DAR AL HARB - E.U./FRANCE: "LIVING WITH TERRORISM"

Living with terrorism
Editorial by Yves Threard

Is it possible we have learned to live with terrorism? Fear set in in the West following the attacks of 11 September 2001. It was the start of the global war launched by the devotees of God. The great democracies, feeling exposed, were disrupted, including in their everyday life. Six years on, the atmosphere is quite different. Three attacks have just been thwarted across the Channel, another is announced as imminent, but life goes on. No hysteria. London celebrated Gay Pride, paid tribute to Lady Di by a giant concert, and is preparing to host the Tour de France next Saturday. Gordon Brown, the new prime minister, has announced loud and clear that Great Britain is not intimidated: "We will not let the terrorists harm the British way of life." Admittedly, there were no deaths this time, but the United Kingdom does bear the painful memory of July 2005: 56 dead. Is this a matter of courage or heedlessness? Commonsense rather, just like the commonsense of the policies launched to combat the barbarity. Some people who think they know better deplore the close surveillance kept on our societies. They accuse the governments of exploiting the Islamist threat. Public freedoms are, they say, in danger. A groundless charge. If it was possible to apprehend two of the presumed suicide bombers so quickly this weekend, it was thanks to the network of cameras in London. This system also made it possible to retrace the terrorists' movements two years ago. An individual can be filmed more than 300 times a day in the English capital! Still, it was the meticulous work of Scotland Yard's departments which avoided carnage at Heathrow Airport last summer. Without sinking into Orwellian delirium, the security of the democracies is worth some sacrifices. Of course, they will never protect us completely from murderous madness, because it is at its roots that the evil has to be extirpated. Doubtless, this evil is fuelled by the wars started in Afghanistan and Mesopotamia and by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The arrival of Gordon Brown at No 10 Downing Street is not ungermane to the latest attacks. Just as the attacks in Madrid took the elections hostage in order to change Spanish policy in Iraq. The West does have to correct its recent mistakes in order to allay the Arab-Muslim world. But the hatred expressed by the soldiers of the jihad goes back a long way. It is suffused by the rancour and the changes of alliance stemming from the end of the Cold War. By indifference as much as by weakness we allowed it spread. Today we live with it. It sows death on every continent. It will take a very long time to wipe it out. Every means must be deployed. But on no account must we give way to fear or change our ways of life. Or that would acknowledge the victory of Bin-Laden and his emulators over the free world.



Pertinent Links:

1) Living with terrorism