I have to rethink my Franco-phobia
Daniel Pipes authored an enlightening (to say the least) column on how France leads the West in anti-efforts. You can interpret this to cover intel, laws, policing, regulations, etc etc.
I hadn’t really thought of it, but I now think he’s really onto something. Of course, I think France, with the highest number of Muslims in Western Europe, is “ground zero” for most RadIslamic agitation, and closest to the fire, as it were.
The column can be fairly well summarized with this block:
U.K.-based terrorists have carried out operations in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Kenya, Tanzania, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Israel, Morocco, Russia, Spain, and the United States. Many governments – Jordanian, Egyptian, Moroccan, Spanish, French, and American – have protested London’s refusal to shut down its Islamist terrorist infrastructure or extradite wanted operatives. In frustration, Egyptian president Husni Mubarak publicly denounced Britain for “protecting killers.” One American security group has called for Britain to be listed as a terrorism-sponsoring state.
Counterterrorism specialists disdain the British. Roger Cressey calls London “easily the most important jihadist hub in Western Europe.” Steven Simon dismisses the British capital as “the Star Wars bar scene” of Islamic radicals. More brutally, an intelligence official said of last week’s attacks: “The terrorists have come home. It is payback time for … an irresponsible policy.”
While London hosts terrorists, Paris hosts a top-secret counterterrorism center, code-named Alliance Base, whose existence was just revealed by the Washington Post, where six major Western governments since 2002 share intelligence and run counterterrorism operations. (The latter makes it unique.)
More broadly, President Jacques Chirac instructed French intelligence agencies just days after 9/11 to share terrorism data with their U.S. counterparts “as if they were your own service.” This cooperation is working: former acting CIA director John E. McLaughlin calls this bilateral intelligence tie “one of the best in the world.” The British may have a “special relationship” with Washington in Iraq, but the French have one in the war on terror.
I admit, I have gored France in the last 4 years. Alot. I’ve called them enemies, I’ve called the all the usual “surrender-monkey-esque” slurs. And I retract them all, partially. I want Msr. Chirac to build on the cooperative spirit from post 9/11 and STOP interfering with what has to be done.
Do that, Msr. Le President, and you will have turned this ‘neck from North Texas around.