The Director of Public Prosecutions and head of the Crown Prosecution Service in the UK , Ken McDonald , Britain 's most senior criminal prosecutor , stated that those responsible for acts of terrorism such as the 7 July 2005 London bombings are not " soldiers " in a war , but " inadequates " who should be dealt with by the criminal justice system . He added that a " culture of legislative restraint " was needed in passing anti-terrorism laws and that a " primary purpose " of the violent attacks was to tempt countries such as Britain to " abandon our values . " He stated that in the eyes of the UK criminal justice system , the response to terrorism had to be " proportionate and grounded in due process and the rule of law " : London is not a battlefield . Those innocents who were murdered ... were not victims of war . And the men who killed them were not , as in their vanity they claimed on their ludicrous videos , ' soldiers ' . They were deluded , narcissistic inadequates . They were criminals . They were fantasists . We need to be very clear about this . On the streets of London there is no such thing as a war on terror . The fight against terrorism on the streets of Britain is not a war . It is the prevention of crime , the enforcement of our laws and the winning of justice for those damaged by their infringement . Stella Rimington , former head of the British intelligence service MI5 criticised the War on Terror as a " huge overreaction " and had decried the militarization and politicization of U.S. efforts to be the wrong approach to terrorism . David Miliband , former UK foreign secretary , has similarly called the strategy a " mistake " . Nigel Lawson , former Chancellor of the Exchequer , called for Britain to end its involvement in the War in Afghanistan , describing the mission as " wholly unsuccessful and indeed counter-productive . "
7 July 2005 London bombings
7 July 2005 London bombings
Criticism of the War on Terror