Posted on 10/04/2007 9:03:43 PM PDT by freedomdefender
I saw Norman Podhoretz plumping his new book, “World War IV,” on CSPAN-2. ...Podhoretz contends World War III to be the Cold War and World War IV to be against what he calls “Islamofascism” — every contention of which is an absurdity. ...
“Islamofascism” is a term I have attacked for years. Fascism was a political system located mainly in Europe in the 1920s-1940s. It is secular in nature; both Mussolini and Hitler, the primary fascists, were anti-religious and secular. So it’s silly to attach a religion to it, as in “Islamofascism.” Fascism also requires a first-class, large industrial base, which no Muslim country has unless it has unless it has oil. And having oil just means you can buy things, not that you are talented at making anything.
Podhoretz compared Iran to Nazi Germany. Except that in 1939 Germany was the second largest industrial nation, after America, and had a long and effective military tradition. Comparing them to Iran, which has relatively small industrial output, is absurd. Iran’s industries mainly are developed by foreigners.
Podhoretz wants the U.S. government to attack Iran to prevent a nuke the Iranians supposedly are developing. Gordon Prather, a physicist and former science advisor to Ronald Reagan, effectively explodes the Iranian nuke threat in his many columns here.
Iran’s conventional military hardly has recovered from the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war. The Iranians have almost no capability to build major weapons on their own.
They just built their first warplane — it’s a knockoff of a U.S. F-5, a 48-year-old design. It’s called the the Sa’eqeh, or Lightning. The U.S. Air Force or the Israeli Air Force could dispatch it in seconds.
So Iran doesn’t threaten America. It does have a loud-mouthed leader with an unpronunceable name, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who actually doesn’t have much real power.
The lack of a real threat to America from Iran is another reason to pull our troops — all of them — from Iraq and the rest of the Middle East. Here’s a plan to do it.
Bring our American boys home in time for Thanksgiving with their families.
Well, well. Isn’t he the Dick for Dolly. I would be willing to comply with all squeals of “bring our troops home” provided all the squealers went where the troops are and stood in for them. After all, there isn’t any danger.
What about Iran’s support for Hezbollah, Hamas and insurgents in Iraq who are killing our troops?
It’s rather obvious that Iran’s nuclear program isn’t for civilian use only. If we let them obtain a nuclear bomb, then what do we do? What if they hand it off to a terrorist organization? What about Israel?
Iran is not run by rational people. The Mullahs are Shi’ite extremists who want the return of the 12th Imam.
I believe that this writer - Mr. Seiler - is a veteran. More than can be said for most of the neocons who want endless new wars in the Middle East.
We shouldn’t ever underestimate Iranian military power. Iran has the most powerful military force in the region except for the United States.
-Gen John Abizaid.
Well . . . for starters, he has his facts wrong about Germany’s industrial output. In 1939 it was behind the US, Britain, and France. There is an excellent book that just came out called “Wages of Destruction” by Adam Tooze. It looks at Nazi Germany from an economic perspective.
One of the interesting things about the book was the revelation about what low standards of living existed in Germany in the 1920s and 1930s. By today’s standards it would be on par with . . . Iran.
Maybe JPod knows whereof he speaks.
Islam is a death cult aiming to wipe out the west....GO AWAY!
Really? Then are you in favor of invading all Islamic countries? Malaysia? Indonesia? Pakistan? If the answer is no - which I suspect it is - it shows you need to halt your hyperbole.
“Freedomdefender”? “Clueless” suits you better.
Does this person even have the slightest idea about what is going on in the world today?
Only the one’s that want me dead...
fascism \fasc"ism\ (f[a^]sh"[i^]z'm) n.
1. a political theory advocating an authoritarian
hierarchical government; -- opposed to democracy and
liberalism.
[WordNet 1.5]
2. an authoritarian system of government under absolute
control of a single dictator, allowing no political
opposition, forcibly suppressing dissent, and rigidly
controlling most industrial and economic activities. Such
regimes usually try to achieve popularity by a strongly
nationalistic appeal, often mixed with racism.
[PJC]
3. Specifically, the Fascist movement led by Benito Mussolini
in Italy from 1922 to 1943.
[PJC]
4. broadly, a tendency toward or support of a strongly
authoritarian or dictatorial control of government or
other organizations; -- often used pejoratively in this
sense.
[PJC]
First of all, Iran is directly reponsible for an untold number of American deaths in Iraq the past few years, so his argument is lost before it even got started. The threat has already been realized.
And if this author can’t see the threat of a nation run by freaks of a death cult who aren’t afraid of dying for their cause (which happens to be the annihilation of Western civilization) possessing nuclear weapons then he’s got some serious mental difficulties, to be kind about it.
bump
The terror is from islam
Then they should convert to a peaceful religion Mr. Goldwater
Thank you for posting this article.
