Posted on 01/01/2005 7:23:40 AM PST by Prospero
"Words fail," they say, and they do, they do indeed.
Having just finished a first-stage restoration of my father's 45 year-old home movies, which included scenes of Djakarta, where our family briefly lived, I've always felt a sub vocal kinship with Indonesia and her millions.
They say I spoke Bhasha, the Malay tongue spoken there, and would translate for my parents instructions for the house servants, who were probably also spies for the Junta, the Communists, or both. Perhaps I dream in that language, occasionally, but this week I retreated into a walking nightmare, early on after the first indications that the Banda Aceh Christmas Earthquake of 2004 had swamped the parameter of the east Indian Ocean, strongly hinting at what the world would find when the northern end of Sumatra was finally heard from.
In America, for days, we could watch a handful of the same "amateur videos," from Phuket and Sri Lanka, and the horror there was bad enough. The only such video I've seen of the torrent that scraped over Banda Aceh, however, appears to have taken almost a week to make it to the Internet. I have yet to see it's like on television. It makes what happed to the beaches in Thailand and Sri Lanka look like a creek over running its banks after a brief summer storm.
Let's just say, what happened to the sex tourism spots and coasts and more distant islands elsewhere is nothing in comparison to the fate of Banda Aceh and the western shore of Sumatra. Since so many can't find the words, here are a thousand of them:
Now, if you had told me a week ago that an American Marine expeditionary force would be in Banda Aceh on New Years Day, my first reaction would have been that the President had decided upon a bold and unexpected strike in the War on Terror, jumping ahead on the timeline of that effort's multi-generational strategy. I might have thought it was a bold and necessary move, and I would have believed you if you had said they had located and captured Osama Bin Laden there.
As it was, in our shock, probing in from the parameter toward the epicenter of the Banda Aceh Earthquake, only a few have considered whether the hand of the Almighty reached out and sliced off a decade from what still promises to be a protracted conflict with Islamo-Fascism.
Consider that Indonesia is largely a Muslim country with a population similar to that of the United States, and developments there have been "the elephant in the living room" few wanted to consider as we cleaned out Islamo-Fascist terror nests in Iraq, Afghanistan and the southern Philippines.
Banda Aceh was, until a week ago, home of a Taliban-like, semi-autonomous government that had succeeded in establishing the Sharhia Islamic law, though the central government on Java nominally "allowed" this legal code on a "separate but equal" basis, for Muslims only. That was in 2002, and it was hoped the restive Islamo-Fascist insurgents who have fought for independence from Djakarta for more than twenty years would be satisfied. The locals had even just recently succeeded in putting into place, shall we say, "heavy legal penalties" for anyone who tried to prosthletize a citizen of Greater Islam... meaning Christians, of course.
Not a week passes without stories emerging from Indonesia of an on-going persecution of its Christian minorities, and the central governments failure to put a stop to it, especially the further one travels further from Djakarta to the myriad islands of the Indonesian archipelago. Remember the bombing of the nightclub in Denpasar on Bali, the only refuge for Hindus in Indonesia? The Australians haven't.
When he was forced to leave Sudan, Osama Bin Laden considered moving to Yemen, Afghanistan and Banda Aceh. He decided upon Afghanistan, of course, and may still be holed up there, or on the border with Pakistan, or under the nervous refuge of the Mullah regime of Iran. In fact, the Grand Mosque in Banda Aceh is right up there with Karbala, Qom, Medina and Mecca in everyone's top ten list of Muslim "holy places."
Today, it's an open air morgue, and if they find Osama among the dead there, I wouldn't be a bit surprised.
Sooner or later, we were going to have to deal with Indonesia, in general, and Aceh in particular. And things weren't looking too good.
Things are looking up.
Consider that the Christian Reformation, perhaps even the American Republic, has roots in the Black Death of 1349. People faced with such tragedy question their Worldview, abandon or are, at least, forced to examine their beliefs and habits, and the rebirth of Philosophy and the scientific method in the West began again in the centuries immediately after the plagues of the 14th Christian Century. They certainly questioned the magic of their priests and closely examined the "mysteries," resulting in a rebirth of Bible study that continues to this day. Unquestioned obedience to Rome ended with the Black Plague, and the True Belief of many a young muslim, of their Imams, may come to an end in the aftermath of the Christmas Earthquake.
Now, some might think I'm suggesting the God of Abraham did an angry thing of "biblical proportions" when He decided to shake Sumatra, and that he's on our side, loves George W. Bush, answered the humble prayers of the persecuted, etc., etc. But, this natural tragedy doesn't strike me that way at all. You won't find me cheering the deaths of a million people on Sumatra, and particularly in Aceh.
"Rather fear," I would think, betting on the "beginning of wisdom" might be the best response to this Catastrophe.
But... after you've digested the indigestible scope of the Christmas Earthquake, consider what you might have thought if Kabul under the Taliban had been wiped off the face of the Earth a week or so before our first boots hit the ground there after the destruction of the World Trade Center.
