Mali Jihadist Attack

[ORAC]

Report on BBC, relayed from French radio.

Jihadist attack on the Radisson Hotel in the capital of Mali. French troops being deployed outside. 100-140 guests/hostages inside.

Guest calling from 7th floor reporting gunfire in the corridors.....

[Easy Street]

If last night's truly appalling Question Time bears any reflection on the state of the public debate on these matters, we might as well not bother discussing this incident. Repeat after me: this has absolutely nothing to do with Islam; the West has brought this on itself through its foreign policy mistakes, for which we must atone by allowing mass immigration. Cue loud applause.

I hope that the PM can bring the detailed debate over Islamic extremism out from its current homes on internet forums and niche right-wing journals. He has made encouraging statements (https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/lord-mayors-banquet-2015-prime-ministers-speech) but the rest of the media seem determined to skate over or ignore them. I'm getting fed up with it.

[Wokkafans]

How long will Andrew Neil last on the BBC after airing his views on the Paris attackers on This Week last night.

https://twitter.com/bbcthisweek/status/667490163052797952

[Wokkafans]

Duplicate post

[strake]

Wokkafans
With luck, they'll fire him and he can become a politician who might lead the country into decisive action rather than the current wallying around which is frankly, embarrassing. There our 'leaders' sit, T's-U-B's letting the USA, France and Russia take the fight to these maniacs.

[Martin the Martian]

Andrew Neil:

Respect!:D

[SilsoeSid]

Wokkas link video embedded;

Muuka8KBd7Y

http://www.pprune.org/jet-blast/570848-petition-stop-using-isis-isil.html#post9186428

[Above The Clouds]

Top man great respect :D:D:D:D

IS, ISIL, Daesh, Daesh, Daesh, take heed and listen carefully.

[glad rag]

There was a thread in the news forum but it's been locked...

[ORAC]

Oh please. An old fool whistling in the dark to keep away his fears.

Paris to last another 1000 years? Maybe, but the glory that was Rome fell easily to the barbarians. Then the splendour of Byzantium and the eastern empire fell to the Ottoman hordes, the basilicas turned to mosques and stables. Nothing lasts eternal.

The Enlightenment has lasted but a few hundred years, as did the British Empire. It could go the same way. If we wish to hold onto what we have, we will have to fight for it.

Niall Ferguson in the Sunday Times. Posted in full as it's behind their firewall.

Like the Roman empire, Europe has let its defences crumble (http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/comment/columns/NiallFerguson/article1633179.ece)

I am not going to repeat what you have already read or heard. I am not going to say that what happened in Paris on Friday night was unprecedented horror, for it was not. I am not going to say that the world stands with France, for it is a hollow phrase. Nor am I going to applaud François Hollande’s pledge of “pitiless” vengeance, for I do not believe it. I am, instead, going to tell you that this is exactly how civilisations fall.

Here is how Edward Gibbon described the Goths’ sack of Rome in August 410AD: “. . . In the hour of savage licence, when every passion was inflamed, and every restraint was removed . . . a cruel slaughter was made of the Romans; and . . . the streets of the city were filled with dead bodies . . . Whenever the Barbarians were provoked by opposition, they extended the promiscuous massacre to the feeble, the innocent, and the helpless. . .” Now, does that not describe the scenes we witnessed in Paris on Friday night? True, Gibbon’s History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, published in six volumes between 1776 and 1788, represented Rome’s demise as a slow burn. Gibbon covered more than 1,400 years of history. The causes he identified ranged from the personality disorders of individual emperors to the power of the Praetorian Guard and the rise of Sassanid Persia. Decline shaded into fall, with monotheism acting as a kind of imperial dry rot.

For many years, more modern historians of “late antiquity” tended to agree with Gibbon about the gradual nature of the process. Indeed, some went further, arguing that “decline” was an anachronistic term, like the word “barbarian”. Far from declining and falling, they insisted, the Roman empire had imperceptibly merged with the Germanic tribes, producing a multicultural post-imperial idyll that deserved a more flattering label than “Dark Ages”. Recently, however, a new generation of historians has raised the possibility that the process of Roman decline was in fact sudden — and bloody — rather than smooth.

For Bryan Ward-Perkins, what happened was “violent seizure . . . by barbarian invaders”. The end of the Roman west, he writes in The Fall of Rome (2005), “witnessed horrors and dislocation of a kind I sincerely hope never to have to live through; and it destroyed a complex civilisation, throwing the inhabitants of the West back to a standard of living typical of prehistoric times”. In five decades the population of Rome itself fell by three-quarters. Archaeological evidence from the late fifth century — inferior housing, more primitive pottery, fewer coins, smaller cattle — shows that the benign influence of Rome diminished rapidly in the rest of western Europe. “The end of civilisation”, in Ward-Perkins’s phrase, came within a single generation.

