It's hard to win a war when people on our side repeat the claim that there is no war at all, but only "misunderstandings".

I am totally convinced that if the Western world rises up and realizes the threat Islam poses for the civilized world, we will win the war.

Posted by: Crusader at February 26, 2008 8:48 AM

What if, thirty years ago, or forty, the American government had seen Islam as something other than a "bulwark against Communism"? What if the ARAMCO-funded view of Saudi Arabia, that view taken apart so unforgettably by J. B. Kelly in his "Encounter" essay "Of Valuable Oil and Worthless Policies," had not had such a long run? What if the American government had consulted with real experts on Islam, and not with those at the level of the ambassadors-to-Arab-countries who could be assured of Arab largesse, provided for after their retirement, as long as they continued to be "friends of Arabia" and defenders of Islam (by carefully avoiding the subject of Islam), as long as they curried favor, in word and deed, with the Arabs while they were still in office?

What would American energy policy had been like if the most powerful lobby in Washington, the Saudi lobby, had not been able to buy up so many government officials, with Prince Bandar himself openly discussing the method of pre-emptive dangling of post-retirement benefits, and businessmen (contracts in the Gulf dangled before them), journalists, and those called nowadays "academics," who found homes close to centers of power at both the Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding and the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, both carefully placed at nearby Georgetown. Assorted mearsheimers and walts, who pay no attention to what really matters, or who really has power, and who seem indifferent to the catastrophic absence of an intelligent energy policy for the past forty years, will not be capable of taking in this idea, so comically fixated are they on the supposed machinations of the "Israel lobby" -- but others will realize that if global warming cannot be controlled, that will in large part be because, for many decades, the government of the United States had no sensible energy policy, refused to tax gasoline as it should have (and then to use the proceeds to build nuclear reactors, subsidize solar and wind power in their nascent state, and permanently subsidize mass transit), because it was determined to put all of its faith in its "staunch ally Saudi Arabia" and focussed its attention merely on getting Saudi Arabia to "moderate" oil prices (a total fiction, based on a misunderstanding of how the Saudis calculated the price that maximized their total return over time) instead of recognizing that, both in order to head off environmental catastrophe, and to diminish the Money Weapon that is the chief instrument of Jihad, gasoline had to be taxed, oil had to be taxed, and the revenues of such taxes had to be used to diminish the use of fossil fuels.

And what if, back in 1967, or earlier, the Israelis had dared to recognize the Arab attempt to disguise the Lesser Jihad as a "nationalist" struggle of "two tiny peoples," carefully "constructing" that "Palestinian" identity that has become such a hot academic topic, as if the "construction of that identity" were not politically premeditated but in truth a natural outgrowth, something that just happened to correspond to certain events, such as the Six-Day War, in the Lesser Jihad against Isael.

What would have happened to the immigration polices in force in Western Europe, if the politial and media elites had listened to those who knew Islam best -- such people as Charles-Emmanuel Dufourcq, for example? What if they had not simply believed that Muslim immigrants posed no special problems, were just like, say, Hindo or Chinese immigrants, with the language problems and other problems of adjustment to a new socidety, when the problem posed by what entered, undeclared, in the mental baggage of Muslim immigrants would in the end lead to much greater unpleasantness, physical insecurity, and expense, for every single Infidel land into which Muslims have been allowed to enter, and settle, in numbers large enough (and they need not be very large) to embolden them to attempt, repeatedly and unembarrassedly, to make demands for all sorts of changes, little and big, in the political and legal institutions, and social arrangements, of the Infidel lands themselves, insofar as those political and legal institutions and social arrangements are flatly contradicted by both the letter and the spirit of the Holy Law of Islam, the Shari'a.

What would have happened to that pitiful energy policy of the world's most important energy-consuming state? What would have happened to all that vain peace-processing, the stuff of which dennis-rosses and aaron-millers are maede, but that do nothing to lessen the Arab war against Israel, but have done much to whet Arab appetites and to convince the Slow Jihadists that they have much to gain by the softly-softly approach that the hotheaded Fast Jihadists of still do not understand? What would have happened to the countries of Western Europe, did Germany not have millions of Turks, Great Britain more than a million Pakistanis, France five million maghrebins, the Netherlands not have a manageable 15,000 Muslims in 1970 balloon into more than a million Muslims today?

What would have happened, had we all -- the United States, Israel, the countries of Western Europe -- known enough about what is in the Qur'an, Hadith, and Sira, and understood that Islam is not only, or mainly, a "religion" as we use that world, but a Total System, a Politics-and-a-Religion-and-a-Social-Code, a Total System whose workings-out, in history, can be seen over 1350 years, in the conquest, and subsequent subjugation, of all manner of non-Muslims.

What would have happened, had we all....only known?

Posted by: Hugh at February 26, 2008 9:02 AM

Crusader,

So true. Its not that we dont have the means the win, we dont have dont have the will.

Posted by: Elric66 at February 26, 2008 9:05 AM

Then we must all do our part to stir their will.

Posted by: undaunted at February 26, 2008 9:13 AM

It's wrong to shout "FIRE!" in a crowded theater ... only when there is no fire.

