Edit: Now it's up to 140. What a sad day :(
Edit: Now it's up to 140. What a sad day :(
The knowledge that a network could carry out such a widespread and well-coordinated attack without being preempted, in a situation of maximum alert, will heavy on the minds of any French citizen regardless of whether victims were 118 or 119. Basically, the French security system has been revealed as completely ineffective. That is a huge problem.
How can a country possibly prevent these things while still maintaining a free society?
You can't even prevent them when not being a free society. Its not like terrorism only occurs in free societies.
There is very little chance of anyone successfully getting up to terrorism if society is
a) riddled with informers b) detaining people without charges is legal c) totalitarian ideology and political supremacy makes the establishment of parallel societies impossible. Border controls make importing terrorists next to impossible.
The former eastern Bloc had no terrorist incidents. Pulling them off would be harder, the state would cover it up, etc. Just like it had practically no mob.
It did have a great many terrorists, mostly in various training camps.