I have no doubt this is ISIS connected somehow. It should be open season on anybody that shows any support to them.

NoDak said:

They're now reporting 73 dead and 100+ wounded.

Unbelievable. It's time for our countries to band together and exterminate this human garbage. I have no doubt this is ISIS connected somehow. It should be open season on anybody that shows any support to them.

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In addition there should be a screening process of immigrants from areas where extremist are known to operate in. That's not a hate message it's a common sense approach.

I have almost no doubt this is Islamic terrorism.

Are they all bloodthirsty, extremist pieces of sh!t? Probably not but if only 1% of say, a 100,000 are, that's 1,000 crazy MFers running around your country. If it's .5%, it's still 500, that's 500 too many and you're talking far more than 100,000 "refugees" in different countries. It's not like this cr@p just started after 9/11, it's been going on for decades. Hijackings, bombings, attacks like this. F this noise, it's far past time to take the gloves off.

I was in Nice right around this time last year, rough to see.

I'm seeing 75 dead now.

DLK150 said:

I have almost no doubt this is Islamic terrorism.

Are they all bloodthirsty, extremist pieces of sh!t? Probably not but if only 1% of say, a 100,000 are, that's 1,000 crazy MFers running around your country. If it's .5%, it's still 500, that's 500 too many and you're talking far more than 100,000 "refugees" in different countries. It's not like this cr@p just started after 9/11, it's been going on for decades. Hijackings, bombings, attacks like this. F this noise, it's far past time to take the gloves off.

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There are more than 2 billion Muslims world wide. If only 1% are extremist then that could amount to over 20 million. Something to think about.

All out war.....just like ISIS wants. Don't take the bait.

What should we do? I has no idea.

L.T. Fan said:

There are more than 2 billion Muslims world wide. If only 1% are extremist then that could amount to over 20 million. Something to think about.

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Yeah, I've pondered that before. I used a lower number because of all the talk about hundreds of thousands of "refugees" in other countries. Just to demonstrate that's still potentially a lot of psychopaths running around that don't care about dying.

I know everyone wants to "posse up" and is out for blood in order to stop these lunatics, but it's really not that simple. This isn't the Cold War era where we can easily identify our enemies and a little "force on force" action will solve the problem.

Blaming Obama and his administration is an easy copout, IMO. What we're seeing today is the natural evolution of warfare; which actually began long before Obama. Plain-clothed insurgents using guerilla warfare tactics to disrupt a superior nation/Army......I think we're all smart enough to know that those tactics didn't just come about 8 years ago. The main thing that has really changed, IMO, is that these blood thirsty lunatics have a broader reach to spread their rhetoric thanks to social media and other forms of new technology.

Bombing the hell out of Iraq & Afghanistan will not solve the problem of dealing with these random lone wolf attacks all across the world.

Look, I don't have all the answers either, but I know trying to get into conventional war with this type of enemy probably won't get the job. It would probably never happen but I think one method that would at least help in curbing some of the lone wolf threats would be to expand federal agencies' authorities when it comes to surveillance & monitoring. Obviously that would call for even more concessions of our civil liberties which is why I don't think it would happen. I think it would also take buy in and cooperation from major companies like Google, Facebook, Apple, Twitter, etc. They'd have to be willing to work with federal agencies to aid in monitoring and accessing accounts of suspected extremists. Again, I doubt that happens because personal privacy and security is a huge selling point for those companies. We saw what happened several months back when the Feds tried to strong-arm Apple into cracking their own code to aid in the investigation of the San Bernardino shooter(s).

So as you can see, it goes much deeper than rallying the troops and running them out of Iraq. And as a matter of fact if a coalition of world forces began to overwhelm them in Iraq they'd just flee to Syria and hide out there for a while. They have a lot of tactical patience. They'll lay dormant for a few years and give US and other world forces a false sense of security....coalition forces will then begin to depart the country then ISIS would be right back at it because the Iraq government and military are nothing but worthless pieces of shit.

Therefore it'll also come down to would the politicians, military leaders, American people, and the Iraq government be open to making Iraq a long term place of American military occupation like we've done with Japan, Germany, and Korea? Right now I don't see that happening. But that's something that should definitely be on the table if we're serious about making sure Iraq doesn't become a safe haven for terrorists.

There are no easy answers to fixing this mess. Again, it goes much deeper and is more complex than dropping bombs.

Wars are always driven by money. Dry up the money and you will shut down this group. Find the money trail and then do anything legal or illegal to sever the line.

I agree this isn't as simple as just going in and kicking their ass because they're everywhere and other than the ones wreaking havoc in Syria and other ME countries where they go about in their little ninja outfits, there's no clear cut way of identifying them. The easiest answers is to keep people of a certain faith from migrating to your country and quit screwing around over there.

LTF, it's not that simple because they're funded by theft and some rogue nations. These "people" are basically criminals who have no regard for life, western values and laws. We had sanctions on Iran for years but they still managed to be one of the biggest sponsors of terrorism out there. They care about their own beliefs and that is it.

It's just F'ed up that with all the modern surveillance, spying and all the acronym intelligence agencies out there, nobody can prevent things like this from happening. Couple that with the "We Are the World", attitude of unconditional tolerance and you have crap like this. It's not a perfect world where everyone gets along and the sooner "leaders" realize this, the better.