Posted by: undaunted at February 26, 2008 9:15 AM

What if the West had responded to the Arab oil embargo as the act of war that it was?

What if the European powers had left the Ottoman empire's remnants to rot and to squabble among themselves instead of taking them as colonies? Would the Europeans have welcomed the Islamists who had made war on Europe for centuries?

What if the Versailles conference had had a different outcome? Would Hitler have been able to rise to power? Without Hitler, would Germany have been reduced to rubble?

What if Jimmy Carter had never been elected president? Would Ayatollah Khomeini have died in exile in France?

Why do so many people insist that these acts of terrorism must be dealt with in criminal courts? Surely events subsequent to the first WTC bombing have shown the futility of this path, but we continue blindly along.

Posted by: PMK at February 26, 2008 9:22 AM

It's called: THEY STILL REFUSE TO READ THE KORAN.

Posted by: profitsbeard at February 26, 2008 9:35 AM

Hmm, it's always a pleasure - and an education - to read your comments and essays Hugh, but I'm no fan of "what if" thinking. What we have we are stuck with and we need to solve it or we'll perish. Lamenting over past ina ctions won't help.

I think this "they are blind" canard is false. I think the problem - and I mean THE problem - is that the US ran out of oil and is now dependent on its enemies for its energy needs.

That the US consumes so much energy is its Achilles Heel. The whole economy - as 1973 clearly demonstrated - can be brought crashing down by our enemies.

It is the same for the EU as well. My point is that our leaders know full well what Islam is about but as they are dependent for oil from OPEC they have to appease, to comply, to dance with the enemy.

For those who think the US and the EU should just go and take the oil by force, well maybe it will come to that at some point. But there's no way the Russians, Chinese, Iranians, Pakistanis, Indians, will just sit back and watch.

The position of the US is similar to that of a crack addict. The more addicted to the crack the user becomes, the more power the pusher has and the more desperate the addict's situation becomes.

Unless the addict finds a way to break out of the sprial of addiction...

Posted by: Britannia's Lion at February 26, 2008 9:39 AM

Clinton speaking fees. Source at link at my name.

Jan. 17, 2002 Dubai, UAE The Dabbagh Group (STARS) $300,000
Jan. 18, 2002 Cairo, Egypt Future Generation Foundation $175,000
Jan. 20, 2002 Jeddah, Saudi Arabia The Dabbagh Group (Jeddah Economic Forum) $300,000
June 11, 2002 Dubai, UAE The American University in Dubai $150,000 Speech transcript
July 6, 2002 Istanbul, Turkey Ahmet San Productions, TUSIAD $250,000
Nov. 28, 2005 Dubai, UAE Leading Minds $125,000

Captain Renault: I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!
[a croupier hands Renault a pile of money]
Croupier: Your winnings, sir.
Captain Renault: [sotto voce] Oh, thank you very much.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034583/quotes

Posted by: Old Atlantic at February 26, 2008 9:43 AM

The linked article ends with the following:

back in 1990, evidence of the paramilitary effort, and the evidence recovered from Nosair’s car, were somehow not enough to signal a broad conspiracy. Neither, apparently, were the 47 boxes of documents, photographs, ballistics, and other items seized by police searching Nosair’s home and locker at work. It would take time to translate much of the Arabic-language evidence that was recovered, but one would have had to go very far out of one’s way to miss the plain fact that Nosair was hardly an independent actor. And yet the authorities went far out of their way to do just that. Long before anything approaching a competent investigation could have gotten to the bottom of things, Joseph Borelli, chief of detectives for the New York City Police Department (NYPD), announced that the shooting had been carried out by a “lone, deranged gunman.” As for the FBI, an unidentified official told the New York Times: “Either the man is a lone nut. Or he’s a lone nut and someone whispered something in his ear knowing he’d do it. Or there’s an enormous international conspiracy.” With an international conspiracy staring it in the face, the Bureau, too, went with the “lone nut” theory.

All recent episodes of "Sudden Jihad Syndrome" result with similar proclamations - within hours of said SJS. It appears that this determination is cemented policy.

Why?

Posted by: justamomof4 at February 26, 2008 9:44 AM

Thank you for the link to the article, a good read.

I am a fan of what is known as contrafactual history, where the road not taken, or certain events played out differently. This is not merely a sort of lament, but is to me an exercise in understanding history and the forces that shape it.

Perhaps, the article will touch some investigator, who will dig into the hard work of following such an open ended lead as was presented to the Kahane assassins investigators.

That is the main point of the article I believe, to prod better investigation. To not try to make such things go away by ignoring them never seems to me to be a very fruitful policy.

Posted by: stickman at February 26, 2008 10:25 AM

Sorry for being Unclear, my last line above should have read, To TRY to make such things go away by ignoring them never seems to me to
be a very fruitful policy.

Posted by: stickman at February 26, 2008 10:28 AM

Wow, first I've heard of McCarthy's new book. He is one of the few allowed mainstream access who gets it. I remember when he tore apart Monsoor Ijaz in an online debate about Islam a few years ago, great stuff.

