(Thumbnail image: New York Daily News)

Airport security measures like watch lists, metal detectors, and rules against bringing liquids aboard planes didn’t stop an alleged terrorist's attempt to blow up a Detroit-bound flight on Christmas.

Not only was suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab able to smuggle explosives aboard, but his father had notified American embassy officials about his son’s radicalism a month beforehand.

We’re looking at views on who’s to blame for the incident with perspectives from Fox News, The Daily Beast, The Mirror, CCTV, and The Telegraph.

First, on Fox News, terror analyst Neil Livingstone says it’s the U.S. State Department’s fault for handing out visas to people from Nigeria.

“The problem here is that the U.S. State Departments says, ‘Well, we’re buying a lot of oil from that country and we have to have good relations, we don’t want to offend them.’”

Blame American officials in Nigeria, writes The Daily Beast’s Gerald Posner.

“…no one evidently tagged the information from the Lagos embassy as a priority and then highlighted it so he would be placed into a more-active suspect database … If they had…security procedures could have promptly moved Abdulmutallab to a no-fly list.”

The Mirror’s Stephen Grey disagrees. He writes that as long as security at airports like those in Nigeria are weak, the fault lies with…

“…a lax (international) security system that assumes those arriving at one country to pick up a connecting flight have already been properly security vetted.”

China’s CCTV notes that Abdulmutallab caught his connecting flight from Nigeria at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport where he passed through security without any problems.

In CCTV’s report, a Dutch counter terrorism agency suggests that the incident isn’t its fault because…

“…it can't completely rule out the potential for dangerous items to be brought on board. Some objects remain difficult to detect with current security technology, such as metal detectors.”

The Telegraph’s Sean Rayment points a finger at a number of spy agencies in Britain and the U.S. for a breakdown in intelligence.

And, he warns:

“…what this incident demonstrates is that despite all the improvements in security since 9/11, determined terrorists can and will continue to mount terrorists attacks against western targets – and one day they will succeed.”

So, who do you think’s to blame? Do you think it’s even possible to stop terrorist acts? Or, will we always be responding to them instead of preventing them?

Writer: Paula Hunt