Tonight there was a terrorist attack at the Crocus City Hall in Moscow several minutes before a concert by the band Picnic. There were apparently at least three or four gunmen with fully-automatic weapons who shot their way into the venue and started a fire. From RT:
Crocus City, a large mall and music venue just northwest of the Russian capital, came under attack by unknown assailants late on Friday.
Several individuals armed with assault rifles attacked visitors, shooting them on sight at point-blank range. The attackers also targeted a concert hall at the mall, setting it on fire and triggering a major blaze in the whole building.
The Russian authorities are investigating the incident as a terrorist attack. No party immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, while the gunmen did not make any statements or attempt to take hostages, apparently just seeking to kill as many as possible.
According to preliminary estimates by Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), at least 40 people have been killed and more than 100 injured in the attack.
By the US embassy’s own admission, they had knowledge of an “imminent” terrorist attack at a concert, and declined to share this information with Russian authorities. At the time, I assumed this was just the embassy staff blowing smoke, and the warning was aimed at internal audiences to push the “Russia bad and scary” narrative. Even now, I still stick with this initial assessment, there is as of right now no evidence the two events are related. Of course it is idiotic to put the US government in the position of being blamed for a high-profile terrorist attack, but it’s been a long time since I’ve considered anyone at the Department of State competent.
My impression of the gunmen themselves is that they don’t have much or any firearms or military training. But they did have a plan and stuck to it, and that’s what saved them from being killed or caught, at least not right away. My biggest takeaway is that they seemed to religiously stick together as a group, and left as a group. If they had split up they likely could have inflicted more casualties, but their odds of escape would have been much lower. This level of self-preservation suggests that they are not suicidal. I also think it is likely that none of them are local and haven’t been to that shopping center before. Reconnaissance can be done without anyone on the team setting foot on the location. Photos, videos, and maps are enough.
There is a video clip and an accompanying rumor that one of the gunmen was caught, but nothing confirmed, and it might just be a passerby who resembled them.
Here’s a compilation of footage of the attack and aftermath that I found on Telegram from various sources:
That’s all I have for now. It’s not possible to say anything conclusive until the story develops further. I do have to say that I am inspired by the actions of the concert goers. People looked out for each other, men protected women, there was no stampeding or over-crowding. Russians were more polite to each other during a mass shooting than during rush hour in the Moscow metro. I’m not sure Americans can say the same. The way these people, I assume to be total strangers, interacted with each other was actually inspiring and that stuck out to me even when this horrific event first unfolded.
Update 1:
Within minutes of uploading, YouTube took down the video. That suggests someone at YouTube immediately made footage of this specific terrorist attack a no-go for any uploads. I also notice my two posts on Facebook got almost no reach at all, suggesting that they’re censoring it too.
That raises the question of – why?
Update 2:
The CIA sock puppet ISIS has allegedly taken credit for the attack. That all but confirms my initial assessment of the lack of military training. If this was an attack by, say, Ukrainian soldiers, they would have had proper shooting stances. It’s pretty certain these were Middle Eastern or Caucasian shooters who wield their weapons very stereotypically.
Also, my YouTube appeal was denied.
Ian Kummer
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I do have to say that I am inspired by the actions of the concert goers. People looked out for each other, men protected women, there was no stampeding or over-crowding. Russians were more polite to each other during a mass shooting than during rush hour in the Moscow metro. I’m not sure Americans can say the same.
I heard that the attack was planned for the election, but something went wrong and they could only do it now
Its sad, ironic, but that is probably blow black for Putin’s past in bombing and gassing North Syrian communities and actions again Islamic communities in Dagestan, Chechnya and other Islamic Oblasts.
Its an anti Christians and also anti Western dynamic from ISIS-K/ Caucasus Presence; so has unlikely Western or Ukrainian links.
Oh fuck off, troll.
The Ukrainian response and the actions of the perps (fleeing towards the Ukrainian border, where they were caught) are interesting to say the least.
Aleksey Danilov, the Secretary of the Ukrainian Security and Defence Council, pretty much admitted it was them, offering to organise “some more fun” for Russians. NATO’s problem is that the FSB has caught the terrorists, and judging from the videos they’ve already released, the terrorists are already singing like canaries and describing a recruitment process identical to the one the Ukrainians have used to get people to set light to things and commit other acts of criminal damage.
I wouldn’t be surprised if MI6 had their fingers in this particular pie, they have history in arranging for Muslims to fight Russians – Dudayev’s Chechens, the KLA in Kosovo and the throat-slitters in Bosnia, not to mention Al-Qaeda in 1980s Afghanistan all had MI6 funnelling British jihadis and taxpayers’ money their way.
Obviously the KLA and Bosnian Muslim jihadis weren’t primarily aimed at Russia, I should have said they liked killing Orthodox Slavs.
I also wonder whether this might have been the nasty surprise Victoria Nuland said she had prepared for Putin.
FSB were seen as late, incompetent and reacting to the atrocity, suggesting no Muscovite is safe, other than Kremlin cellar dwellers.
fuck off, troll