Pakistan school massacre.

[Aggers]

What is wrong with the world that men can carry out such a brutal attack on innocent children?

News items now seem be be getting more terrible every day.

Should we do something about it?

What do you think?

[victor]

Should we do something about it?

well the Uk/USA/Oz,and presumably a few more countries have just spent a bloody fortune with a great loss of lives of their military forces-for what?

the country is still a war zone ,the Taliban again on the rise

absolutely nothing achieved -except to make a few politicians feel important

[Kaz]

Pakistan is a Stone Age country - we need to keep out of it. The death of children is absolutely dreadful, but I fail to see what any sort of intervention would achieve

[Suff]

What is wrong with the world that men can carry out such a brutal attack on innocent children?

News items now seem be be getting more terrible every day.

Should we do something about it?

What do you think?

The world no longer executes crazy idiots like this. They also don't hunt down all their partners in crime and execute them too.

The "Terror" is a one way street. If it were two way things would not descend into chaos the way they do.

But, we're "civilised" you know. So we can't be like them. So we have to put up with it. You cannot reason with a fanatic, you can only remove them all and those who are fanatics in training. Only the belief that this kind of fanaticism will lead to an early demise with no "glory" in it is likely to curb their followers in training.

Such is a civilised world. If we could, the Romans, the Greeks, the city fathers of Troy, Adolf Hitler, would tell us all the same thing. Bare naked force has solved more things, permanently, than every negotiation ever made. Uncivilised as it is, it happens to be the truth.

Peace in our time? Unlikely.

[victor]

Peace in our time? not a hope in hell

agree 100% with Suff,you either turn your forces loose to do the job or keep your nose out

[Lozzles]

I'm not a political person so excuse me if I'm wrong here, but shouldn't the UN do something? Looking at their role here
http://www.un.org/Overview/uninbrief/about.shtml it seems that this is just when they should be stepping in.
My husband worked across from the UN building in Geneva and it sickened him to see how much money went in to building such a beautiful palace, but we don't see or hear about what they do. If they are not there to:

to maintain international peace and security;
to develop friendly relations among nations;
to cooperate in solving international problems and in promoting respect for human rights;
and to be a centre for harmonizing the actions of nations.

then what's the point?

[cromwell]

The UN has become a bureaucracy which ends up like all bureaucracies. They end up with a massive ego, massive self importance and love telling other people what to do about trade, health, climate change etc. But not much use against people like the Taliban. When you are a fundamentalist you are right and everybody else is wrong, end of. You can't say let's all sit down and be reasonable chaps because they aren't at all reasonable chaps.

Suff is right. My late father was a boy soldier on the North West Frontier pre WW2. He said the Afghans raided and caused merry hell from time to time then, but the way they stopped them was to lob some 25ib shells on their heads, dad being in the Royal Artillery. We are too civilised now.

Eta - unlike the Taliban. They burned the female school principal alive.

[TheOstrich]

I think what will be interesting to see now is the response of the Pakistan military - whether or not they go for the terrorist's jugular. It was their children in that school, after all. If they don't react massively then Pakistan will surely and finally become a fragmented failed state.

[Workingman]

It has become an intractable problem and that is largely due to how Islamic fundamentalism was handled, or managed, in the 20th century. During the Cold War the US and UK actively encouraged Islamic fundamentalists throughout the Middle East and Asia as a bulwark against creeping Communism. The thinking in those times, especially the 60s and 70s, was that the Cold War would never end or would end in real war and possibly nuclear war. That thinking has now come back to bite us.

I see that Pakistan has reintroduced the death penalty after the school attack. It is nothing more than a gesture. The modern jihadists are not the political Islamic fundamentalists of the past they are religious fanatics hell bent on destroying politics of all kinds and replacing them with Sharia law. If they die in their cause they become martyrs with 72 virgins in heaven. A death sentence will not stop them.

[KateLMead]

It has become an intractable problem and that is largely due to how Islamic fundamentalism was handled, or managed, in the 20th century. During the Cold War the US and UK actively encouraged Islamic fundamentalists throughout the Middle East and Asia as a bulwark against creeping Communism. The thinking in those times, especially the 60s and 70s, was that the Cold War would never end or would end in real war and possibly nuclear war. That thinking has now come back to bite us.

I see that Pakistan has reintroduced the death penalty after the school attack. It is nothing more than a gesture. The modern jihadists are not the political Islamic fundamentalists of the past they are religious fanatics hell bent on destroying politics of all kinds and replacing them with Sharia law. If they die in their cause they become martyrs with 72 virgins in heaven. A death sentence will not stop them.

The terrorists attack, killing all those school children was a sub human act. I was mortified, as For Sharia Law it has been alive and well in this country for years.. How anyone can believe that they are martyrs when and if they are killed is beyond my comprehension. As for Britain! We are living in an asylum run by lunatics.