OK, let me say something nice about a Korean newspaper for once — I think The JoongAng Ilbo is decent, and their English-language news coverage is pretty good. That said, two jagoffs apparently tried to fire-bomb a Daegu hagwon this morning:
“At 7:07 a.m. yesterday, an explosion went off on the third floor of a nine-story building in Suseong District, Daegu, starting a fire. Two arsonists had gotten access to the floor and hurled glass bottles filled with flammable liquids.
A janitor alerted local police, who dispatched officers to the scene. They suspected terrorists because the target of the attack was the American Cultural Center, located on the third floor of the building.
The intention was indeed to strike against America. Unfortunately for the terrorists, they ended up torching a private, Korean-owned English academy.”
First of all, “explosion” might be a bit too strong of a word. If they chucked molotovs I don’t think that constitutes an explosion. Second, “terrorist” is getting thrown around way too lightly these days (in America as well). Yes, in a very general sense, terrorism is violence intended to achieve political goals (usually fear). But to call, say, the two kids in Boston “terrorists” instead of “confused, hateful little shits” is possibly giving them way too much credit.
Same thing here.
Granted, stuff like this is much less common in South Korea in general so it probably comes as a bit more of a shock to the system. But societies really need to keep a strong firewall between domestic criminal activity (in this case what might just amount to vandalism) and actual sophisticated, coordinated, 9/11-style terrorism.
