Aftermath

Although yesterdays events where obviously difficult for people caught up in the maelstrom of the moment for the rest of us nothing much has changed. Having lived in the shadow of terrorism for most of my life its just another one of those things that may get you, but way down bellow drunk drivers and being hit by a bus.

What I was struck by was how well the emergency services handled the situation. Anyone who has ever done any first aid training will of been drilled on how the most dangerous moments are usually straight after an incident when chaos can led to secondary injuries and compound the issues you have to deal with. The coverage showed people on whole calmly evacuating the affected locations while the authorities took control of the situation and established well practised command and control. The media was generally well behaved and despite sometimes feeling like a mobious loop gave a pretty calm picture of what was going on. There was no impression that the sky was falling.

Michael Portillo made some very good points on This Week last night. Although I disagree with using terms like "winning" and "losing" when referring to the "War on Terror" I certainly think its true the terrorists are under pressure. Although intelligence failed this time the terrorists have had to adapt to avoid coming up on the radar. Operations like yesterdays take co-ordination and support networks that they have to keep small to avoid bringing attention to their activities. This limits the overall impact that any terrorist cell can have. I have no doubt the resulting criminal investigation will do more to dent their capabilities than any number of bombs dropped on far away countries. This was no 9/11, we do not need any fundamental changes to the way we run our country and I hope the politicians remember that over the following weeks and months.