Peter Heather’s Fall of the Roman Empire emphasises the disastrous effects not just of mass migration but of organised violence: first the westward shift of the Huns of Central Asia and then the Germanic irruption into Roman territory. In his reading, the Visigoths who settled in Aquitaine and the Vandals who conquered Carthage were attracted to the Roman empire by its wealth, but were enabled to seize that wealth by the arms they acquired and the skills they learnt from the Romans themselves. “For the adventurous,” writes Heather, “the Roman empire, while being a threat to their existence, also presented an unprecedented opportunity to prosper . . . Once the Huns had pushed large numbers of [alien groups] across the frontier, the Roman state became its own worst enemy. Its military power and financial sophistication both hastened the process whereby streams of incomers became coherent forces capable of carving out kingdoms from its own body politic.”

Uncannily similar processes are destroying the European Union today, though few of us want to recognise them for what they are. Like the Roman Empire in the early fifth century, Europe has allowed its defences to crumble. As its wealth has grown, so its military prowess has shrunk, along with its self-belief. It has grown decadent in its shopping malls and sports stadiums. At the same time it has opened its gates to outsiders who have coveted its wealth without renouncing their ancestral faith.

The distant shock to this weakened edifice has been the Syrian civil war, though it has been a catalyst as much as a direct cause for the great Völkerwanderung of 2015. As before, they have come from all over the imperial periphery — from North Africa, from the Levant, from south Asia — but this time they have come in their millions, not in mere tens of thousands. To be sure, most have come hoping only for a better life. Things in their own countries have become just good enough economically for them to afford to leave and just bad enough politically for them to risk leaving. But they cannot stream northwards and westwards without some of that political malaise coming with them. As Gibbon saw, convinced monotheists pose a grave threat to a secular empire.

It is doubtless true to say that the overwhelming majority of Muslims in Europe are not violent. But it is also true that the majority hold views not easily reconciled with the principles of our liberal democracies, including our novel notions about sexual equality and tolerance not merely of religious diversity but of nearly all sexual proclivities. And it is thus remarkably easy for a violent minority to acquire their weapons and prepare their assaults on civilisation within these avowedly peace-loving communities.

I do not know enough about the fifth century to be able to quote Romans who described each new act of barbarism as unprecedented, even when it had happened multiple times before; or who issued pious calls for solidarity after the fall of Rome, even when standing together meant falling together; or who issued empty threats of pitiless revenge, even when all they intended to do was to strike a melodramatic posture. I do know that 21st-century Europe has itself to blame for the mess it is now in. Surely nowhere in the world has devoted more resources to the study of history than modern Europe did. When I went up to Oxford more than 30 years ago, it was taken for granted that in the first term I would study Gibbon. It did no good. We learnt a lot of nonsense to the effect that nationalism was a bad thing, nation states worse and empires the worst things of all.

“Romans before the fall”, wrote Ward-Perkins, “were as certain as we are today that their world would continue for ever substantially unchanged. They were wrong. We would be wise not to repeat their complacency.”

Poor, poor Paris. Killed by complacency.

Niall Ferguson is Laurence A Tisch professor of history at Harvard, a senior fellow of the Hoover Institution, Stanford

[Kitbag]

Good article, the final sentence being the most important; killed by complacency. The trick now is to not be complacent, take the fight to the enemy's heartland; nt just the so-called 'Caliphate' but the basis of their version of Islam. Recognise that sometimes there are bad people out there who are just...plain mad and bad, these folk cannot be negotiated with, we have nothing to give that they want.
The end of the West is not an inevitability, the apocalypse prophesied in the Koran is as likely as any of Nostradamus' predictions. The situation can be turned round.

[Heathrow Harry]

"The Hoover Institution is a unit of Stanford University[3] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoover_Institution#cite_note-3) but has its own board of overseers.[4] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoover_Institution#cite_note-4) It is located on the campus. Its mission statement outlines its basic tenets: representative government, private enterprise, peace, personal freedom, and the safeguards of the American system.[5] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoover_Institution#cite_note-Hoover_Institution_Mission_Statement-5) Although the Institution is often described as politically conservative[6] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoover_Institution#cite_note-6)[7] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoover_Institution#cite_note-7)[8] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoover_Institution#cite_note-8) or as Republican (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Party_%28United_States%29)-leaning, directors and others associated with it resist this description, saying that the Institution is not partisan and that its goal is "to advance ideas of supporting freedom and free enterprise"

aka the idiots who got us into Afghanistan & Iraq.....................

[glad rag]

Harry, I normally enjoy your posts however the Invasion of Afghanistan was justified, you are however 1000% correct from that point on..

[West Coast]

Guess its easier to offer a condemnation of the institution rather than provide a counter argument.

