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I hope I am doing this right. I know I'll hear about if not. But this is a from a great blogger that I think puts it all in perspective. I have never posted an article before, just comments to others.

From The Braden Files Blog..

http://braden.weblogs.com/2004/05/02
The clash of civilizations and the Great Caliphate

(Larry Abraham is editor of a monthly newsletter entitled "Insider Report."
It tracks global trends, with emphasis on information for investors.)

President Bush and his administration spokesmen are not telling the American
people what they really need to know about this "war." If they don't do that
between now and November it may cost them the election.

The war against terror did not begin on September 11, 2001, nor will it end
with the peaceful transition to civilian authority in Iraq, whenever that
may be. In fact, Iraq is but a footnote in the bigger context of this
encounter, but an important one none the less.

This war is what the Jihadists themselves are calling the "Third Great
Jihad." They are operating within the framework of a time line which reaches
back to the very creation of Islam in the seventh century and are presently
attempting to recreate the dynamics which gave rise to the religion in the
first two hundred years of its existence.

No religion in history grew as fast, in its infancy, and the reasons for the
initial growth of Islam are not hard to explain when you understand what the
world was like at the time of Muhammad's death in 632 AD. Remember that the
Western Roman Empire was in ruins and the Eastern Empire, based in
Constantinople, was trying desperately to keep the power of its early
grandeur while transitioning to Christianity as a de facto state religion.
The costs to the average person were large as he was being required to meet
the constantly rising taxes levied by the state along with the tithes
coerced by the Church.

What Islam offered was the "carrot or the sword". If you became a convert,
your taxes were immediately eliminated, as was your tithe. If you didn't,
you faced death. The choice was not hard for most to make, unless you were a
very devoted martyr in the making. At the beginning, even the theology was
not too hard for most to swallow, considering that both Jewry and
Christianity were given their due by the Prophet. There is but one
God-Allah, and Muhammad is His Prophet, as was Jesus, and the pre-Christian
Jewish prophets of the Torah (Old Testament). Both were called "children of
the book"--the book being the Koran, which replaced both the Old and New
Testaments for former Christians and Jews.

With this practical approach to spreading the "word" Islam grew like
wild-fire, reaching out from the Saudi Arabian Peninsula in all directions.
This early growth is what the Muslims call the "First" great Jihad and it
met with little resistance until Charles Martel of France, the father of
Charlemagne, stopped them in the battle of Tours in France, after they had
firmly established Islam on the Iberian Peninsula. This first onslaught
against the West continued in various forms and at various times until Islam
was finally driven out of Spain in 1492 at the battle of Granada.

The "Second Great Jihad" came with the Ottoman Turks. This empire succeeded
in bringing about the downfall of Constantinople as a Christian stronghold
and an end to Roman hegemony in all of its forms. The Ottoman Empire was
Islam's most successful expansion of territory even though the religion
itself had fractured into warring sects and bitter rivalries with each
claiming the ultimate truths in "the ways of the Prophet". By 1683 the
Ottomans had suffered a series of defeats on both land and sea and the
final, unsuccessful attempt to capture Vienna set the stage for the collapse
of any further territorial ambitions and Islam shrunk into various
sheikhdoms, emir dominated principalities, and roving tribes of nomads.
However, by this time a growing anti-western sentiment, blaming its internal
failures on anyone but themselves, was taking hold and setting the stage for
a new revival known as Wahhabism, a sect which came into full bloom under
the House of Saud on the Arabian Peninsula shortly before the onset of WWI.
It is this Wahhabi version of Islam which has infected the religion itself,
now finding adherents in almost all branches and sects, especially the
Shiites.

Wahhabiism calls for the complete and total rejection or destruction of
anything and everything which is not based in the original teachings of The
Prophet and finds its most glaring practice in the policies of the Afghani
Taliban or the Shiite practices of the late Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran. Its
Ali Pasha (Field Marshall) is now known as Osama bin Laden, the leader of
the "Third Jihad", who is Wahhabi as were his 9/11 attack teams, 18 of which
were also Saudi.

