Not since 2001 have Americans entered the holiday season with more trepidation, more nervousness, thanks to the Friday the 13th attacks on Paris. Thanksgiving weekend sends millions of Americans onto roads, into airports and train stations and shopping malls, soft targets for terrorists intent on wreaking havoc. On Monday, the U.S. State Department issued a worldwide travel alert, urging Americans to be vigilant in public places and on public transportation, especially during the holiday season. Wednesday, President Obama came to cameras, flanked by his homeland security team, to reassure the public that law enforcement and intelligence services will be on the job through the holiday to secure the country. He said there is currently no specific or credible intelligence of a terrorist plot. Is there a threat? Yes. What’s the likelihood of a terrorist attack in the U.S.? The experts say, extremely low.
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Thanksgiving Tension Over Terrorism
Why ISIS Is Winning
The U.S. needs to assume a stronger role in coordinating the anti-ISIS coalition and step up its intervention in the region, both military and diplomatic. At present, ISIS is benefiting greatly from the strategic confusion among its opponents.
The Politics of Fear
Famed former President Franklin D. Roosevelt once said “We have nothing to fear, but fear itself.” That aphorism is timeless, particularly in these times. The wave of deadly attacks across Paris by Islamic State militants has understandably frightened many. Are we next? That is the common questioned being asked by the United States and other, more vulnerable targets, like Germany. IS is exporting their war from its base in Syria. Meanwhile, Republican presidential hopeful — and frontrunner – Donald Trump is calling for government database to track Muslims in the United States. That is what fear can do to any of us.
Meet the New Islamic State: Same as the Old Islamic State
[A] series of active Islamic State plots have been disrupted all across Europe in the last year …The individual identified as the “mastermind” of the Paris attack, Abdelhamid Abbaoud, was connected to another plot in Belgium that was foiled by the Belgian police in January this year,
There is No Good Argument for Encryption Backdoors
If secure encryption is outlawed, only outlaws will have secure encryption … Remember, the NSA’s bulk collection program foiled exactly zero terror plots, by its own admission. The call for encryption backdoors is just another extension of this futile and counterproductive dragnet.
Unspeakable Kerry
It seems that to Kerry, when people kill journalists and Jews, that is not an attack on “everything that we do stand for,” whereas attacking a restaurant and stadium and a concert hall is.
Is America a Nation of Xenophobic Trumps?
The radical proposals now being put forward by Trump (and frequently echoed in only slightly less virulent form by his rivals) would define the United States as a much less tolerant and pluralistic country, one in which an entire religion could be cast under a shroud of state-sponsored suspicion.
Before the Next Islamic State Attack
Telling ISIS that the U.S. and its allies will escalate if they’re attacked is pointless. Escalation is what ISIS wants. Deterrence doesn’t come into it. Fine, you might say, but then what would a good robust strategy look like?
What If Obama’s Sham War Gets Real?
He didn’t become president to wage wars in the Middle East so he’s not going to treat the attacks in Paris or the manifest failure of the campaign he promised to “degrade and ultimately destroy” the group as a reason to change strategies.
Paris Attacks Provide Fresh Fodder for Presidential Hopefuls
American presidential campaigns are always rough and tumble.The horrific and shocking terrorist attacks across Paris are forcing a hard look at the national security positions from both Republican and Democratic candidates. Hillary Clinton made her more hawkish-than-President Barack Obama views known at an appearance Thursday at Council on Foreign Relations, suggesting directly arming Iraqi Sunni and Kurdish forces if the Baghdad government won’t . Regarding the 10,000 Syrian refugees promised sanctuary in America by Obama, Donald Trump said “They’re going to be gone. They will go back” if he’s elected president. The scale of the last week’s deadly attacks poses a serious question for all those hoping to win their party’s nomination: how to end the scourge of terrorism? Their answers may prove to be a weeding out process.
The Real War
We are confronted by a virus that is closer to epidemiology than to traditional state-to-state warfare. We will have to eradicate this virulent religious intolerance and violence here at home and across the planet. This is an extraordinarily difficult challenge.
Teaming up with Russia in Syria Could be a Dangerous False Step for the U.S.
Mr. Putin is doing his best to look like a potential partner. On Tuesday, after weeks of obfuscation, his government suddenly confirmed that the Islamic State was responsible for the bombing of a Russian airliner last month, and Russian forces carried out a rare wave of attacks against the Islamic State capital, Raqqa.