Never again? Please, don't make us laugh.
Last week's attacks on Paris were so shocking and horrific they brought out the sympathetic (#PrayforParis) in a worldwide outburst. For a short time, the world from Bangkok to Brisbane to Birmingham really cared about the victims and the survivors of the Islamist atrocity.
They also encouraged the tough talkers. From the Nobel Peace Prize winner and US President Barack Obama to the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and British Prime Minister David Cameron, the response to the Paris attacks quickly veered from the obvious shock to the, well, macho.
Mr Obama, blamed by opposition politicians for ignoring the IS until it was too late: "It is an attack on the civilised world." Prime Minister David Cameron: IS is "trying to change [Britain's] way of life and destroy our way of life".
Even Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha said, "The truth is the risk is now everywhere," and he ordered immediate steps to tighten Thai security.
It was entirely fitting that the outraged French President Francois Hollande got to talk toughest. France is committed to the destruction of the Islamic State at home and abroad, he said. Paris and Washington spoke, then increased their airstrikes on the IS headquarters in Raqqa, Syria.
Based on the past, there are just two chances Mr Hollande and allies will engage in an actual war without pity against the IS. The first is a fat chance, and the second is a slim chance.
It's simple, really. As dreadful as the Paris butchery was, and as real as the future threats of it are, there is no actual outrage, apart from those directly touched. That does not include, this week, Mr Obama or Mr Cameron, Mr Abe or Gen Prayut.
Here's how we know. We looked at social media, specifically the global warbling of the Twitterati.
Take Thailand. Please. The hashtag #PrayForParis lasted a full six hours as the top trend across the country. By Saturday's mid-afternoon, Thai twitterers were back to showing the world the national ADD problem. At 5pm, the top trend was #KRYinBKK (yes, a Korean boy band, what a surprise), to be replaced an hour later by #TeamBee about models, which morphed an hour later into #TheFaceThailandseason2, before becoming #DreamteamThailand (a TV show modelled on Takeshi's Castle and the US copycat Wipeout) and #hormonestheseries3. Sunday morning, the awesomest Twitter leaders turned to #aiscallingmelodybeachbattle.
#AisCallingMelodyBeachBattle in Thailand, #MTVStars in Japan; #insiders, about a political TV show (Australia); #TEDxVan, speeches and music in Vancouver (Canada); #BasketxDIRECTV about a basketball game in Ecuador; #MTN4SYTEMVA, about "the most influential artiste" was all that Ghanaian tweeters cared about.
Among important Muslim-majority countries, Saudis discussed soccer and the new teeth job by an Arabic singer. Egyptians on Twitter were enthralled by the new album by singer Sami Aboouzid and Indonesians cared especially about #HappyWeddingAngelChibi, who, as you know, is Margareth Angelina, who is quite famous in Indonesia for being famous.
Across the Strait, Malaysians were especially interested in #PurposeTheMovement. At least the Malaysians are concerned about a threat to civilisation -- Justin Bieber.
And how about this? On Tuesday afternoon none of the top-5 trending subjects on Twitter concerned the Paris attacks -- among French tweeters.
With leaders unwilling to commit for more than a couple of soundbite speeches, and with citizens unwilling to take any steps, even self-protective ones, standing up to the IS is a problem. France has the Foreign Legion, whose fortune in Syria and Iraq is not bright.
And then it has the Canadian Solution. France might consider the work of Pierre Elliot Trudeau, the late Canadian prime minister and father of the current premier, Justin Trudeau.
When Pierre Trudeau was prime minister in 1970, he perceived a great threat to the nation from the separatist and sometimes-terrorist Quebec separatists, especially from the self-styled Liberationa Front of Quebec (FLQ), which kidnapped and murdered Pierre Laporte, a Quebec province cabinet minister. So in October of that year, 45 years ago, this liberal icon:
- invoked the War Measures Act for the first time in Canadian history, including when it was a colony
- declared martial law
- put the army on the streets
- rounded up 497 "extremists" and jailed them without charges or warrant.
(Later, only 62 of them were charged with anything at all.) Trudeau called people who opposed these policies bleeding hearts. In an interview on national television now known to Canadians as the "Just Watch Me" speech, he rubbed it in, too: "Go on and bleed," he goaded them.
He crushed the violent and terrorist side of Quebec separatism. He effectively also crushed the whole idea of separatism. Even today, a tiny few Canadians demand "freedom" for Quebec. His actions made them into a laughable, clownish group which never recovered the respect it had in Quebec or the fear of its real and threatened violence.
Obviously there are huge differences between then and now, Canada and France. Also, though, there are many similarities. As with Quebec's violent separatists, France's violent young men of the banlieu are the core of the IS attempts to intimidate. Perhaps there are enough similarities that President Hollande has begun a programme that could run as deep as that of Pierre Trudeau. The Canadian success of 1970 isn't guaranteed in the France of 2015-16, but it could just work.
With world leaders, including Justin Trudeau, entirely unwilling to face the IS man-to-man, it may be the best shot at harming and stripping away the IS's ability to terrorise.
Alan Dawson is former Saigon UPI bureau chief.