Written by Scott Lucas.
Even as Parisians were trying to assess the scale of the attacks by Islamic State (IS) which killed 132 people on November 13, politicians were promising a decisive and effective military response.
French President Francois Hollande assured, “We will be merciless toward the barbarians of Islamic State group. Faced with war, the country must take appropriate action.”
British Prime Minister David Cameron responded, “Your values are our values, your pain is our pain, your fight is our fight and together we will defeat these terrorists.”
US President Barack Obama – who had said only on November 12 that “we have contained” IS in Iraq and Syria – asserted that “those who think that they can terrorise the people of France or the values that they stand for are wrong”.