listen stooopid... when Good and EVIL compromise, EVIL ALWAYS WINS!!!
Posted on 03/31/2008 5:09:07 PM PDT by Alouette
At the National Theatre, a new play by the former radical playwright Howard Brenton, Never So Good, paints a surprisingly sympathetic portrait of the Sixties Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, who as a young man opposed Neville Chamberlain's appeasement of Hitler.
Chamberlain's claim that he could talk Germany out of war and produce "peace for our time" is, of course, a byword for craven weakness and earns only contempt. But in the very week the play opened, a second Chamberlain was revealed in the form of our Defence Secretary, Des Browne.
In an interview on Saturday, Mr Browne said he thought Britain should be talking to "elements of the Taliban and Hezbollah".
Since this country's Armed Forces are locked in a desperate conflict with the Taliban in Afghanistan, Mr Browne makes Chamberlain's monumental error positively pale by comparison.
At the very moment that our soldiers are giving their lives to defeat the Taliban, how can the Defence Secretary - of all people - say that Britain should be talking to them instead?
What sort of a government is this where the minister in charge of the Armed Forces demoralises and undermines them in time of war by implying that their sacrifice is pointless - and correspondingly heartens their enemies, thus inciting them to further attacks?
Afghanistan is the front line for the defence of the world against the global Islamic jihad. If the Taliban returned to power, it would again become a vast haven for Al Qaeda.
Mr Browne says we should talk to them so they realise that their political ambitions can be delivered through politics rather than violence. What stupendous idiocy. The Taliban recognise only one "political" authority: God.
Any "political" process in which they take part will be subordinate to their interpretation of God's word - which requires them to turn Afghanistan once again into a brutally repressive Islamic state in order to incubate the wider Islamist assault on the rest of the world.
As for Hezbollah - the other group Mr Browne wants us to sit down with - it is a bunch of murderous fanatics currently stamping the life out of Lebanon's fragile democracy, pointing thousands of rockets at Israel and training gunmen in Gaza, in order to further its aims of the destruction of Israel, domination of the region and defeat of America, Britain and the West.
Precisely which of these "political ambitions" does Mr Browne think can be achieved through the political process?
He is, however, far from alone. A very large head of steam has now built up for such dangerous ideas among the defence, intelligence and political establishment.
In recent days, similar views have been voiced by Jonathan Powell, Tony Blair's former chief of staff, and the Security Minister Admiral West; while last year the Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee recommended that the British Government should "engage" with elements in Hezbollah and the implacable Palestinian extremists Hamas, along with Syria and the Muslim Brotherhood.
This thinking - based on the utterly flawed idea that within all these terror groups there are 'moderates' with whom the civilised world can do business - is the product of the fad for "conflict resolution".
What drives it all is the "peace process" in Northern Ireland whose apparent success, thinks the Establishment, can be repeated across the entire planet.
The fact that former wild men such as Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness have actually run an administration side by side is said to show that every terrorist can be turned into a statesman.
But the Northern Ireland analogy doesn't work, for three main reasons. First, the agenda there was just not comparable to Islamic extremism. The IRA did not want to subject the whole of Britain to Irish rule, nor turn the UK into a Catholic state.
The second crucial difference is the IRA itself asked to join the political process - because the British Army had beaten it at least into a permanent stalemate, forcing it to realise it could never achieve its aims by violent means.
The third reason is that peace in Northern Ireland has been bought at a very high price indeed. True, the bombs have stopped; but parts of the province are now effectively a kind of mafia state, with the rule of law destroyed and the streets handed over to former paramilitaries who are now running protection rackets and inflicting mob "justice" through knee-cappings and murder.
What's more, the "peace process" also destroyed moderate political parties in the province so that it is only the extremists who now rule.
In every conflict where the men of violence are appeased, moderate politicians are undermined and destroyed.
Yes, history is littered with ex-terrorists who go on to become statesmen. But treating them as legitimate while they are still engaged in violence is to run up a white flag.
Indeed, the outcome of the secret channels that the British Government opened up with the IRA as far back as 1972 was a huge increase in violence.