What has happened in Banda Aceh is no less miraculous and undreamed of a possibility, and, at this hour, American Marines are handing out water and food to the pitiable handful who escaped the 20 foot high, hundred mile wide river that swept over their island, again, making what happened in Thailand and Sri Lanka look like a simple storm surge in comparison. The Epicenter of fierce hatred, a sanctuary of Islamo-fascism is no more, as though Falluja had been hit with several hydrogen bombs.
Now you see them, now you don't.
Some of those locals, who have waited for almost a week for food and water, helping off-load our nation's charity are wearing T-Shirts with the image of Osama on them.
We certainly didn't cause this tragedy, but we'd be fools not to take advantage of the strategic miracle God has handed to us.
NW_AZ is finding messages posted now with efforts to stop the US support to the victims.
The messages are encouraging add to go to the NGOs and all other efforts will be blocked.
Guess that is why Annan came home early from his ski trip.
Here is one of the messages that NW_AZ is coming across:
Topic in soc.culture.usa
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Sri Lanka
making third
tragedy for
Tamils
Only 1 message in topic
Larry de
Silva
Dec 31 2004, 11:36 pm show options
First one is Sinhala army killing Tamils
second one is Tsunami
Third one is Sinhala government block the AID that goes with Tamils
money and get AID showing Tamils death and never distribute any AID.
PLEASE DON'T GIVE AID TO SRI LANKAN GOVERNMENT BUT TO NGO.
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layou...
Tamil Hindus working on tea plantations in Thambathamne and Thangamamy
Estates were stopped when they tried to bring rice, vegetables and tea
past a military checkpoint yesterday, and had to reclaim their goods
when the army tried to divert them to a Buddhist temple, according to
Sivam.
A team trying to deliver aid shipments to the hard-hit Ampara district
was blocked at an army checkpoint, despite promises by top local
government officials that clearance would be granted, said Sivam.
Three Tamil relief trucks heading to Kallar, southeast of Batticaloa,
were stopped at the Chettipalayam checkpoint by elite soldiers from the
Special Task Force who forcibly unloaded the relief supplies and took
over distribution, according to Kurukulasingam Thevarajah, Batticaloa
office director.
Another shipment was delayed at nearby Pillaiyarada checkpoint,
Thevarajah added.
Reply
End of messages
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reaching East of Sri Lanka?
They are doing drops from US planes and helicopter distributions..Good luck...and they also have the carrier making clean water to distribute..The people rushing to the helicopter didn't seem to mind the insignia.
You are right. I think I saw that on this thread here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1311936/posts
Amazing how we have to fight to help these people.
If they are saying that God Almighty was indifferent to the jihadi's there,
I assert that they are . . . wellll . . .
dead wrong.
This is an interesting "take". He certainly sees a silver lining.
While I had certainly heard of Islamofascism and Christian persecutions in Indonesia, I had only vaguely heard of Banda Aceh as an Islamofascist stronghold. Any comments on that?
It certainly appears just *gone*, from some fairly hi-res satellite imagery I've seen.
"A member of the U.S. Navy from the USS Abraham Lincoln prepares supplies for victims at the airport in Banda Aceh." (AFP)
I don't know about you all, but he looks like he just arrived in Tehran.
I hope we're all not too stunned to take advantage of this opportunity, or to muck it up. Getting your first drink of water in five days from someone with an American flag on his jacket might make you think twice about a lot of things your Imam has been telling you about "The Great Satan."
Post 18 in this thread has a link to the satellite images I had seen.
You're amazing. Happy New Year!
Set six before and after has this mosque pic in it.....
http://www.islamicity.com/Culture/Mosques/Asia/bagm.htm
http://www.goodolddogs3.com/bandaaceh6.html
It was a islamakazi stronghold
Happy New Year to you and yours.
Yes, Lord, speak truth to them through this experience. May they know deep in their hearts, spirits, bone marrow, minds that their Imam's are lying idiots. May they choose life over death in every way. Make yourself real to them. In Jesus' Name.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/EG22Ae05.html
The other side to Aceh's rebels
snip
Ethnic chauvinism is also evident in GAM's construction of Acehnese nationalism. While Indonesian identity is a civic nationalism which is inclusive, multi-religious, multi-ethnic, and multi-tribal, Acehnese nationalism is ethnic and exclusive. It is based upon the imposition of the identity of the Aceh tribe upon the other eight tribes in the region in order to create the Acehnese nation. This nation is defined by blood ties, tribalism, and Islam.
GAM's ethnic parochialism has been underscored by a narrow, hardline ideology that has defined the movement's attitude toward the peace process. GAM has made it very clear that it is neither interested in negotiating with the Indonesian government nor in a compromise solution. It sees the peace process as a way of internationalizing the conflict with the aim of forcing Indonesia to relinquish sovereignty under outside pressure. Thus it is not surprising that it was not interested in Jakarta's concession of special autonomy for Aceh and even actively worked to undermine its implementation by paralyzing the local administration through threat and intimidation. snip
Amen!
And Amen.
THANKS.
Lord, an ammendment to my last . . .
where the Imam's are 'merely' grossly deceived--please break their deception and woo them to Yourself, too. Where they are knowingly demonized deceivers and liars, with no hope of redemption, please take them out of the equation entirely in your way and timing, in Jesus' Name.
islamofascist banda acheh ping
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