I don’t know who John Seiler is, but he demonstrates to us that he couldn’t punch his way out of a paper bag.
Paragraph 1: an ‘absurd’ conclusion with absolutely no reference to specifics.
Paragraph 2: he specifies what is required for fascism, admits Iran has it, then claims they aren’t fascist because they are stupid.
Paragraph 3: Same as #2.
Paragraph 4: He offers supportive conclusions from a “former” advisor to Reagan (that would be 20 years ago when he was getting “current” info)
Paragraph 5: He states the Iranians have “almost” no capability...... Is that like “kinda” pregnant ????
Paragraph 8: ..another reason to pull out our troops?
I didn’t see a first “reason” in his remarks. Is he just confused???
Paragraph 9: Bring our boys home for Thanksgiving.
Hasn’t he heard????? We won’t be celebrating Thanksgiving, nor Christmas, nor reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, nor praying to a Christian/Jewish God in this country anymore, due to the very thing he denies exists.
You're missing the big camel in the room: nuclear weapons possessed by a Islamic fundamentalist regime. None of the other Islamic countries you named fit that description. ...including Pakistan (for now, at least). Iran would be the only one. ...and we're going to make damn sure it doesn't happen. Allowing nuclear proliferation throughout the Muslim world is pure insanity. The doctrine of muturally assured destruction (MAD) only works when the nations involved are sane.
Pakistan has nuclear weapons; as does India.
We aren’t really fighting the nation of Iran.
Or the nation of Syria.
We are fighting the extremists, the terrorists, the crime bosses, the drug lords, the black market dealers, the nuclear black market dealers who have taken a world religion and are hiding behind it’s skirts in an attempt to seize control, and power, and wealth.
They have united behind a label (Islam), and they are fascist potentate dictators, and wanna-be’s.
They lie, and enslave their masses using religion as a drug.
In short. Islamofascists.
Not all Islams are fascists, just as not all German were Nazis.
But it is a label that does accurately describe the reality of the situation in the Middle East.
(Note: Fascism as seen defined in one of the posts above, also describes the current trends in the two parties of the US government, primarily the Democratic party officials)
They work with us for the most part. Isn’t India mainly Sikh?
Read it again. It appears you (conveniently enough) missed the “fundamentalist Islamic regime” part of my post. If the Islamoloons in Pakistan ever succeeded in one of their coup attempts the U.S. would secure those nukes quickly, I assure you.
Hindu.
More than four-fifths of Indians practice Hinduism. Islam, practised by around one-sixth of the population, is the most prevalent minority religion. Christianity and Sikhism are each practised by around 2% of Indians
Fascism was “secular.” Well, Mussolini, yeah. Hitler, no. Hirihito, really no.
Anyone who has ever read and who realizes that Hitler meant every word he dictated to Hess—a fact that few in the West could grasp, CAN grasp. Is that Hitler thought of himself as a divine instrument. Not the instrument of the Christian God, of course, but of what we Christians would say was the Devil. Son of Satan. Say this to secularists and they think you are nuts. But again, reference the divine worship of his subordinates. To them he was the true messiah. For the masses, he was a god. But to understand this, one has to talk to people who were young while Hitler was building his regime and were exposed to Hitler-worship.
But the prist case of religious fascism was Japan, Hard as it is for secularists to understand, the Japanese thought of Hirohito as a living god, a modern Pharoah. Nothing can explain the blind fanaticism of his soldiers than their beliuef in his divinity. Themselves blind to all evidence, treapped in their stupid rationalism, the secularists nonetheless can conceded that this was, in deed, fascism. And so we have a close modern parallel to the blind fanaticms that informs Islamo-fascism.
Of course, Amhadawhackjob is currently repsonsible for American soldiers dying by using his Quds Force to supply ieds and islamonuts to the bad guys in Iraq. I would hope, sooner rather than later, he pays the ultimate price for that.
Meanwhile, you're ignoring the point I made in #30 -- India and Pakistan, while they both possess nukes, aren't run by Islamic fundamentalist regimes intent on destroying the West. Iran is. Get the distinction?
Reestablishment
Once the subject of intense conflict and rivalry amongst Muslim rulers, the caliphate has lain dormant and largely unclaimed since the 1920s. In recent years though, interest among Muslims in international unity and the Caliphate has grown. For many ordinary Muslims the caliph as leader of the community of believers, "is cherished both as memory and ideal", though "not an urgent concern" compared to issues such as Israeli-Palestinian conflict.[5]
Tight restrictions on political activity in many Muslim countries, coupled with the obstacles to uniting over 50 nation-states under a single institution, have prevented efforts to revive the caliphate. Popular apolitical Islamic movements such as the Tablighi Jamaat identify a lack of spirituality and decline in personal religious observance as the root cause of the Muslim world's problems, and claim that the caliphate cannot be successfully revived until these deficiencies are addressed. No attempts at rebuilding a power structure based on Islam were successful anywhere in the Muslim World until the Iranian Revolution in 1979, which was based on Shia principles and whose leaders did not outwardly call for the restoration of a global Caliphate.
