The recent attack in France by individuals or groups unknown but assumed to be Islamic State was particularly disconcerting. The truck barreling into holiday festivities and killing dozens was like a scene from a JG Ballard novel describing the atrocities of modern life; or maybe a page from Robert Anton Wilson’s vision of the future in his Illuminatus Trilogy. Or maybe just another “bring on the apocalypse” moment from a religiously-inspired group intent on some kind of earthly gain. Whoever was responsible, the fact that something as common as a traffic accident is now another tool in the terror toolbox has to make folks a bit uneasy. Then again, Palestinians have been dealing with bulldozers knocking down their homes and killing residents and their supporters for years. That was never called terrorism in the mainstream media.

As Counterpunch Editor Jeffrey St. Clair pointed out in a Facebook post after the truck attack in France, both presumptive presidential candidates seem to think unleashing further terrorism and calling it war is the best answer to the Nice incident. He quotes Donald Trump and Hilary Clinton to prove his case:

Trump: Asked by Fox News host Bill O’Reilly if NATO troops should now launch a ground and air offensive against unspecified terrorist targets. “I would say that would be just fine,” Trump reportedly replied. He said “I would, I would” when asked if he would seek a formal declaration of military action from the US Congress. “This is war,” Trump continued. “If you look at it, this is war. Coming from all different parts. And frankly it’s war, and we’re dealing with people without uniforms. In the old days, we would have uniforms. You would know who you’re fighting.”

Hillary: “I think it is clear we are at war with these terrorist groups and what they represent. It is a different kind of war and we need to be smart about how we wage it and win it. So I think we need to look at all possible approaches to doing just that.” Asked who, precisely, the US was at war against, Clinton said: We’re at war against radical jihadists who use Islam to recruit and radicalize others in order to pursue their evil agenda. It is not so important what we call these people as what we do about them.”

In other words, bomb the hell out of people who look like what we say terrorists look like and let god sort them out. Same old approach with the same likely results—war and more war.