Terror in Madrid

This chapter analyzes the dramatic days around the massacre of 11 March 2004. It reveals new crucial information on the political handling of the terrorist attack and the unfortunate role played by the Spanish secret intelligence services, who were also kept in the dark about the real identity of the perpetrators of the attack by their own government. It effectively rejects the thesis that Al Qaeda determined the outcome of the elections, as it is able to reveal that by mid-February, one month prior to the general elections, the Conservative Party knew that a dramatic change in the voting pattern in favor of the Socialists was underway.