Posted on 04/30/2008 6:33:40 PM PDT by PotatoHeadMick
An apocryphal internet tale provides a double insight into the fundamental problems of the Western world. A senior Australian army officer, General Peter Cosgrave, is being interviewed by a woman presenter. She questions him about a scheme to introduce boy scouts to army barracks. What will they do there, she asks; he replies, climbing, canoeing, archery and rifle-shooting.
"Shooting? Don't you admit that that's a terribly dangerous activity to be teaching children? You're equipping them to become violent killers."
"Well ma'am, you're equipped to be a prostitute, and you're not one, are you?"
Now, this story is widely believed, not least because we all have come across the depravity of the effeminate feminist who thinks that all will be well if we just get rid of violence. But it has also been widely denounced as a foul, "sexist" internet-myth. Myth it is, but sexist it is not. Any woman is equipped to be a prostitute, and only in the querulous PC world of the 21st century would a statement of this obvious truth, be denounced as "sexist". Moreover, the pathetic and intellectually juvenile language of soppy feminism is incapable of capturing the awfulness of the world we live in.
Mohammed Halim, a 46-year old schoolteacher in Ghazni, in Afghanistan, was recently abducted by the Taliban for the crime of teaching girls. They disembowelled him, still alive, and then, tying his arms and legs to motorbikes, tore him apart. His remains were put on display as a warning to others.
The fate of this Muslim schoolteacher is a terrible indictment of the Western failure to confront Islamicist terrorism in its home bases. For, contrary to the feel-good, all-will-be-well emotions so typified in the spurious interview above, passivity in Afghanistan could lead to disaster. A victorious Taliban would merely confirm the Islamicist belief that the West is not serious, and would undermine the most important allies we have: moderate Muslims in Pakistan and Turkey.
It would, moreover, strengthen the grip of the fundamentalists in Iran. Worst all of all, it would increase the chances of Islamic jihadists getting nuclear weapons from rogue regimes in Iran or Pakistan.
Europe slumbers. Britain aside, no European country has taken its UN-mandated obligations to fight the war in Afghanistan seriously. But the British experiences both there and in Iraq have been utterly demoralising. The British army has been defeated in Basra. It can no longer take on the Mahdi militia in the city. Indeed, its
rule extends solely to the perimeter of the single air-base from which one day soon it will make its ignominious, Saigon-style vertical exit, to be replaced by the US Marine Corps.
In Afghanistan, it is fighting the same enemy, in the same places, that it was fighting years ago, only now that foe is more numerous and more skilled, does not count its loss, and only exults in martyrdom. Moreover, this is a war which can only be won by Afghans holding the ground once Western troops have withdrawn, and so far the Afghan army has not developed the tactical skills or the autonomous culture which would enable it to do just that. Indeed, far from the initiative resting in any sense with the Karzai government in Kabul, the president narrowly escaped with his life during an assassination attempt last Sunday.
In other words, the situation is critical -- but you'd never know it from politicians, military leaders or the media. You'd never gather from the BBC or ITN that in Basra, the British face their biggest military humiliation since Tobruk. "The difference is, we fought at Tobruk," one British officer observed dryly. There is actually one other difference. Rommel's men were civilised. The characters who govern Basra are murderous savages, who burn girls alive, or rape and stone them.
Yes, you can state the obvious -- that the British are the authors of this calamity. But that is history. We must live with the present and the future. The US is incapable of taking on any more military burdens in the two war-zones. The British army is facing defeat in one, and unsustainable stalemate in the other. The Canadians and Australians have more than done their bit. Time for the Fifth Cavalry of Europe to come over the hill. But the despicable EU arm of NATO is far too interested in foisting incomprehensible, ten-zillion word treaties on its unwilling peoples than it is in taking its rightful place: on the right of the line in the war of civilisations being fought on the frontiers of its homeland.
We are back to the Crusades, but now with Muslim allies. And unless Europe helps those allies now, we must soon fight without them. For, in our absence, they will surely be slain, seduced or suborned. And then, when this real conflict starts, as it certainly will, the Islamicist Fifth Column across Europe will be fully armed and ready. Still, at least we'll have our European constitution -- and that's all that really counts.
Not to long ago, I remember reading advice from the usual suspects that we should adopt the British tactics in Basra.
Don’t get me wrong, the Brits are damn good fighters....when they are allowed to fight as noted in the article.
that has been my point to uksupport1 all along. The British military is hard as nails. UNfortunately their commanders are pudding heads and undertook an unfortunate strategy designed less to win in Basra than to minimize casualties (i.e. controversy in UK public opinion) therefore you have what we are seeing right now: The Iraqi gov, backed by US forces, having to take back what the British ‘supposedly’ won through their ‘softly, softly’ approach.
This whole problem is rooted in the fact that in Europe it is politically unacceptible to take casualties. Lacking the capacity to wage extended war from fifteen thousand feet like Clinton did, the defensive crouch is the only posture available.
[the defensive crouch is the only posture available.]
What is that, head in the sand, arse in the air?
