France's response

President Hollande has categorically stated that yesterday IS declared war against France and that France's response against the IS will be merciless and pitiless.

On the one hand I admire the conviction of the leader of a country to clearly identify and acknowledge the situation, to call a spade a spade and to promise retaliation, something that another country under similar circumstances has been either unable or unwilling to do.

On the other hand, I have been struggling to grapple with how one could wage war against an enemy that is fragmented and has no specific location, and worse, has no qualms about taking their own people hostage or making human shields of their own civilians. The civilized world's weapons of war are designed to work against an enemy who presents a defined front. Even the most modern drones and laser sharp precision are never completely effective against an enemy that is amorphous and growing. The new enemy is like a virus for it affects your own body. IS clearly has sympathizers within France and Belgium and the UK - people who like the said virus can stay dormant for an indeterminate amount of time only to be activated by some unknown event and proceed to wreak havoc on the host.

I find one part of me wishing that France's response is more than political rhetoric, and yet another part of me hopes that it will remain the response of a civilized nation, not the wrath of Anakin Skywalker who could just as easily kill women and children.

How does one reconcile this paradox, where civility itself shackles the hands that hold the weapons of retaliation?