Fjordman responds to critics who say that he writes good analyses, but doesn't say anything about what should be done about the problems at hand, by offering some superb Recommendations for the West at Gates of Vienna.
In doing so, as you'll see, he often draws upon the recommendations made here at Jihad Watch by our own Hugh Fitzgerald, the Vice President of the Jihad Watch Board of Directors.
Thank you Robert for alerting us about the article..
Great article, I would like to see more studies which address the potential muslim reactions to strict controls over them. Most of us regulars understand the impact, additional riots, acts of terrorism and sudden jihad syndrome just to name a few. I don’t think a scholarly study has been done that addresses what steps will be necessary to handle the increase in violence, especially on a global scale. I am a firm believer in the saying “violence begets violence” although I do think it is controllable. At some point civilized man must address the muslim menace and its potential to destroy civilization as we know it. An islamic world would not be an improvement, it would amount to global slavery and mankind being trapped in a very restrictive, narrow box. Mankind would suffer globally, resources would also suffer, population growth, limits on education especially in hard sciences and restrictions on personal freedoms would just be the tip of the iceberg.
The US is blessed in the fact our own muslim population although growing has only a limited power base. With the possible exception of parts of Michigan our police agencies would quickly round up suspects in any mass muslim attacks, like the riots in Europe. The problem would be the lengthy trails and the costs of the prosecution. The power of islam here in the us is backed only by muslims themselves and a growing number of liberal haters of the democratic processes which grant them some measure of control. Muslims in the US do not have any political power except for protections granted to all citizens of America and what favors they are granted by politicians and business leaders seeking a monetary reward from them.
Does the USA have a responsibility to help the rest of the world protect itself or should we become isolationists and wall ourselves in while Europe, Africa and the rest of the world falls under the sword of islam?
Have studies been conducted which addressed the impact of partner nations which could experience religious indoctrination and the impact it will have on the sharing of information? Will military exercises and the cooperation of intelligence agencies even be possible with muslim controlled Europe? Our main western allies are already under attack, England, Australia and Canada, all countries we traditionally share information with. Will we trust them ten years from now? Should we?
These issues will have to be addressed and populations will have to decide on individual freedom or the restrictions of a controlling gang of mullahs. They will also have to decide if we will walk peacefully into the veil or fight with every ounce of our being. I see very few academics working on any of these issues, probably out of fear of personal injury and partially because the threat is so massive it takes years of study to understand it. To those few who do attempt to warn the populace of the existence of a growing global threat, I salute your courage and will do what little I can to aid your efforts.
A brilliant essay. Here’s another prediction. Fjordman makes the case that the welfare state is probably doomed, I agree, but it won’t happen for a while. During the transformation from the welfare state to whatever comes next, the already high tax rates will be raised and productivity will be further punished.
In 2006, there exists another, less reported migration trend. Waves of Americans and Europeans are deciding to re-locate in the Panama’s, Costa Rica’s, and Belize’s of the world. Local governments love the influx of cash and jobs. For the retirees, it’s largely about lifestyle; for businessmen, it’s all about taxes. Neither group misses the social safety net that they were compelled to buy into in the ‘old country’. Both groups enjoy the greater degrees of freedom.
By the time the smoke clears in the US, a successful business owner pays over half of his earnings to the government. In the place I occasionally work down south that number is closer to 7%. Aside from the hippies, most of the expatriates you meet down there are pretty accomplished people.
Taxes re-distribute income, but they also re-distribute people. If the ‘democratically elected’ governments of the future decide to impose still higher taxes on the productive part of society to pay for more social benefits, the targets of the new laws have an option, they can leave. More native-born Americans left California than arrived for the first time in, I think 2003, and the trend continues (U-Haul records). The same thing can happen on a national level.
If the unsustainable trends that our brave politicians have introduced lead to Fjordman’s logical conclusions, watch Central America. A sad thought, but as long as the article brings up civil war, it makes sense to think about what might precede it.
Another excellent contribution from Fjordman, whose work is always very incisive. As a reformed, reconstructed and repentant ex-leftist, I am in agreement with nearly all of what he says, and I'm sure that his criticism of multiculturalism rings true to most of those who post on Jihadwatch, myself included, although I would say that in the multicultural ethos there is a baby that should be kept as well as a great deal of very dirty bathwater that should be discarded, but since my time is limited right now, I'll save my thoughts on this for some other time, perhaps in another thread. There's no doubt whatever that a great many forces on the Left, as well as some on the right, which Fjordman makes note of, have treasured and preserved this fermenting bathwater and used it to produce a lot of very unsavory plant life that yields some very rotten fruit, when it should have been discarded a long time ago.
