The Belmont Club has been considering the meaning of both the recent Russian terror attacks, as well as the issues the French hostage situation in Iraq. He has more than this, just click down, but I like this paragraph:
"In many ways, the Russian policy is exactly the reverse of the American. They are less squeamish about retaliating but lack the Bush doctrine of creating functioning democracies to replace the chaotic sinkholes of Islamism. To a certain extent, the Russian and French policies are identical. They draw a curtain over the putrefaction fermenting in certain societies, dismissing them as a natural state or in terms of cultural relativism, as situations in which civilization -- I use the word consciously -- would be ill advised to interfere. But it has become apparent that terrorism is an externality of rotting societies, an effluent, which if unchecked will poison the whole world. No cologne, not even French perfume, will long prevail against it. Civilization cannot hang back but must step forward, if not for love then for survival.
Liberals, Democrats and critical conservatives may question whether President Bush’s ’forward strategy for freedom’ has been carried out well or botched; but its conceptual rightness is indisputable and its undertaking long overdue."
Cultural relativism and the post-modernism of Derrida and Foucault that is so popular in the American academy has infused European thought. Unfortunately, in their non-judgmentalism, they have denied the existence of a "clash of civilizations" because they have undermined the very notions of truth and civilization. One civilization is just as good as any other whether or not it is infused with slavery, human sacrifice, mass murder, or killing the infidel. They scoff at Bush’s "simple-minded" classifications of good & evil but then are paralyzed when evil acts are done to them, but cannot really be named as such since truth, good & evil, black & white, don’t exist and are cultural constructions or hegemonic language.
NPR reported that many French were pleading with the terrorists by gushing over French support for Palestinians. So, while the French themselves prevent freedom of religion and expression, they support groups that terrorize the state of Israel with homicide/suicide bombers. But, then, the French proclaim their tough stand against terrorism and refuse to capitulate on their demands - on what grounds?
When radical Muslims are plotting on U.S. territory, killing innocent Israelis, bombing Spanish trains, killing Frenchmen, and blowing up planes and schools and trains in Russia, I would have to conclude that there is definitely no clash of civilizations.