As I said in my original post Mumbai was a suicide mission, whereas Lahore was clearly devised to enable the gunmen to escape. These are opposite tactics, so why do you persist in asserting that I stated that the tactics were the same?

I never made any statement one way or another about the goals of these attacks.

Neither did I assert that it was certain that these two attacks emanated from the same source. Like you, I don’t rule it in or out. Do you have an alternative definition of the word “suggesting”?

With regard to armaments, it is true that the Mumbai gunmen do not appear to have carried RPGs but as at Lahore, they did carry grenades and assault rifles. As you say, these armaments are very common in the region. But is is also true that they did not wear suicide belts. Thus both the Lahore and Mumbai gunmen were expected to use marksmanship to wreak the damage they caused, which requires a much higher level of training than that expected of a suicide bomber. Given that the Mumbai attack was a suicide mission, the question (which I am not attempting to answer) is why operatives with considerable expertise in firearms were chosen rather than suicide bombers.

I don’t think it’s beyond the realm of possibility that the same people who were behind Mumbai were behind these attacks. I do take issue with silly comments like “They were dressed the same, they were armed the same, their tactics were the same, their goal was the same”. These statements are either all factually incorrect or completely irrelevant.

Pakistan Punjab governor Salmaan Tahseer, Governor of Pakistan’s Punjab province on Tuesday, said the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team’s bus in Lahore was similar to the Mumbai’s 26/11 attack.

“This attack is similar to the attack that took place in Mumbai. They were the same people who attacked Mumbai and were highly trained,” Tahseer told CNN-IBN.

They speak of a “convoy” and “VIP security”. I gather that the bus containing the players tore off and escaped, albeit having taken some fire. The driver of the vehicle containing the umpires was shot dead. I heard that someone, presumably a policeman, tried to take over but it turned out he couldn’t drive the thing. They sat there taking fire for a considerable time before someone managed to drive them away without being shot.

Presumably there were support vehicles with said commandos who must have taken off and fled with the players’ bus. You’d think that they should have returned fire to provide cover for the people who they were guarding to get away.

There was also criticism because the police station, I think the main one, was only a few hundred metres away and no reinforcements appeared.

So it might be a big stuff up rather than a conspiracy, but it could be a bit of both.

BTW the place where it happened is said to be an elite area of Lahore. Geoff Lawson said he lived 200 metres from the scene while he was coach of the Pakistan team.

BBB

He also reckoned there were supposed to be 25 Pakistani commandos protecting them who were nowhere to be seen when the fun began. And wasn’t amused to see TV footage showing the perpetrators just strolling off down the street at the end.

There were three relevant segments on PM tonight, with commentators giving some hope. Pakistani politics seems endemically ordinary, to say the least.

“What you have to remember about Pakistan is that it’s basically a military encampment with a country attached.”

I’m not sure to this day whether he sounded amused or envious.