Eugene David<br>...The One-Minute Pundit

Posted 8:46 PM by Gene

A month before the July 7 attacks, Britain's Joint Intelligence Committee made the judgment that "there would probably be a successful attack of some sort in the U.K. in the next five years." Today, British authorities are not much more confident of thwarting all plots, so they have erected a line of defense that is absorptive, not pre-emptive. It rests on harmony between social groups and on the country's ability to suffer atrocities from time to time, as it did during the heyday of the I.R.A., without escalating unrest or oppression, or the rise of extremist parties. Britain is now betting that the country will retain its historically bottomless reserves of sang-froid in the face of a threat that is orders of magnitude more dangerous than the threat of the I.R.A.; that there is something in the makeup of Britons that makes them more stoical than, say, Americans in New York about bombs going off; that the quiet tenor of the British fight against Islamist terrorism thus far is a sign of good manners and forbearance, not of abject fright or sneaking sympathy; and that Britain in the age of the Diana funeral is the same country it was during the blitz.

It is a risky bet.

Yes, I think we can call Christopher Caldwell's article "a must read" and "depressing."