European Security Scrambles After Brussels Attacks

Europe’s patchwork of spy agencies after Brussels. From eavesdropping to sharing intel, the challenge ahead.

Bombs in Brussels. A bombing in Pakistan. It’s such a depressing drumbeat. And yet, it has to be taken on. You can’t just have city parks becoming death zones for children, as in Lahore yesterday. Or Brussels’ airport as a no-go zone. It’s still closed. Pakistan’s fight goes on. Europe has a particular problem. Many countries. Many security organizations.  Many returned ISIS fighters and, apparently, a target on its back. This hour On Point, the security future of Europe. How that works.
-- Tom Ashbrook

Kamran Haider, correspondent with Bloomberg News.

Angela Charlton, Associated Press bureau chief for France, Belgium and North Africa. (@acharlton)

Clint Watts, fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and the George Washington University Center for Cyber and Homeland Security. (@selectedwisdom)

Christina Schori Liang, advisior for Emerging Security Challenges Program at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy.

Associated Press: Brussels police conduct more raids linked to deadly bombings -- "Police raided Brussels neighborhoods Friday in operations described as linked to this week's bombings as well as a suspected new plot in France. They detained three people and shot two of them in the legs, including one who was carrying a suspicious bag while accompanied by a young girl. Gunfire and two explosions rang out in the Schaerbeek district, the same area where police had earlier found explosives and bomb-making material in an apartment used by the suicide attackers who killed 31 people and wounded 270 on Tuesday in the airport and subway."

Washington Post: Suspect arrested as plot in France is foiled; six detained in Brussels investigation — "The French interior minister said Thursday that police had foiled a terrorist plot with the arrest of a man who was believed to be at 'an advanced stage' of planning an attack on French soil. The arrest infiltrated the upper level of a terrorism network, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said, and was the culmination of several weeks of investigation. There was no apparent link to Tuesday’s attacks in Brussels, he said."
Foreign Policy: A Wounded Islamic State Is a Dangerous Islamic State — "Recent European attacks, viewed from afar, might imply that the Islamic State is stronger than ever, but it’s the reverse: The group desperately needs to show signs of success to shore up its ranks and inspire international popular support. And since those wins are harder to come by in Syria and Iraq, they have started looking elsewhere. From Paris to Istanbul to Brussels, the Islamic State has decidedly moved to Europe, where they are terrorists without borders."