The strategy for this "holy war" did not begin with the planning of the
destruction of the World Trade Center. It began with the toppling of the
Shah of Iran back in the late 1970's. With his plans and programs to
"westernize" his country, along with his close ties to the U.S. and subdued
acceptance of the State of Israel, the Shah was the soft target. Remember
"America Held Hostage"?

Thanks, in large part to the hypocritical and disastrous policies of the
Jimmy Carter State Department, the revolution was set into motion, the Shah
was deposed, his armed forces scattered or murdered and stage one was
complete. The Third Jihad now had a base of operations and the oil wealth to
support its grand design or what they call the "Great Caliphate".

What this design calls for is the replacement of all secular leadership in
any country with Muslim majorities. This would include, Egypt, Turkey,
Pakistan, Indonesia, all the Emirates, Sudan, Tunisia, Libya, Algeria,
Morocco, Yemen, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Malaysia, Indonesia and finally what
they call the "occupied territory" Israel.

As a part of this strategy, forces of the jihad will infiltrate governments
and the military as a prelude to taking control, once the secular leadership
is ousted or assassinated. Such was the case in Lebanon leading to the
Syrian occupation and in Egypt with the murder of Anwar Sadat, along with
the multiple attempts on the lives of Hussein in Jordan, Mubarak of Egypt
and Musharraf in Pakistan. Pakistan is a particular prize because of its
nuclear weapons. (Please note al Qaeda call for the Islamic-militant
overthrow of Musharraf in Pakistan on March 25, just yesterday.)

The long-range strategy of the Third Jihad counts on three strategic goals.
First, the U.S. withdrawing from the region just as it did in Southeast
Asia, following Vietnam. Second, taking control of the oil wealth in the
Muslim countries, which would be upwards to 75% of known reserves; third,
using nuclear weapons or other WMDs to annihilate Israel. A further outcome
of successfully achieving these objectives would be to place the United
Nations as the sole arbiter in East/West negotiations and paralyze western
resistance, leading to total withdrawal from all Islamic dominated countries
Evidence of the Bush Administration awareness of this plan is found in the
events immediately following the 9/11 attack. The administration's first
move was to shore up Pakistan and Egypt, believing that these two would be
the next targets for al Qaeda, while Americans focused on the disaster in
New York. The administration also knew that the most important objective was
to send a loud and clear message that the U.S. was in the region to stay,
not only to shore up our allies but to send a message to the Jihadists.

The attack on Afghanistan was necessary to break-up a secure al Qaeda base
of operations and put their leadership on the run or in prison.
The war in Iraq also met a very strategic necessity in that no one knew how
much collaboration existed between Saddam Hussein and the master planners of
the Third Jihad or Hussein's willingness to hand off WMDs to terrorist
groups including the PLO in Israel. What was known were serious indications
of on-going collaboration as Saddam funneled money to families of suicide
bombers attacking the Israelis and others in Kuwait.
What the U.S. needed to establish was a significant base of operations smack
dab in the middle of the Islamic world, in a location which effectively cut
it in half. Iraq was the ideal target for this and a host of other strategic
reasons.

Leadership of various anti-American groups both here and abroad understood
the vital nature of the Bush initiative and thus launched their
demonstrations, world-wide, to "Stop The War". Failing this, they also laid
plans to build a political campaign inside the country, with the War in Iraq
as a plebiscite, using a little known politician as the thrust point--Howard
Dean. This helps to explain how quickly the Radical Left moved into the Dean
campaign with both people and money, creating what the clueless media called
the "Dean Phenomenon".

By building on the left-wing base in the Democrat party and the "Hate Bush"
crowd, the campaign has already resulted in a consensus among the aspirants,
minus Joe Lieberman, to withdraw the U.S. from Iraq and turn the operation
over to the U.N. And, if past is prologue, i.e., Vietnam, once the U.S.
leaves it will not go back under any circumstances, possibly even the
destruction of Israel.

Should George W. Bush be defeated in November we could expect to see the
dominoes start to fall in the secular Islamic countries and The Clash of
Civilizations, predicted several years ago by Samuel Huntington, would then
become a life changing event in all of our lives.