A few things that his recommendations did not directly include - perhaps he meant to imply them in what he did say - but that should be included is the exclusion of Muslims from the military, police and security agencies of western nations, or at least a downgrading of their service to roles wherein they can not compromise public or state security), from public office, and from certain professions, such as teaching. This will seem harsh, but it is the same principle that during certain periods of the Cold War excluded those with connections to Communist parties and the far left. No matter how sincere, honest and principalled such people are - as some may be - they simply are not suited to such roles when their views and affiliations put them in such clear association with the nation's enemies. We can view it this way: would it have made sense during World War II to have members of Nazi-sympathisizing parties serving in the armed forces of the Allied nations? Civil libertarians and other human rights boosters have to simply be given to understand that these things are the necesary, if regrettable, cost of security during times of major conflict.
Finally, Fjordman is right that relations with China and Russia are difficult, and I am glad to see him note that this need not mean they must be our enemies, but I would take it further: we can and should, try to get them on board as military allies. But these nations have their own Muslims to worry about, and Russia in particular has good reason to be very alarmed about that right at this moment. Western diplomacy should make clear to nations like China and Russia, that if containment of Islam fails, and the Muslim world is actually stupid enough to continue to provoke us to full-scake war, their best interests are served not only by not standing in our way but by actively helping us eliminate this scourge once and for all.
Woops! Typing error: "But these nations..." (third paragraph) should have been "Both these nations ..."
Fjordman needs to be required reading in every Western capital. He is 100% right-we need a cultural couterrevolution to reverse five decades of mindless leftism that has brought us to our current woeful state. Containment will work once such a counterrevolution takes place because profiling and deportations and border control will finally be considered as the best and proper tools to root out terrorists and traitors and to keep them out. Once that's accomplished the Islamaniacs can whine all they like and kill one another in their disputes about who's the most pious Muslim.
I object to Fjordmann's application of "useful idiot" to "right wing libertarians" and big business. They are the "greedy idiots". The useful idiots are the leftwing moonbats like Cindy Sheehan and Rosie O'Donnell.
It makes me laugh how the Muslims love to say that theirs is the fastest growing religion, and it's true - but why? Take Bangladesh for example, in 1975 it had 75 million people (incl. 10 million Hindus) in 2006 latest government census shows 159 million (and there's still only 10 million Hindus)!!!!! There has been a similar population explosion in Iran. Now take a relatively poor Christian country that's just slightly bigger than Bangladesh: Uruguay, in 1975 it had 2.8 million people, in 2006 it's got 3.2 million people.
Yes, Islam is the fastest growing religion and by 2050 there will be no more oil and they won't be able to feed themselves! Then that will be the job of the "Satanic" West.
Fjordman is correct that "Perhaps we will need to resolve the war within the West before we can win the war against the West" -- though his "Perhaps" is an odd enervator: we cannot deal with the Problem of Islam unless we first deal with the Problem of PC.
Where Fjordman begins to falter more seriously is his diagnosis of the Problem of PC:
"...[multiculturalism] is also championed by groups with a hidden agenda. Multiculturalism serves as a tool for ruling elites to fool people, to keep them from knowing that they have lost, or deliberately vacated, control over national borders. Leftists who dislike Western civilization use Multiculturalism to undermine it, a hate ideology disguised as tolerance."
Fjordman's multiculturalism is a tool being used by nefarious and obtuse elites; but I would suggest that PC multiculturalism is a much broader deeper problem, affecting the culture that surrounds these elites, the culture in which these elites flourish is itself already PC, they simply take advantage of its givens, and in doing so, they are semi-consciously acting with the general flow; they are not nefariously manipulating spider webs of influence against all us hapless, ordinary, non-"elite" Jihad Watchers: in fact, we Jihad Watchers are the "elite" minority going against the grain of the predominant PC culture.
Fjordman is right on the money. But reading it, gave me a sense of elation mixed in with bloody reality. Kind of like the build up to a bad blind date.
What Europeans are willing, what Americans have the guts, vision and stamina?
One thing you can say about Muslims -- they're moving, doing, yes conniving -- motivated! Are we like the Dutch, too worried about our comfort to give a damn?
The most important point he makes is having as little as possible to do with Muslim countries. This has been the fatal mistake of the Bush administration and many European countries. Aid should be withdrawn immediately from the Palestinians whose corrupt leaders have robbed their people blind and are merely using the Palestinians as poster children of victimhood. If you remove the Muslim victim card by disengagement with those countries, you force the populations to examine their own corrupt governments and regimes more closely. You also pull the rug out from under the feet of much of the so called "Left."