Tag Archives: Francois Hollande

International news

Allies tighten ties against Islamic State

air-strike

France and Russia are allies with a common enemy.

It’s the Islamic State.

The two nations’ presidents — Francois Hollande and Vladimir Putin — have agreed to tighten their alliance in the shared fight against the monstrous terrorist cabal.

Wait, though, for critics of President Obama to weigh in. They’ll wonder aloud: Why isn’t Barack Obama in the lead?

What difference does it really make?

France and Russia have skin in this game. The Russians lost more than 200 of their citizens when a bomb exploded on a jetliner; ISIS took responsibility for the deed. Then came the Paris attacks that killed 130 victims; ISIS took responsibility for that deed, too.

Hollande and Putin agreed to share intelligence and to intensify their air strikes against ISIS targets in Syria. As the Associated Press reports: “We agreed on a very important issue: To strike the terrorists only, Daesh and the jihadi groups only, and not to strike the forces and the groups that are fighting against the terrorists,” Hollande said after the meeting, referring to IS by its Arabic acronym. “And we are going to exchange some information about that: what can be struck, and what must not be struck.”

Both countries employ significant military assets. Let us welcome them more fully into this fight.

As for the United States, there’s plenty of pressure being applied for our president to kick our own immense military establishment into an even more active role in the war against ISIS.

My bigger hope, though, is that President Obama is continuing to seek out more allied help — from the rest of the European Union and friendly Middle East countries that more than any other ought to want to destroy ISIS.

For now, I see nothing at all wrong with France and Russia locking arms in this mortal combat.

 

International news

Paris attack ringleader gets it … see ya

attack

There won’t be a trial for the Belgian jihadist who organized the Paris terror attacks.

Awww …

The remains of Abdelhamid Abaaoud  have been identified by French authorities after the daring commando raid in the town of St. Denis. The 27-year-old terrorist was among several murderers killed by French police, demonstrating that French President Francois Hollande meant what he said when he declared his intention to launch a “pitiless” response to the carnage that erupted in Paris late this past week.

Let the bad-guy body count mount.

Just as American commandos took out Osama bin Laden in May 2011 and other terrorist leaders have been eradicated systematically during the course of this international war, let’s not high-five each other too vigorously over this latest battlefield victory.

Abaaoud will be replaced by someone else. The Islamic State is full of reprehensible individuals willing to die for whatever perverted cause they seek to further.

It’s becoming clearer by the day that the Islamic State act in Paris has brought new energy to this world war — and that’s what we should call it. France is bringing its own significant military capability to bear as it has stepped up its air strike campaign against ISIL targets in Syria. Russia, too, has pledged to increase its aerial bombardment efforts against ISIL as payback for the bombing of the Russian jetliner recently, which killed all 224 people on board.

The U.S. effort? It, too, must continue … and I have heard President Barack Obama give every assurance that we’re going to keep stepping up our own efforts to eliminate terrorists wherever and whenever we find them.

But now at least we can say “good bye” to one more evil ringleader.

It’s time now to find the rest of them.

International news, military news, national news, political news

Here’s a novel idea: Ask Congress to declare war

President Franklin D. Rossevelt signing the declaration of war against Japan, December 8, 1941. (National Park Service) NARA FILE #: 079-AR-82 WAR & CONFLICT BOOK #: 743

Former Florida governor — and Republican presidential candidate — Jeb Bush wants the United States to declare war on the Islamic State.

I am going to make a leap here and presume for a moment that he means the real thing. You know, actually make a formal declaration of war. It’s kind of an old-fashioned idea that hasn’t been carried out since, oh, Dec. 8, 1941. President Roosevelt stood before a joint session of Congress and asked lawmakers to make that declaration … which is how the U.S. Constitution prescribes it.

Well, why not do it the old-fashioned way?

I am increasingly of the opinion that war is what we’ve got on our hands. The Islamic State seems to want it. They committed an act of war Friday in France, bombing and shooting its way further into infamy, killing more than 100 innocent victims.

France has called it a wartime act. French President Francois Hollande has vowed zero mercy in seeking revenge for the killings. The Islamic State already has demonstrated unfathomable barbarism with its video-recorded beheadings of foreign captives, including Americans.

ISIL has killed tens of thousands of Muslims on its reign of terror — supposedly in the name of Islam. It is a murderous cult that must be wiped out.

This war, though, is being fought on terms with which the world is not yet familiar. There used to be a time when we defined war simply as nations taking up arms against each other. This war is vastly different.

