According to Scottish geopolitical analyst Steven MacMillan, it is beyond even a shadow of doubt that Western foreign policy has directly resulted in the rise of terrorism in the Middle East.
"These groups would not have the resources and global reach to launch any attacks in the West if they had not been armed, trained and let loose on the Syrian government by NATO members in collusion with regional allies. For those who have been following the proxy war in Syria and the nefarious and insidious policies of the West, this latest attack comes as no surprise," MacMillan notes in his recent piece for New Eastern Outlook.
Citing the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) report, MacMillan noted that back in 2012 the US authorities were well informed that the major forces driving the insurgency in Syria included "the Salafists, the Muslim Brotherhood and AQI (al-Qaeda in Iraq)." Al-Qaeda in Iraq is one of the names used for the notorious Islamic State.
According to the report, US intelligence officials envisaged the establishment of a "declared or undeclared" Salafist principality in Eastern Syria (Hasaka and Der Zor) in order "to isolate the Syrian regime."
"The former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Michael T. Flynn, revealed in a recent interview that the Obama administration took the 'willful decision' to support the rise of the Syrian rebels in 2012, even though Washington knew the opposition was composed of extreme terror groups," MacMillan continues.
In its turn, the French government has delivered vast sums of money and weapons to the so-called "Syrian opposition," MacMillan emphasized.
In a further complication of the situation, former French minister of Foreign Affairs Roland Dumas revealed that the war in Syria was "prepared, preconceived and planned" by some Western top officials at least "two years before the violence" erupted in 2011.
But were London, Paris, Brussels and Washington indeed unable to foresee the possibility of terror attacks in Europe after they armed Syrian religious extremists and then flooded Europe with refugees and migrants from the Middle East and North Africa?
Predictably, terrorists jumped at the opportunity to enter the European Union alongside innocent asylum seekers, the analyst remarked.
"This leads to the question: Do Western leaders welcome more attacks?" he asks.
"It is clear that Western countries have been using the hoax of the 'war on terror' as a justification to impose totalitarian control domestically, in addition to using it to mobilize public opinion for imperial wars abroad. The US, UK and France, can't justify a dystopian surveillance state without terror attacks, and these attacks allow the government to impose policies that the population would have never have accepted prior to the crisis," MacMillan explained, adding that the recent Paris attack may prompt the Western governments to demand even more Orwellian-style surveillance powers.
At the same time, the Scottish researcher noted that there have been a few signs showing that European powers could shift their stance toward Syria and the government of Bashar al-Assad.
"In Syria, we're looking for the political solution to the problem, which is not Bashar Assad. Our enemy in Syria is ISIL," Hollande said as quoted by MacMillan.
And still it is difficult to believe that the West will change its foreign policy course anytime soon, the analyst believes, expressing the hope that Russia "will encourage the West to move in the direction of sanity."
