On the one hand, it's been over three months, and they haven't (yet) set off the radiological warhead they claimed to have already deployed in a major European city. Emphasis on the word yet. On the other, they've shown no hesitation and a bloodthirsty overenthusiasm for making good on smaller but no less proportionately grisly threats. Bottom line: We must assume that everything they threaten, they fully intend to carry out, and the only limiting factors are time and resources (note that Western, and especially U.S., counter-terrorism capabilities are not one of those limiting factors, not with Barack Obama calling the shots). And ISIS doesn't lack for resources, what with its massive oil and kidnap/ransom revenue streams.
Which is what makes their latest threat more than a little newsworthy, if not too terribly surprising:
ISIS has declared its intention to "blow up your White House, Big Ben, and the Eiffel Tower," its official spokesman said in a new audio message....
Adnani said ISIS wanted control of numerous cities across the globe, including Jerusalem, Kabul, Rome, and Paris.
I guess that means they plan to just incinerate Washington, D.C.
The ISIS spokesman warned Jews and Christians that they could either "convert to Islam or pay the ultimate price when your armies are expelled from Muhammad's peninsula, from Jerusalem, and all Muslim lands," Ynet News reported.
And, of course, they consider ALL lands to be "Muslim lands". Even other planets. Although it's at least a little ironic that we had pretty much evacuated the Middle East of U.S. military forces already until they publicly humiliated Barack Obama into sending back token "pinprick" air assets to save at least some face. Since we never hear about them anymore, they may already have been withdrawn.
After welcoming Boko Haram and their burgeoning West African empire into the Global Caliphate, the Muzzie Josh Earnest delivered the usual spittle-flecked peroration:
"We — with Allah's help — want Paris, before Rome and Islamic Iberia [Spain and Portugal] and after we blow up the White House, Big Ben, and the Eiffel Tower before Paris, and Rome," he warned. "The Muslims will return to power, to be the vanguard and lead in every place."
And as they see it, that endgame is inevitable, and no reason exists why they won't attain every last bit of it, and rule the entire planet forever. And they have every reason to believe they will. Because they are the strong horse, and we're not even a sea horse.
It is, in short, not hyperbole, but a declaratory statement of such utter confidence that they consider it almost an accomplished reality.
I do think that timing plays a factor in the details, though, as well as the sense of theatricality ISIS inherited from al Qaeda. Which is to say, I think their plan is to wipe out the White House, Big Ben, and the Tour Eiffel simultaneously. Perhaps via hijacked airliners as a gesture of "nostalgia" as well as practicality and to project a sense of futility upon us - "We told you we would do it, we used means you've spent years and a fortune preparing for and convincing yourselves you'd be able to stop, and we used that very means and took out your White House anyway. We're UNSTOPPABLE!"
Only question I have is how their "dirty" bombs fit into the plan. Nukes are the only thing that would enable ISIS, via another, intercontinental 9/11, to out-al Qaeda al Qaeda.
But don't worry, they'll give O enough time to get away on Marine One. They wouldn't want to off their most valuable military asset, after all.
No comments:
Post a Comment