PARIS (AP) – The gunman had an arsenal that he claims to have stumbled upon in a park near the train station. Like three other men accused of drawing up failed plans for attacks in France recently, the suspect denied any links to terrorism, telling his lawyer he was homeless and only wanted to rob a train “to eat.”
Instead, the assault rifle jammed, and he was tackled and bound with a necktie by three Americans and a Briton who were celebrated Monday with France’s highest honor. Now, with many lives potentially saved on the high-speed train by quick-thinking and courageous passengers, the limits of a continent’s worth of security were thrown into relief by a lone attacker during a less-sophisticated act of violence.
“I don’t think we can rely entirely on the police, the law enforcement services. They will do their best. We can put in place the best intelligence networks, but somebody is probably going to get through at some stage. And my vision of this is that as citizens, we need to be prepared to think about how to act,” Chris Norman, the British businessman who helped bind the suspect, told The Associated Press.
“We need to have it in our minds, because if I had never thought it before, then I probably would’ve just been sitting in a corner cowering,” Norman said.
With thousands of Europeans believed to be radicalized by propaganda from the Islamic State group, and legions of security forces guarding the most visible targets, governments are increasingly worried about the possibility of carnage by individuals, with little planning, in a setting where there is minimal or no security.