What surprised the Jihadists following the 9/11 attack was how American
sentiment mobilized around the president and a profound sense of patriotism
spread across the country. They were not expecting this reaction, based on
what had happened in the past, nor were they expecting the determined
resolve of the President himself. I also believe this is one of the reasons
we have not had any further attacks within our borders. They are content to
wait, just as one of their tactical mentors; V.I. Lenin admonished... "two
steps forward, one step back".

A couple additional events serve as valuable footnotes to the current
circumstances we face: the destruction of the human assets factor of the CIA
during the Carter presidency, presided over by the late Senator Frank
Church. This fact has plagued our intelligence agencies right up to this
very day with consequences which are now obvious. And, Jimmy Carter himself,
the one man who must bear the bulk of the responsibility for setting the
stage of the Third Jihad. Americans should find little comfort in how the
Democrat contenders constantly seek the "advice and counsel" of this
despicable little hypocrite.

Lastly, we should not expect to see any meaningful cooperation from Western
Europe, especially the French. Since failing to protect their own interests
in Algeria (by turning the country over to the first of the Arab terrorists,
Ammad Ben Bella), the country itself is now occupied by Islamic immigrants
totaling twenty percent of the population.

We are in the battle of our lives, a battle which will go on for many years
possibly even generations. If we fail to understand what we are facing or
falter in the challenge of "knowing our enemy" the results will be
catastrophic. Imagine a world where al Qaeda regimes control 75% of the
world's oil, have at their disposal nuclear weapons, legions of willing
suicide soldiers, and our national survival is dependent on the good graces
of Kofi Annan and the United Nations.

There is one final footnote which may be the scariest of all. Either none of
the Democrats currently leading the drive to their party's nomination are
aware of the facts of the Great Caliphate and Third Jihad or they do know
and they don't care so long as their power lust is satisfied. But, I can
guarantee you one thing for sure: some of their most ardent supporters are
aware of this and will do anything they can to bring it about.

Larry Abraham
January 29, 2004

Jerry Trent comments: Note....this was written before John Kerry had the
nomination sewed up...but recent events clearly demonstrate that Kerry is
going to fulfill Abraham's prediction of the Democrats calling for the UN
and the French/Germans/Spain coalition to force the US out of Iraq. Also
understand that the current 9/11 hearings are a political show, and Clarke's
book were timed for these hearings and the campaign. And this is why
Condoleezza Rice is seeking a private meeting with this commission to tell
it like it is. The national security issues involved around 9/11 cannot be
an open book to the public, and I believe we have to understand that.

This is scary stuff. President Bush and the Republicans are obviously
extremely cautious in bringing this issue to the campaign because the
left-leaning media and the Kerry Democratic left would call this racist
against Islam and a distraction for the alleged lies of WMD and our reasons
for going into Iraq. Bush correctly referred to the axis of evil (Iran,
Libya, Iraq and North Korea) as a pointed strategy to blunt the
WMD-terrorist movement and he has been very successful in thwarting al
Qaeda, despite what everyone on the left says. We are far better off without
the threat from Iraq and Libya -- all within the last 12 months. We are
threatened in Pakistan and if Musharraf is assassinated (it's been tried
several times in the past year), we can see how the militants will gain
control of Pakistan's nuclear weapons, which have already spread to Iran (by
a militant Islamic scientist) and if Musharraf is taken out we have both
Iran and Pakistan as militant Islamic power bases armed with nuclear
weapons. And let's not overlook Abraham's issue about the potential for
militant Islamic states who would control 75% of the world's oil.

This probably why Dick Cheney, Rice, Powell, and Wolfowitz are so committed
to the belief that we are in this struggle for the free world as we have
known it and focused on defeating the militant Islamic al Qaeda's global
strategy. They skirt the core issues raised by Abraham in this article
because of the political-correctness implications, but after reading this,
you understand what is at stake here.

Kerry and the liberal Democrats want control of Washington at any price.
Abraham clearly spells out what price that is: Victory for al Qaeda and the
Islamic militancy.

Abraham's article brought all of these issues together and why it is
important for us to gain this perspective and educate our friends and
associates.