ISIL Nov 14^th

Terrorists have struck a heavy blow in Paris. Now everyone is left with the repercussions; all of the political pundits in this country seem to agree that the same thing could happen here…and, of course, it could. You want soft targets; look at any football stadium on Saturday afternoons.

Now come the pundits: Congressman Peter King, a perennial guest on Fox news because he can be depended upon to say something derogatory about the President, was commenting at length (what else?) on the potential problem. Mr. King is Chairman of the sub-committee on Counter Terrorism and Intelligence, and a member the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. So how did he achieve this critical position? Not because of his intelligence, although you would think that might have been important in his selection given the committee titles; it wasn’t. He has been re-elected to Congress over and over again for 23 years and now has the seniority to get what he wants. Heaven help the country!

Fox presented another expert on security, or at least Fox said he was. I had never heard of him although he spoke authoritatively and had a foreign accent; these might have been very important to Fox in his selection. Fox played a tape of President Obama saying that we now had ISIL on the run, citing the Kurds’ recent recapture of the cities of Sinjar and Hol which had been held by ISIL for over a year. Those seemed to be important events as was the likely incinerating of Jihadi John the ISIL killer who had been the principal actor in the beheading of captives. There was also the claimed killing of 300 terrorists in these actions.

But none of this was convincing to the expert on Fox’s screen. He began shaking his head dismissively well before the President had finished his first sentence. He claimed these were unimportant victories because the Kurds had simply recaptured their own territory. What an odd thing for an “expert” to say. Every bit of territory that ISIL controls was once controlled by some other political entity. Any pushback of ISIL results in a recovery of territory previously held by someone else. Naturally no one on Fox challenged him on this point.

ISIL is being pushed from ground they once controlled so the “Caliphate” they aspire to is in considerable danger. Could that be the reason they are suddenly attacking soft civilian targets, first in Beirut where they have killed nearly 50 people in suicide bomber attacks, and now, a few days later, in Paris, where the death toll might reach 200. The Paris attack was designed to maximize civilian casualties; there were no government structures, no newspapers nearby.

ISIL has killed many Frenchmen and at least one American. What have they gained? They have made the French very angry. If the French had not been willing to take more than a nominal role in attacks on ISIL up until now, that will surely change to the considerable discomfort of the Caliphate.