Terrorism in Jakarta - and Melbourne

If any of our friends in Melbourne are feeling terrorised - please come and spend some time with us in Jakarta until things settle down.

Oh - DFaT hasn't issued an alert about travelling to or staying in Melbourne?  Why am I not surprised?  They save such pointless, counter productive and destructive responses for Bali and Jakarta.  It's good to see ordinary Australians ignore them - and sad to see companies covering their butts to no useful purpose.

Well done AFP and Vic Police for the work that led to arrests in Melbourne this morning - before something happened.  Also well done to the Indonesian police for their work since the hotel attacks here 10 days ago.  

We ought to be more realistic about these things.  Terrorism exists because, on one level, it works - it's an high impact, low cost way to advance a minority view.  Whether it's evil or not depends on your point of view - one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter.  Consequently, it will always be with us.

Having watched what has happened over the last 10 years, I think the only rationale response to terrorism is police work within the rule of law.  Because the threat is international, it now needs international cooperation - with the collaboration between Australia and Indonesia since the Bali bombings being a good model.

A year or so ago I read a book called Three Cups of Tea about a guy called Greg Mortenson and his work in Pakistan and Afghanistan.  His work costs about the same as terrorism in input terms.  But he truly does God's work.  A few dollars in his hands achieves what millions in military expenditure cannot.

I just looked at his website - and its seems he's now having a wider influence - quite exciting really.  It's worth a look.

In the mean time - keep safe and think clearly.