Originally Posted by
toddbabe
Not trying to offend anyone, but it is quite simple really, because of our foreign policy and our "Special" relationship with America we have made ourselves more of a target for the extremists.
Has their been a problem in France with extremist Terrorism? Germany? Holland? Italy ? if there has it has been on a much smaller scale.
It is widely regarded as a major factor as to why we are such targets for terror.
It's about time we started putting our own people first and stopped sticking our noses in America's problems, we aren't a superpower and haven't been since the end of the Second World war, we should stop trying to be the worlds policemen and take a step or two away from America's influence.
This Nation used to be Great in it's own right, now it is seen as America's puppy and it's about time it stopped, if we want to live free from Terror we should stop starting wars in Extremist country's for no bloody reason
France has had its share of Islamic terrorism. Al-Qaeda lists it as one of the 'Crusader nations' and therefore a legitimate target. I seem to recall a bombing campaign on the Metro in the eighties, repeated attacks on French nationals and interests in Algeria throughout the nineties and the hijacking of an Air France Airbus from Algeria to Marseille in December '94 (successfully resolved by GSIGN) was apparently intended to culminate in the aircraft being flown into the Eiffel Tower or blown up over Paris.
Germany has also had its own terror shock recently and with bayonets and helis in Afg it probably won't be its last.
The fundamental differences seem to be that France was reacting to what was almost a single-polar threat, which hadn't evolved as Al-Qaeda has, still less enjoyed AQ's
PR savvy, and more importantly that there has always been a more Machiavellian aspect to the Quai d'Orsay's foreign policy than to whatever emanates from the White House. Foggy Bottom is actually quite good at that kind of thing when it's allowed to be (as are we), but the policy hardnuts in the White House seem to be missing the 'receive' option. America's foreign policy professionals - the ones who aren't parachuted in because of their links to the incoming administration - were no more eager to get dragged into Iraq and Afghanistan than we were and are extremely sensitive to the clumsy propagandising which their (and our) masters engage in. Like the French, too, they're not the bleating pacifists the media would like everyone to think; they just prefer the knife to the cavalry charge wherever possible.
Not convinced how much we'd gain, or for how long, by distancing ourselves from America, unless it was a post-Madrid kind of backstep. AQ will still be out there looking for the next flimsy excuse to blow up a transport network full of civilians and behead foreign engineers and will have to be broken, preferably out of sight. If we can separate them from the Talibs it'll be a start.
And where were the Americans when PIRA were murdering their way around Europe ? Well, most of the informed ones were mortified that those subhumans were sometimes publicly lauded in the Land of the Free, but like any other country the majority had little inclination or time for the debate and paid little attention when some of their politicos (Pataki in New York ?) rejigged the state school history syllabus to make the potato famine read as an act of genocide. Ironic perhaps that one of the best add-ons we could use to win the war on terror would be to ramp up some of PIRA's tactics : long term infiltration and observation; targeted assassination (preferably the anonymous must-be-one-faction-hitting-another kind) and pitch-perfect propaganda. Not simple, not quick, not bloodless, but the alternatives are even more of what we're doing now or total surrender.