President Hollande finally notices ISIS's war on civilization

By Donald Hank

French President Hollande said after last night's attacks in Paris:

"C'est un acte de guerre" commis par une "armée terroriste, Daech" – This is an act of war committed by a terrorist army, Daesh (ISIS)

This is how it starts. Recall that GW Bush used the 911 attacks as a pretext to invade Afghanistan and Iraq, which had not aided the perpetrators in any known way. He stood on ground zero in NY and said "the people who knocked down these buildings are going to hear from us," thereby creating a false connection in the minds of Americans, most of whom unthinkingly supported his irrelevant and disastrous wars, which led to the creation of ISIS. The perpetrators had been mostly Saudi terrorists, supported by Saudi money, but the Saudis did not "hear from us" at all. The State Department did not so much as breathe a hint of caution in their direction. The perpetrators were in fact fully absolved of all blame, which was heaped instead on scapegoats, at a tragic cost of American blood and treasure.

A slick documentary was aired on French cable TV station TV5 about a month ago showing a typical work day of President François Hollande, during which he said on the phone, apparently to a cabinet member, that he still wants to remove President Bashar Assad. This was a hint for the French people and a red flag for the world.

Think about that. There were definitely ISIS sleeper cells in France at that time, some of which later perpetrated the Paris attacks, but Hollande ignored them in his obsession with removing Bashar al-Assad, the only man in the world who had been fighting ISIS since its inception, and yet, instead of focusing on the obvious real enemy, Hollande was hatching plots to remove Assad, the only man truly engaging the enemy. One can assume that Hollande's aims have not changed since then. After all, Hollande had to know all along that Daesh was the enemy of France and all of civilization, so last night's statement that this is war was out of place because he knew before the attack that every murder that Daesh had committed in Syria and Iraq for years was in fact an act of war on France and every other country purporting to be civilized.

Let's put this in plain English, shall we?

By focusing on removing Assad and his loyal forces – the only effective resistance against ISIS – and by refusing to ally with Assad, Hollande – like all Western "leaders" – was in fact assisting ISIS from the start. So now when he turns around and says the Paris attacks are an act of war – effectively declaring war on ISIS, this is rank hypocrisy. In view of Hollande's past neglect of ISIS's warlike behavior and his focus on opposing the most effective opponents of ISIS (including Russia), he has been a de facto ally of ISIS.

Now on the US side, my wife and I were watching Fox News this morning (I never watch that channel voluntarily but wanted to be sociable) where various commentators spoke about the Paris attacks and on ISIS in Syria. One "expert" said it would now be necessary for the US to get involved because otherwise, ISIS would never be defeated. It was as if Russia had never accomplished a thing in Syria, and yet, the Russian accomplishments were astonishing, as evidenced here, here, here and by a host of news outlets easily found by a quick search using the search terms "russian accomplishments syria isis." By the way, while the entire Western establishment initially insisted that Russia was only attacking the "moderates," the downing of a Russian plane over Egypt was graphic evidence that the entire West had been lying in unison.

As shown in the last-linked commentary above, Putin did more in one month than the entire West had done in years to defeat ISIS. Thus, the entire West, including Hollande, had no intention of answering ISIS's call to war.

Despite this mountain of proof that Russia and the Syrian army have been the only effective resistance to ISIS, not one commentator on Fox this morning gave any credit whatsoever to the forces in Syria that have been shedding their blood to stop ISIS. No one mentioned Russia and their highly effective attacks which now have routed ISIS in various places (places invaded as the US government twiddled its thumbs), and of course, no one mentioned the brave Syrian army which lost a huge percentage of its troops over the years to ISIS.

No, they insisted that the demonstrably unwilling and ineffective US military leaders are the only chance we have to stop ISIS. In contrast, when my wife switched to CNN, we heard Christiane Amanpour reminding her audience that Russia had also suffered an attack by ISIS on its airliner in Egypt and had received threats of domestic attacks on its soil. So who's fair and balanced?

All in all, however, it would appear as if the world is being brainwashed by the Neocons to support another military adventure in the Middle East that is doomed to fail because it is focused on eliminating the only effective forces against ISIS rather than on defeating them once and for all. Look, let's make it easy: If you want to eliminate a plague of rabbits, do you start by killing all the foxes?

Based on Hollande's clear desire to take out Assad and the US position on Assad, there is little hope that the world will ever see an end to Islamic terror as long as "leaders" like him are in power.

© Donald Hank