November 18, 2015

Paris attacks: No security can stop Isis – the bombers will always get through
By Patrick Cockburn
November 16, 2015

Only the total destruction of the terrorist group, through US air support for Assad’s ground forces, can keep Europe safe.

"The Independent " - The “Islamic State”, as ISIS styles itself, will be pleased with the outcome of its attacks in Paris. It has shown that it can retaliate with its usual savagery against a country that is bombing its territory and is a power to be feared at a time when it is under serious military pressure. The actions of just eight ISIS suicide bombers and gunmen are dominating the international news agenda for days on end.

There is not a lot that can be done about this. People are understandably eager to know the likelihood of their being machine-gunned the next time they sit in a restaurant or attend a concert in Paris or London.

But the apocalyptic tone of press coverage is exaggerated: the violence experienced hitherto in Paris is not comparable with Belfast and Beirut in the 1970s or Damascus and Baghdad today. Contrary to the hyperbole of wall-to-wall television coverage, the shock of living in a city being bombed soon wears off.

A further disadvantage flows from excessive rhetoric about the massacre: instead of the atrocities acting as an incentive for effective action, the angry words become a substitute for a real policy. After the Charlie Hebdo murders in January, 40 world leaders marched with linked arms through the streets of Paris proclaiming, among other things, that they would give priority to the defeat of ISIS and its al-Qaeda equivalents.

But, in practice, they did nothing of the sort. When ISIS forces attacked Palmyra in eastern Syria in May, the US did not launch air strikes against it because the city was defended by the Syrian army and Washington was frightened of being accused of keeping President Bashar al-Assad in power.

In effect, the US handed ISIS a military advantage, which it promptly used to seize Palmyra, behead captured Syrian soldiers and blow up the ancient ruins.
Click Link:
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/paris-terror-attacks-no-security-can-stop-isis-the-bombers-will-always-get-through-a6735491.html