The leadership of the United States must recognize that the West is at war with radical Islam and stop treating actions like the attack on Charlie Hebdo magazine on Wednesday as law enforcement issues, former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton said.
"This was a military style attack on innocent civilians in the capital city of a major western country," Bolton said Wednesday on Fox News Channel's
"On the Record with Greta Van Susteren." "This is a big, big event. If it can happen in Paris, it can happen in Washington and New York."
Unless President Barack Obama understands that Western civilization is under attack and reacts accordingly, the tragedy seen in Paris will be repeated "endlessly," he said.
Gunmen shouting "God is great," in Arabic killed 12 and injured 11 in the attack on the satirical magazine that has printed cartoons insulting Mohammed, the founder of Islam.
"What happened today was more than just a version of knocking over the local grocery store. This is not a law enforcement question. It's a war," Bolton said.
To protect civilians, America should go after the base camps of the enemy in North Africa, the Middle East and Yemen, he said.
Rather than doing that, the Obama administration has focused on Israel building apartments in East Jerusalem as the biggest threat to peace and security, he said.
"It's time to wake up and acknowledge we are still at war with terrorism, and they are either going to kill more of us because we are not doing enough to destroy their capacity to do that, or we're just going to face this for as far as the eye can see," Bolton said.
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