I quite liked Tony Keller's commentary in the Sunday Star on terrorism in this country from 35 years ago, and the lessons it holds for today.

An excerpt:

Al Qaeda is not the FLQ. But there are lessons to be learned from what happened to us, and how we responded, a generation ago.

The first thing to remember is that terrorism is generally a weapon of the weak and desperate, and that means the terrorists are almost never as powerful or organized as they seem. The FLQ once threatened to launch an uprising hundreds of thousands strong, yet it had but a handful of members, supported by a minority of Quebecers. They had no real hope of overthrowing the government.

Similarly, a recent survey of British Muslims shows just how ideologically isolated London's 7/7 bombers were. According to a poll conducted this month for The Guardian newspaper, 90 per cent of British Muslims believe violence has no place in a political struggle.

At the same time, however, a small minority of British Muslims surveyed were of a very different mindset: 5 per cent told the pollster that more attacks would be justified. Another poll commissioned by London's Daily Telegraph found that 10 per cent of Muslims feel "not at all loyal" to Britain.

And 1 per cent of the respondents — 16,000 of the nation's 1.6 million Muslims — feel Western society is decadent and Muslims should seek to bring it to an end "if necessary by violence."

Which brings us to the second lesson of the October crisis, and of most terrorist campaigns. Because they are such a small group, supported by so few people, a terrorist organization's only hope is to try to radicalize the population, by getting the government to overreact.

Thirty five years on, we are still debating whether the War Measures Act was justified. It was sharp, but it was short and it was probably the right thing.

But let's imagine that Trudeau had imposed the War Measures Act for years rather than weeks; remember, its restrictions on civil liberties were arguably more severe than anything authorized thus far by George W. Bush or Tony Blair.

It would have infuriated many Quebecers, maybe even a majority. It would have worked to create an atmosphere of Us vs. Them, in which the opposing sides are not terrorists vs. civil society, but what the FLQ wanted: Quebeckers vs. English Canadians.

That's how Al Qaeda and its sympathizers want Muslims to see the world: as a war of Muslims vs. everyone else. But surveys show that's not how most Muslims in Britain see things. I suspect that goes doubly for Muslim Canadians.

There will be more terrorist attacks. But the terrorists — small, disorganized groups with little popular support, even in the communities they claim to represent — can only win if we overreact in ways that give them what they desperately need: Sympathizers and recruits. We are their only hope.