Attempted suicide bombing at a Taylor Swift concert… “Fear for Japan” looms as “Islamic extremists” are implicated.

Taylor Swift’s three-day concert in Vienna, Austria (August 8-10) was canceled due to a terrorist plot, and the relationship between the three teenage suspects arrested and the Islamic militant group ISIS, as well as a horrifying terror plot has emerged.

ISIS is an Islamic extremist group that has emerged in Iraq and Syria.

According to Austrian security authorities, on August 7, they arrested a 17-year-old and a 19-year-old suspect for planning a terrorist attack at a Swift concert, and on the evening of August 8, they arrested a third suspect, an 18-year-old.

According to Page Six, the main suspect carried out the suicide bombings, using homemade explosives and a knife.

“I wanted to kill as many people as possible,” he confessed.

He confessed that he “wanted to kill as many people as possible.

The 19-year-old suspect, an Austrian with roots in North Macedonia, confessed to planning the attack after his arrest. During the search of his house, chemicals and materials that could be used to manufacture explosives were seized.

Investigators are scrutinizing the suspect’s “network” and are examining physical and electronic evidence.

The suspect is believed to have been radicalized by Abul Bala’a, a Berlin-based Islamist and “preacher of hate”. The mosque where Balaa was preaching has been frequented by ISIS fighters in Germany for years.

The 17-year-old suspect, who was arrested near the stadium where the performance was scheduled to take place, had only been hired a few days earlier by a company that provides services at the venue during concerts. A vast amount of material related to ISIS and al-Qaeda was seized in the raid.

The 18-year-old suspect, an Iraqi national who had been in contact with the main suspects but was not directly involved in the current plot, had recently pledged allegiance to ISIS leaders online.

Austrian concert organizers said they expected up to 65,000 fans inside the stadium and up to 30,000 outside for a single concert. Had it been executed, it would have been a disaster.

Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer said on August 8,

“The suspects had a very specific and detailed plan to cause a catastrophe,”

Nehmer clarified. Due to Austrian privacy rules, the names of the suspects are not being released.

This is not the first time Islamic extremists have targeted a concert; in ’17, militant Salman Abedi detonated a homemade bomb at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England, killing 22 people and injuring more than 200. The incident occurred. The bomber was killed in the explosion, but his brother, Hashem Abedi, later admitted involvement in the terrorist plot and was sentenced to 55 years in prison.”

Swift, shocked by the incident, said in ’19 that his “greatest fear” in life was a violent attack at a concert.

On July 29 of this year, a hooded 17-year-old boy broke into a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport, England, and slashed participants with a knife, killing three girls. The motive for that attack is unknown.

Austrian authorities are said to have received information about the Swift concert threat from U.S. intelligence agencies because Austrian law does not allow them to monitor the messaging app the suspects allegedly used to communicate.

All three Vienna concerts were cancelled, an unusual situation, but the terrorist plot was thwarted and a catastrophe was averted. Swift’s future performances are said to be under tight security.

International terrorist attacks by al-Qaeda, IS, and other Islamic extremist groups have occurred frequently in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, and other countries. In November 2003, 130 people were killed in an indiscriminate shooting attack by an Islamic extremist group on the Bataclan Theater in Paris. In June ’17, a car plowed into a downtown area in London, and three passengers attacked people with knives, leading to an IS attack in Europe and on the Indonesian island of Bali.

Although similar incidents in Japan are believed to have been rare, Japan, which is strengthening its military alliance with the U.S. by drastically increasing defense spending, cannot be certain that there is no possibility that it will be targeted by Islamic extremist groups. It will be necessary to consider further countermeasures rather than treating the attempted attack on the Swift concert as a “fire on the other side of the river.