[Stratopause]

The fact that we let the Taliban carve out their own country in Afghanistan led to Sep 11. The fact that we've let Daesh do the same thing in parts of Iraq and Syria has led to the events of the past few weeks. I doubt they will stop there.

No nation wants to solve this problem alone (although the Kurds are doing a hell of a job considering). The permanent five members of the UN Security Council have a "primary responsibility for maintaining international peace and security". If they wanted to, they have the capability to put together a coalition force of overwhelming superiority that would flush these turds out pretty quick. Even the Chinese have had a wake up call for crying out loud. But don't hold your breath.

[ORAC]

Even the Chinese have had a wake up call for crying out loud. But don't hold your breath.

Isis: United Nations Security Council resolution planned by world powers to declare war against group in Iraq and Syria | World Politics | News | The Independent (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/isis-world-powers-plan-united-nations-security-council-resolution-to-declare-war-against-group-in-a6741181.html)

World powers are poised to forge a single resolution at the United Nations Security Council to declare a common war against Isis and “eradicate” jihadists in Iraq and Syria, The Independent understands.

The attacks in Paris as well as the downing of the Russian jet over the Sinai Peninsula have galvanised a hitherto divided Security Council. And a new reality exists: with its alleged execution this week of a Chinese national, Isis has now slaughtered citizens of all five permanent Security Council members........

[Stratopause]

Ha! I slouch corrected. I will believe it when I see it but at least there's hope.

[ORAC]

Not an authorisation, as such, but with the governments in Baghdad and Damascus approving, it gives all the authorisation and international approval needed....

UN Approves Resolution Urging Action Against Islamic State (http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/vote-resolution-condemning-islamic-state-attacks-35325923)

The U.N. Security Council unanimously approved a French-sponsored resolution Friday calling on all nations to redouble and coordinate action to prevent further attacks by Islamic State terrorists and other extremist groups. The resolution says the Islamic State group "constitutes a global and unprecedented threat to international peace and security" and expresses the council's determination "to combat by all means this unprecedented threat."

The measure is the 14th terrorism-related resolution adopted by the U.N.'s most powerful body since 1999. It was adopted a week after violent extremists launched a coordinated gun and bomb assault that killed 130 people in Paris which the Islamic State claims it carried out. It also comes eight days after twin suicide bombings in Beirut killed 43 people, and three weeks after a Russian airliner crashed over Egypt's Sinai peninsula killing all 224 people on board — both attacks also claimed by IS.

The resolution "unequivocally condemns in the strongest terms" these and earlier "horrifying terrorist attacks" carried out by the Islamic State this year in Sousse, Tunisia and Ankara, Turkey. The resolution calls on U.N. member states "that have the capacity to do so to take all necessary measures" against the Islamic State group and all other violent extremist groups "to eradicate the safe haven they have established over significant parts of Iraq and Syria."

This does not constitute an authorization for military action, however, because the resolution is not drafted under Chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter which is the only way the United Nations can give a green light to the use of force...............

Britain poised for Syria air strikes after Labour revolt against Jeremy Corbyn (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/Jeremy_Corbyn/12008993/Britain-poised-for-Syria-air-strikes-after-Labour-revolt-against-Jeremy-Corbyn.html)

Up to 60 Labour MPs could back military intervention in Syria in defiance of Jeremy Corbyn on the basis of a UN resolution calling for "combat by all means" to be used to wipe out Isil

Britain is poised to join air strikes against Isil in Syria after senior Labour MPs publicly defied Jeremy Corbyn and pledged cross-party support for international action in the wake of the Paris terrorist attacks.

Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, welcomed a UN security council resolution - poised to be passed tonight- calling for "combat by all means" to be used to wipe out Isil.

Labour insiders said that the resolution is likely to be enough to convince as many as 60 Labour MPs of the need to extend RAF air strikes to Syria - something which would boost David Cameron's chances of passing a vote in the Commons. Shadow cabinet ministers say that military intervention is even more likely after the party's own legal advice suggested that there is a "sound basis" for air strikes even without the UN approval..........

[Lonewolf_50]

I'll believe it when I see it. My reservations regarding the UNSC are significant.

Harry, it wasn't the Hoover Institute who got the US into Afghanistan and Iraq, you might want to blame PNAC as the braintrust behind that if you are looking to point the finger. The actual culprit, however, is the US Congress, who went along with it at the time. They didn't have to, but they did.

[Stanwell]

'.. a UN resolution calling for "combat by all means" .. '

What a load of tripe!
Under pain of imprisonment, one will only be permitted to terminate enemy combatants under certain proscribed circumstances.
These circumstances will, of course, be determined by PC politicians and UN bureaucrats after a most satisfying luncheon.

Fills me with confidence, it does.