It is an ideological war being fought with guns, knives and bombs.

Is it possible then to declare war the way this country used to declare war? I think it can be done.

The question now is this: Does the president have the will to ask for a declaration and does Congress have the courage to make that declaration?

Your thoughts? Is a war declaration possible?

 

International news, military news

ISIL clearly not ‘contained,’ however ….

obama and kerry

President Obama might have been a bit more precise in his answer to a question this past week regarding the U.S. war against the Islamic State.

He told ABC News’s George Stephanopoulos that ISIL has been “contained.” Twenty-four hours later, terrorists launched the hideous attacks throughout Paris, killing nearly 200 innocent victims.

The president’s foes have seized on the “contained” remark as proof, they say, that he’s clueless.

What he said later in his answer to the question dealt with ISIL’s battlefield capabilities and whether the fighters’ advances in Syria and Iraq have been stopped. He believes that our air campaign has stalled the Islamic State’s march.

Clearly, though, the terror cabal is capable of launching the kind of attack that it did Friday in Paris. Richard Clarke, the anti-terror expert who’s worked for administrations of both political parties, said this morning that ISIL is far more capable and fearsome than al-Qaeda.

ISIL has committed “an act of war” against the civilized world, said French President Francois Hollande. How do nations respond to such acts? By going to war.

Contained or not, the Islamic State needs to face the combined fury of the immense military power of the nations it has chosen to fight.

 

International news

Up next? A ‘pitiless’ response to terror

epa05024278 French president Francois Hollande speaks in Paris, France, 14 November 2015, following a series of coordinated attacks in and around Paris late 13 November 2015, which left more than 120 people dead. Hollande blamed the Islamic State group for the attacks in Paris that left at least 128 dead, calling them an 'act of war'. EPA/STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN / POOL MAXPPP OUT

There can be nothing good to come from the Paris attacks this week that killed at least 120 French citizens.

However, the response from French President Francois Hollande gives one hope that the civilized world has gained another full-time participant in the world war against terrorism.

Hollande has vowed a “pitiless” response to the coordinated, well-planned attacks at several locations throughout the City of Lights. And from across the English Channel, British Prime Minister David Cameron told the French that “their fight is our fight.”

France brings considerable muscle to this global effort. The country has a significant military force capable of bringing great harm to whomever it engages. Its intelligence network ranks as one of the more sophisticated on the planet.

Meanwhile, the United States has been waging its own brand of warfare against the Islamic State — which has taken “credit,” if you want to call it that — for the horrifying act it committed in Paris.

Air strikes are continuing. President Obama has decided to send in a small cadre of special operations forces to help train the Kurds in their fight against ISIS in Syria. The British continue to provide air support for the air strikes against terror targets. And, yes, the Russians have joined the fight, too — although it remains an open question whether the MiG fighter jets are actually hitting ISIS targets or merely going after rebel forces fighting the brutal regime of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, who remains a sworn enemy of the United States.

What will it take to defeat the Islamic State? Perhaps it will take more acts of brutality by the monstrous organization against more of our allies throughout the world.

We should continue to accept and welcome all the help we can get.

 

International news

France bestows its highest honor on heroes

american heroes

Imagine you’re one of three young Americans who were traveling through Europe.

You’re visiting with friends.

“Hey, how was your trip to France and those other countries in Europe?” one of the friends asks.

“Oh, it was great. We saw some beautiful scenery, met some lovely people and, oh yeah, we stopped a terrorist from possibly blowing up a train, saving the lives of dozens, maybe hundreds, of people.

“And then we get the Legion of Honor from the president of France.”

French President Francois Hollande pinned his country’s highest honor on the chests of Spencer Stone, Alek Skarlatos and Anthony Sadler, along with Briton Chris Norman for their extraordinary heroism in subduing an AK-47-wielding gunman who reportedly intended to inflict some serious harm to train passengers.

The alleged gunman is Ayoub El-Khazzani, a Moroccan who is believed to be an Islamist sympathizer.

“In the name of France, I would like to thank you. The whole world admires your bravery. It should be an example to all of us and inspire us. You put your lives at risk in order to defend freedom,” President Hollande said while pinning the medals on the four men.

We hear about so much terror and fear in this world of ours. These four men have proved, as Hollande said, “Faced with the evil called terrorism there is a good, that is humanity. You are the incarnation of that.”

Travel safely the rest of the way, gentlemen.