paris attacks
There's no evidence this is a false flag - at least for now. What this seems to be proving is that Daesh is a certified pro ops with badass connections.

Scouring a ton of reports, I found a Danish citizen describing one of the attackers to a Paris café; ultra-pro, black-clad head to toe, AK-47, very well trained. These are not your usual al-Zawahiri underwear bombers; these are precision killers. This one left the scene undisturbed, and contrary to French police, may not have been captured. He wore no suicide vest.

French intel swears they are monitoring at least 200 nationals who came back from "Syraq". Talk about a lousy job. Paris is hyper-policed. The mind boggles thinking of at least 8 jihadis promenading at will on a Friday night dressed as pro killers.

For me, this is also personal. Jihad came to my hood in Paris. I left Paris last week on my usual commute back to Asia. I have always mocked Fox News describing my hood as a "no-go" area - obviously for the wrong/stupid reasons.

They picked a small Cambodian restaurant, cheap and cozy, where the habitués are young and relatively hip. This means the quartier may have been carefully researched for months.

They picked a mix of heavily symbolic venues.

You have a France-German match witnessed by the President in a stadium where all barriers - ethnic, religious - dissolve, a true symbol of multiculturalism.

You have a gig by an American band in a concert hall filled with young people.

You have your average, cool, neighborhood cafés in the 10eme and 11eme, young, hip, secular, bobo Paris hoods.

This points to a calibrated conceptual spectrum - carefully mapped out by French insiders; perhaps those "Syraq" returnees.

This also points to a monumental fail by French intel and the Ministry of Interior.

There are so many accumulated reasons for blowback; overt and covert discrimination against Muslims, leading them to feel like second-hand citizens; France's coddling of "moderate rebels"; Sarko The First and General Hollande's wars on Libya and Mali; the meek bombing raids in Syria; France as NATO enforcers.

Timing: crucial. Just as the US/Brits announce they "may" have evaporated with Jihad John. And a few hours before the Vienna talks are supposed to come up with an official Top Ten terrorist list in Syria (the subject of my current article on Asia Times.)

Cui bono?