The Mumbai terrorist attacks were a "ghastly reminder" for us all, said David Ignatius in The Washington Post. Islamic militants—including those affiliated with al Qaida—are as capable of mounting deadly, "meticulously planned" assaults as they were on Sept. 11, 2001. "For Americans watching the carnage, the obvious question was: Could it happen here?"
And the obvious answer is "yes," said Robert Spencer of in Human Events online. The entire "civilized world" is unprepared for attacks like the ones that killed at least 175 people in Mumbai. And we'll remain unprepared until we firmly demand that Muslim leaders everywhere condemn murder committed in the name of Islam.
For the sake of potential victims everywhere, said Thomas Friedman in The New York Times, let's hope ordinary Pakistanis take to the streets to protest these attacks by men apparently trained in their country. "The best defense against this kind of murderous violence" is for the home society to discourage recruits by isolating and condemning the murderers.
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Pakistan clearly can't contain the terrorists within its borders, said Bernard-Henri Levy in The Wall Street Journal. And that's chilling, since the jihadist group believed responsible, Lashkar-e-Taiba, counts the rogue father of Pakistan's nuclear program, A.Q. Khan, among its sympathizers. This time it was neighboring India that suffered, but anybody could be next.
So it's time to take stock here in the U.S., said The Washington Post in an editorial. A new bipartisan report said it’s more likely than not that, somewhere in the world, a weapon of mass destruction will be used within five years. Barack Obama's Homeland Security team should use coming confirmation hearings to discuss "what's working and what isn't" in our efforts to prevent the next attack on U.S. soil.