The Brits, as well as the Western countries, have yet to learn that in order to preserve civilization in the face of murderous fanaticism, it takes civilized men doing very uncivilized deeds in order to preserve their way of life.
They cherish their civility and only when their backs are at a wall will they then defend their countries to the death...They need to learn that the time to act is now while the enemy is weak and uncoordinated, rather than later when they have nuclear weapons and the reckless abandon to use them to conquer the weak Western countries...
But these civilized people will never learn until it is too late..That is one advantage the US military has: it can take ordinary citizens and turn them into fighting machines who know how to get the job done...The Brits and the world can thank their lucky stars the Yanks are there fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan..The Canadians and Australians have learned well and are fighting alongside our troops..
The Islamists will rue the day the Europe wakes up. Europeans *invented* all the horrors of modern warfare. They’ve spent last 60 years feeling guilty and atoning for their sins of the past. Let me tell ya - the spirit of the West is alive and well, and it will wake up. People thought things that happened in balkans would never happen, but they did. People think western Europe is weak, but it is no different than anywhere else - once the tipping point is reached, people who knew what it meant to be free or that have some notion of it will wake up again.
I just hope when it does we don’t have to go rescue the whole continent again.
It is never too late. Do not underestimate the Western capacity for War. There is a reason the West rose out the mists of medieval times and created what we currently enjoy as the western civilization. As you said, when, finally, European backs are against the wall, I wouldn’t bet on the Islamists - not a penny. Sooner or later, as they keep pushing, they’ll find out they’ve awakened something that has been put away for a very good reason. Last time it was westerners vs westerners. And, god help us, next time there will be little to restrain the western peoples.
I am only interested in selective saving. the ones that got fat and lazy on the backs of our security while hectoring us at the UN for our cowboy ways can reap the whirlwind as far as i am concerned...
I can see the Germans waking up. Not sure about the rest of Western Europeans though.
If Europe doesn't wake up soon, its aging and shrinking population will find its homelands already occupied by millions of young Muslim immigrants -- the "Islamicist Fifth Column" which the author describes. Time is not on Europe's side.
I think you misunderstand what I mean by ‘saving’. Last time we went there to save the west from themselves. What I worry about is us having to go there again for the same reason, or, worse, to save Muslims from their fate at the hands of those ‘fat/lazy’ Europeans.
Noone ever talks about what, for example, the French do in Africa. What the Foreign Legion does on behest of the French government and French oil companies, in order to protect French interests. Lets just say that I have *NO* doubt that should push comes to shove in Europe, Islamists have absolutely no clue what kind of a sleeping animal they’re poking with a sharp stick.
The time to act is now before our birth rates ultimately doom Western Civilization.
The old Europe, perhaps. But even then, I’ll take one French for ten Mohammedans. But the new Europe, the Poles, the Chech, the Slovaks, the Eastern Europe, the Slovenes, the Croats, the Serbs, the Romanians, the Bulgarians, the Greeks - will resist to the last man. They remember the Ottoman/Islamist rule and history of in their cultures all to well. And, they do not allow Islamist immigration either. It is only France, England, Germany, Spain that are truly at risk, and, as I said, I believe that once they wake up, may god help the Islamists, because noone will.
Yes, but the critical mass hasn’t been reached yet. But it may soon.
In either case, I’ll take 1 free western man or woman (especially a woman) for every 10 Mohammedans. They have no idea what they stir. Things are afoot already in many Western countries of EU. Germany, Belgium, Norway even... all reported as ‘anti-immigrant’, far-right movements. Some of them are. That’s the scary thing. The pendulum swings...
My money is on the French, though it is a very cautious bet. Germany was so thoroughly pacified by guilt and re-education during the Post-WWII occupation that its current leaders lack the moral courage for war, and its childless citizenry cares only for the plunder of its welfare state. The shrinking of Germany's native population will soon accelerate alarmingly, while Muslim immigrants continue to pour in and breed like rats.
On the other hand, France's Post-WWI funk has lasted almost a century, and I believe it is due to end. The Frogs can be cruel bastards in their own right, and at their late-20th Century ebb still mustered the guts to blow up the Rainbow Warrior and to launch occasional forays into the African interior. France's cities are crowded with Muslims, and France is where I believe the Mohammedan "youths" will finally go too far -- and where the push-back will begin. Never forget that the non-assimilated Muslims look different from their hosts, and they will not be able to hide. When the purge comes, it will be a bloody mess. Vive le France!
demographics would suggest that they would need to resort to genocide to ‘rebalance the equation’. I think that regardless of their ruthlessness when it comes to national preservation, the horse is out of the baqrn and there is not much short of outright, unconditional war/internment camps/etc that they can do to reverse the tragedy.
Well, France is way overdue for a bloody revolution and the events are turning out to be perfect for the fall of this republic and the rise of the new government in France led by that “extremist” who finished 2nd for President back in 2002.
I agree. But Europe must awaken and fight before its aging, shrinking population loses the will and capacity for a very bloody war.
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