The stories of so-called ‘foreign fighters’ – outsiders who left their homelands to hook up with terrorist groups like Islamic State (IS), Al Qaeda (AQ) and others – are a dime a dozen. Literally. As estimates range up to 40,000 who joined IS alone over the past five years or so, one can be excused […]
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Do you know the old saying “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me”? It refers to the notion that we may be hoodwinked by an unscrupulous character once for no fault of our own (aside from having a poor judge of character perhaps), but if we have the wool pulled […]
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No, Al Qaeda never went away
Ready for a “where were you when…?” question? I launched my first book last week in Ottawa and my host, the CBC’s Hannah Thibedeau, asked me what my favourite part of ‘An end to the war on terrorism‘ was. She had warned me she was going to throw that one at me so I had […]
This post appeared in The Hill Times on October 1, 2018. In 1964 US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart came up with a now famous comment that has become a meme (not there were memes back in 1964). During a threshold case on obscenity he stated “I shall not today attempt further to define the […]
This piece appeared in The Hill Times on September 24, 2018. We are now in year 17 of the ‘war on terrorism’. After the catastrophic terrorist attacks on the US on September 11, 2001 the US, and many of its allies, declared war on violent extremism. The initial effort to locate and punish the perpetrators […]
I am trying very hard not to sound like a broken record (maybe it is time to update that analogy: like a CD that skips – or does no one besides me listen to CDs anymore?) but a recent news item has me very angry and makes me have to talk – once again – […]
When you work in security intelligence or law enforcement showing up late is usually a very bad thing. I am not talking about a neighbourhood party or a movie but rather getting to the scene of a crime or identifying a terrorist cell AFTER the act has been carried out. When that happens, people have […]
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What’s with Islamophobia in Quebec?
This piece appeared in The Hill Times on September 10, 2018 “Islam should be banned like we ban pit bulls”. You read that right. This was a Twitter post by an erstwhile candidate for the Parti Quebecois in the upcoming Quebec election. Suffice to say he is no longer on the PQ slate. But let […]
One of the harshest criticisms over a lot of stuff that is written about terrorism is the distinct lack of reliable and primary sources. Papers and books are written in an academic style with little use of actual data, although as my friend Bart Schuurman in the Netherlands has stated things are looking up as […]
So what are YOU afraid of? Snakes? Sharks? Public speaking? For me it is heights. I have a hard time even climbing a ladder to clean out the eavestroughs at home. Seriously, a metre off the ground and I get weak in the knees. Yeah, I know, what a wimp! What about terrorism? Does it […]