[edit] Islamist call
A number of Islamist political parties and Islamist guerrilla groups have called for the restoration of the caliphate by uniting Muslim nations, either through peaceful political action (e.g., Hizb ut-Tahrir) or through force (e.g., al-Qaeda).[6] Various Islamist movements have gained momentum in recent years with the ultimate aim of establishing a Caliphate; however, they differ in their methodology and approach. Some are locally-oriented, mainstream political parties that have no apparent transnational objectives.
One of al-Qaeda's clearly stated goals is the re-establishment of a caliphate[7]. Bin Laden has called for Muslims to "establish the righteous caliphate of our umma." [8] Al Qaeda recently named its Internet newscast from Iraq "The Voice of the Caliphate."[9]
In Pakistan the Tanzeem-e-Islami, an Islamist organization founded by Dr. Israr Ahmed, calls for a Caliphate.
The Muslim Brotherhood advocates pan-Islamic unity and implementing Islamic law, it is the largest and most influential Islamic group in the world, and its offshoots form the largest opposition parties in most Arab governments.[10] Officially sanctioned Islamic institutions in the Muslim world generally do not consider the Caliphate a top priority and have instead focused on other issues. Islamists argue it is because they are tied to the current Muslim regimes.
One transnational group particularily strong in Central Asia, and now growing in strength in the Arab World[11], Hizb ut-Tahrir (lit. party of liberation), has tried to recruit the world's Muslims to a renewed caliphate, aiming to ultimately form a pan-Islamic government.[12]
[edit] Position of George W. Bush
United States President George W. Bush has warned repeatedly in speeches on the War on Terror that the Caliphate is at the heart of radical Islamic ideology. President Bush has said Iraq is a pivotal battleground in a larger conflict between advocates of freedom and radical Islamists.
Bush said that Al Qaeda terrorists and those that share their ideology
"hope to establish a violent political utopia across the Middle East, which they call caliphate, where all would be ruled according to their hateful ideology...This caliphate would be a totalitarian Islamic empire encompassing all current and former Muslim lands, stretching from Europe to North Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia."[13]
On 4 February 2006 United States Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said U.S. allies should increase military spending to prevent the creation of a "global extremist Islamic empire."[14]
Various commentators, such as NBC, have criticized this approach, saying Bush is seeking to replace the red menace with a new illusory 'green menace' caliphate run by extremists, using an appeal to fear.[15][16]. The Washington Post headed an article with the title "Reunified Islam: Unlikely but Not Entirely Radical, Restoration of Caliphate resonates With Mainstream Muslims", arguing that such a call is not radical nor only resonant with Islamic guerrilla movements.[17]
Perhaps you should address your post to someone who advocated that. I merely advocated eliminating Iran's nuclear capability. Quite a difference.
In the case of Pakistan that is a fragile distinction.
At any rate we were told all through the 60's 70's and 80's during the cold war that our ABM system was capable of taking out the main body of a massive nuclear first strike by the former Soviet Union. Unless we were lied to then why should we fear what would have to be a very limited nuclear missile attack from a rouge Arab nation? Surely our Anti Ballistic Missile System could detect and deflect an missile attack from even further away from our shores then Russia is.
Fascism is an authoritarian political ideology (generally tied to a mass movement) that considers individual and other societal interests subordinate to the needs of the state.
The threat to the USA is more 9/11’s.
From the Boston Globe, October 29, 2005…BY TELLING a conference in Tehran Wednesday that ”Israel must be wiped off the map,” Iran’s new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was not only revealing the hate-twisted face of the Islamist hard-liners who took over key government posts following his suspect election last June. He was also throwing down a challenge to the governments of the world.
Should they use nuclear weapons, they will start WW3.
Cold War thinking. Iran isn't planning on using ICBMs, that's for certain. Our concern is with their nukes getting into the hands of the terrorists who do their dirty work. ...specifically, Hezbollah. We're fighting a new type of war now.
I stand corrected.
At a level of 1.2 billion, they represent about 22% of the world's population. They are the second largest religion in the world. Only Christianity is larger, with 33% of the world's inhabitants.
This report includes all the countries of the world and shows how many Muslims are in each one.
Only 1.2 billion? I guess that's manageable eh?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.