Speaking of terrorist attacks (as I was in my last post) I watched the move Patriots Day very recently. It stars Mark Wahlberg and covers the bombing of the Boston marathon on April 15, 2013 , when three innocent people were killed, including an eight year old boy. Hundreds of people were injured, including 16 who lost limbs.

Although based on the events of the day, and the few subsequent days, it is obviously not a documentary. And even though you know what happened, it does make compelling viewing.

One of the things which comes across very strongly in the movie is the unified way the people of the city reacted to the atrocity. The phrase “Boston Strong” began to be used, and almost immediately became a popular hashtag on Twitter. For me this reaffirms what I was saying in the last post: if the intention of these attacks is to frighten people and weaken their resolve, then it actually seems to have the opposite effect.

There seem to be a number of differences between this attack and the recent ones in the UK:

  • The two attackers (whom I will not name) were brothers
  • The elder brother was married, with a young daughter
  • The two attackers had no intention of being killed in the attack. The investigation uncovered lots of CCTV footage of the two men, and one shows the younger brother running away from the scene
  • The attackers intended to continue their campaign, and were apparently intent on going to New York to commit another atrocity

Three days after the attack, the brothers killed a MIT policeman, and the elder brother was killed, having been shot several times by policeman and (incredibly) run over by his brother.

The younger brother remains on death row.