Thinking Meat

Steven Den Beste writes:

OK, let me get this straight. Seven men on an American terrorist watch list were all found to have purchased tickets on the same Air France flight from Paris to Los Angeles. Our people alerted the French, who cancelled the flight, took them all into custody, and after briefly questioning them released them all. French action was big and showy and will have the effect of convincing those men and their friends to make their next attempt against us from somewhere else.

France is safe. We are not.

Charles Johnson has more details via Reuters:

One or more terror suspects may have escaped due to a premature disclosure in France of the security concerns behind the cancellation of Christmas flights to Los Angeles, U.S. officials said on Friday.

[. . .]

U.S. law enforcement and intelligence officials had hoped all the suspects could be detained as they showed up for the flights, said a senior U.S. official familiar with the situation who did not want to be identified.

[. . .]

Washington believed that the longer publicity could have been avoided, "the greater the chance to catch anybody else who was suspected of being involved," he said. "The French announcement caught everyone off guard."

Is anyone else reminded of Saudi Arabia's "cooperation" when they were asked to arrest bin Laden a few years back, and instead simply denied his plane permission to land?