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Well, That Happened
Most post-9/11 Islamic terrorists in the West — the Madrid and London bombers excepted, though even the more recent of those happened nearly 10 years ago — have been hopeless amateurs, incapable of causing more casualties than a typical spree-shooter. If your global Jihad can’t predictably out-perform lone nut cases such as Adam Lanza, James Holmes, and Jared Lougfner, that speaks poorly for you.
This morning’s attack on on the left-wing French satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, however, appears to be something different. Obviously, we’re still learning details and we don’t know how this one will end, but the basic facts show a level of competency we haven’t seen from domestic terrorists in a while. Any idiot can ambush a cyclist, set-off a pair of pressure-cooker bombs, or go on a suicidal shooting-spree, but attacking a specific, symbolic location in broad daylight — whose inhabitants knew themselves to be serious targets — with multiple, highly-armed assailants who planned to get away and did takes some degree of planning, skill, and smarts. I’ll concede I’m mildly impressed in addition to being disgusted, saddened, and angered.
Fortunately, France — for all its problems — is a serious country with a proud people, a strong martial tradition, and willingness to use it, even under a silly socialist government. These barbarians may be celebrating right now, but I doubt they could find anyone willing to sell them a life-insurance plan.
Published in General
We all know how this plays out. Western leaders will “condemn in the strongest possible terms this cowardly attack” and then… do NOTHING.
Because, you know, Religion of Peace.
I am not sure that the French will be so complaisant as is suggested. I don’t believe that this will end quickly but would suggest that the French want to get to the root of this problem, to find the people who back the shooters and are hidden in the shadows. Get the backers and it will have a real detrimental effect on those homicide merchants who are a dime a dozen.
I haven’t yet read of the details of the attack, but it does sound like a significant departure from the “ordinary” assault. I will be interested to learn what security measures were in place and how they were circumvented or overcome.
I blame the Vatican. We should have finished these creeps off in the Crusades 1,000 years ago.
Well that’s hardly fair. Its not like the Vatican had an Army. I personally choose to blame the Byzantinians for being weak and pathetic and letting them conquer Asia and North Africa. Though to be fair if some one from Europe should be blamed it should be the scurrilous French who pulled out from the 3rd crusade to conquer back territory from England while Richard was busy.
Hollande:
“An act of exceptional barbarism has been committed in Paris against a newspaper. A paper, in other words, an organ of free speech. An act against journalists who had always wanted to show that in France it was possible to defend one’s ideas, and exercise their rights guaranteed and protected by the Republic…
The people responsible for this are now hunted men. They will be hunted for as long as it takes. They will be arrested and face justice for their crime.
Today France is in shock; the shock of a multiple assassination, a terrorist attack. That much is clear; Charlie Hebdo had received threats in the past, and was under police protection…
These are tense times. In the last few weeks we have foiled several terrorist plots, and we have known we were threatened, like other freedom-loving countries, and it is for precisely this reason we are targets. Because we are a free country we can overcome these men of violence and punish them for their crimes.
No-one can be allowed to think they can get away with such things in France, and strike at the heart of republican values through one of its pillars, an independent press.”
Obama’s statement, by contrast, said nothing about freedom of speech or the press. But this is the man who once said that “the future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam.” (Can you imagine the outcry from the left if Bush had said, “The future must not belong to those who slander Jesus Christ, the son of God”?!)
Well, Charlie Hebdo “slandered” the prophet with humor, and the dead will certainly have no future. Doesn’t the quote in bold above sound like eliminationist rhetoric from the Islamist extremists themselves? One could look at that statement in isolation, then look at the attack, and say, “Mission acccomplished.” I don’t mean to say that the president incited the attack, but such words, the product of sloppy thinking by our supposedly brilliant leader, do not help matters when they give some degree of comfort to the enemy.
Tommy De Seno
I blame the Vatican. We should have finished these creeps off in the Crusades 1,000 years ago.
Clarence! Beauséant! Get ’em!
Scott Johnson (PowerLine) noted that President Obama in his statement avoided any reference to Islam. To be fair, I can’t say President Bush (inventor of “Religion of Peace”) did much better.
It’s high time we began to deal with Islam directly. In 2006, Pope Benedict issued a historically and theologically grounded challenge to “Islam” during his term. Since then, there’s been quite a drought. Though now we have a statement by the President of Egypt.
Someone with more stature (ideally the American president, but I’ll settle for Francois Hollande) needs to step up. Reagan provided the model, with his “Tear down this wall” speech. Today’s leader needs to call out the leaders of Islam, using the same language: “If you seek peace, come here to this gate…”
Now, there is one logistical difficulty, as there is no one single leader of Islam. But I’m sure the State Department could come up with a top ten list. And yes, they need to be called out by name.
The Byzantines had pulled of a remarkable reconquest of much of their empire under Heracleus not 20 years before the Arab invasion, beating the Persian empire back at tremendous cost. This is all the more remarkable given that Byzantium was, at the start of that war, reduced to only holding coastal outposts and some heartland Anatolian territory, plus Carthage and their Mediterranean territories. They had lost Egypt, Jerusalem, and many other key points, only to rally and drive Persia to its knees.
The cost was enormous to Byzantium though, depleting manpower, treasure, and reserves. Just prior to the rise of the Islamic armies, the empire was further decimated by a terrible plague, and Heracleus himself was dying (probably of cancer) and unable to assist in any way. Persia was too weak to resist the conquest, and totally collapsed. Byzantium fought a desperate multi-century holding action against the Arabs, only regaining the upper hand and retaking much lost territory in the 800s and 900s. Bad management and internal corruption saw them lose it all again (this time permanently) after the death of Basil II, this time to the Turks.
Hellenic sissies.
Pope Frank won’t let us finish.
That they had plans for getting away alive suggests that they cannot be dismissed as the usual crazies.
@Misthiocracy, exactly.
What I’m finding depressing is that responses are entirely predictable, as if playing out by a script.
Prepare yourselves now to see a more robust response from the French, both rhetorical and kinetic, than anything we’ve seen from Obama over the last 6 years. It’ll be tough to stomach, yet at the same time I’ll be cheering them on.