As the historians John Bew and Martin Frampton write in their forthcoming book, Talking To Terrorists, such contacts intensified the attacks and increased the sense of constitutional instability that contributed to the crisis.
Appeasement produces such results over and over again. When the Sri Lankan government invited the separatist Tamil Tigers to a conference and offered them concessions, there was a huge increase in terrorist violence.
It has only been since the Sri Lankans decided to attack the Tamil terrorists militarily and started flushing them out that it has succeeded in isolating them in a small area.
Yet Paul Murphy, the former Northern Ireland Secretary of State, and Chris MacCabe, one of the first British civil servants openly to meet with Sinn Fein, have been advising Tamil separatists on "engagement" with the Sir Lankan government.
In the Middle East, Tony Blair - with his Messianic belief that he performed a miracle in Northern Ireland - is one of the greatest enthusiasts for bringing Hamas, which aims to eradicate Israel, into a renewed peace initiative.
But since 1991, Europe, America and Israel have made repeated contact through back channels with Hamas - only to discover that has merely made it even stronger.
Disastrously, the idea that such initiatives can succeed has achieved significant influence within an establishment which is reluctant to admit that we now face a hideously long war if freedom and justice are to be successfully defended.
The Islamists' violence is fuelled by the belief that the West will not have the stomach for such a fight. The situation in Afghanistan is indeed desperate. But attitudes like Mr Browne's will ensure that the war will indeed be lost.
Appeasement does not mean the difference between peace and war. It means the difference between fighting a war which vanquishes tyrants and defends life and liberty, and surrendering in a war in which the tyrants win and life and liberty are extinguished.
Peace is to be most ardently wished for - but not at any price.
Warning! This is a high-volume ping list.
Patrick Henry understood this all so well:
"Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace -- but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"
Words wasted perhaps on a craven civilization that can't handle the truth, and is "too enlightened to fight."
That needs to be change to Give me liberty or give THEM death!
During the Cold War, we had the policy of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD). It worked pretty well. The Russians didn't want to all die. And neither did we. So the wars were small, in out-of-the-way places like Vietnam. It wasn't great, but it worked OK and no nukes flew in anger.
It's just different with Islam. I think the US has an absolute need to use a nuclear weapon or two. It doesn't have to be Mecca. It could be Damascus and Tehran. But the point is this: The Muslims will not stop trying to kill us until we demonstrate a willingness to kill them on the scale of millions. We can do that. They cannot. When they see our willingness, then -- and only then -- will the jihad end.
I don't necessarily disagree with you, but I would want it to occur at some point when the American left and our global "Allies" can't stab us in the back for it, while at the same time benefiting from our effort. In other words, I want some of their blood to run first. I want the cries of "help" to come from their mouths first.
They understand that, which is why they are busily infiltrating Europe, the UK, and the US as fast as they can.
They can have their own nukes by making them themselves, OR by becoming a voting majority in a country that already has them
listen stooopid... when Good and EVIL compromise, EVIL ALWAYS WINS!!!
You got it ClearCase. Although I don’t think it even be with nuclear weapons. 200 cruise missles hitting the only gasoline refinery in Iran would teach the mullahs much. In Syria, some mysterious dissapearances would also work, close to Assad’s personal family for example. It need not be all or nothing but certainly reaching out and touching them instead of playing defense right now is still the way to go.
Hey British - Stop hating America and Bush. If Bush didn’t do what he did you would likely have had a nuclear 711 instead of just a tube attacked.
May I point out a mistake here on Melanie's part?
"The Taliban recognise only one "political" authority: allah(may pigs be upon him). allah is satan, big difference.
Real Englishmen know and accept the truth in the old English truism, “The Arab is either at your throat or at your feet. Better he be at your feet.”
They bite the hand that feeds them, and kiss the boot that kicks them.
Muslims - To know then IS to loath them.
I’m being a good boy tonight, ‘cause I haven’t posted Churchill’s famous summation of Islam’s negative influence.
But, I’m getting tempted.
As usual, an outstanding column by Melanie Phillips.
This facet of the ROP is of course, inexplicable to a Western intellectual.
Good old Patrick was showing his knowledge of scripture.
Jer 8:11 For they have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when [there is] no peace.
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