Posted by: Bosch Fawstin at February 26, 2008 1:36 PM

Andrew McCarthy vs Monsoor Ijaz

Posted by: Bosch Fawstin at February 26, 2008 1:39 PM

Isn't this the same McCarthy that Romney hired in his last week to help on speech writing? Romney's final speech was great, and probably reflects McCarthy's input. McCain badly needs someone of this caliber. He should hire McCarthy. But he is probably too stubborn to admit that he needs help on Islam.

Posted by: Jimmy Bones at February 26, 2008 1:49 PM

Stickman

The problem I have with contrafactual history is that the circumstances from the past have changed dramtically. A solution that may have been prudent then - such as declaring the OPEC actions of '73 as an acy of war - certainly would not be prudent today.

Demographics, influence of marxism and over-population combined with a loss of cultural confidence in the west mean that finding solutions to today's issues aren't going to be found by "what if" lamentations IMHO.

We are faced with what we have. Sure, be mindful of history and the lessons we can learn. But we also have to be very aware of the present and that the circumstanbces we are faced with today may not be the circumstances we face tomorrow, next week, next month or next year.

We always choose. Once we choose one option, we bring about consequences - even when we choose not to act.

How we break this cycle of continually choosing appeasement is however a very, very difficult question. But I just don't buy this "they are ignorant/foolish" line. I think the wesr knows what Islam is about but is compromised.

It's a very very difficult situation the west is now in, no doubt about it.

Posted by: Britannia's Lion at February 26, 2008 4:52 PM

El-Sayyid Nossair shot Meir Kahane before 16 witnesses, then shot his way out of the room, wounding another man, ran out of the building, hijacked a cab at gunpoint, then jumped out of the cab and shot a Federal US Post Office cop point-blank, only a bullet-proof vest saving the officer's life - all this with the same murder weapon - and was then captured by the cop with the smoking gun in his hand, literally.
And yet, 12 New York cowards acquitted Nossair!
Judge Alvin Schlessinger was so disgusted with them, he publicly chastized them, saying their verdict was "devoid of logic and common sense". The 12 subanimals, shining their eyes at him out of that box, did not give a damn about logic or justice, they only cared about keeping their stinking, shivery hides alive. They knew damn well Nossair was murderer-terrorist, this is exactly why they acquitted him. They were scared sh...less that his comrades will find out where they live and go after them and their families.
They know who they are. They have the blood of 3,000 of their fellow Americans on their hands.
Meanwhile, cowardice continues. Cowardly American jurors keep acquitting jihadist after jihadist after jihadist in Tampa, Chicago, Dallas and Miami.

Ruslan Tokhchukov, EnragedSince1999.

Posted by: Enragedsince1999 at February 26, 2008 5:54 PM

Kahane's murderer was treated, lest memory fails me, as someone who had violated the Jewish rabbi's civil rights. The Islamic connection was only vaguely recognized--or not at all. It was the darn "Palestinian" problem--nothing to do with Islam, jihad, or anything going on in the United States.

Later, the dots were connected, but still no one dared shout out what they saw.

Hey, you don't want to see it, it's still coming for ya.

Live and learn or in this case don't.

Posted by: unicorns62000 at February 26, 2008 5:56 PM

Kahane's murderer was treated, lest memory fails me, as someone who had violated the Jewish rabbi's civil rights. The Islamic connection was only vaguely recognized--or not at all. It was the darn "Palestinian" problem--nothing to do with Islam, jihad, or anything going on in the United States.

Later, the dots were connected, but still no one dared shout out what they saw.

Hey, you don't want to see it, it's still coming for ya.

Live and learn or in this case don't.

Posted by: unicorns62000 at February 26, 2008 5:57 PM

"The problem I have with contrafactual history is that the circumstances from the past have changed dramtically. A solution that may have been prudent then - such as declaring the OPEC actions of '73 as an act of war - certainly would not be prudent today..."
-- from a posting above

You have misread what I wrote. I was not offering a wild "counterfactual history" as in "what if Columbus had never discovered America" sort. I was simply suggesting that had the American governmnet, or the Israeli government, or the governments in Western Europe, been staffed by people who had thought to look into the texts and tenets and history of Islam on their own, and thought to see things over a longer period than they were used to doing, then they would not have been so quick to view Islam merely as a "bulwark against Communism" and might have figured out what the sums OPEC states received would naturally, in part, be spent on.

Furthermore, I never suggested that the OPEC price rise be treated as an "act of war." I merely wrote that the Western world was in thrall to Saudi (and other Arab) money, and consequently did not come up with an energy plan that made sense. Thus the Money Weapon has not diminished because we have foolishly refused to tax gasoline and oil, in order to dampen demand and use the revenues to subsidize or pay for conservation and non-fossil-fuel sources of enerbvy (nuclear, solar, wind), If anthropogenic climate change proves irreversible and catastrophic, much of the blame is surely to be put on members of the Saudi lobby within the American government, a government that never understood the need to limit OPEC revenues, and never could quite see what was wrong with relying on "staunch ally" Saudi Arabia in lieu of an American energy policy.

Posted by: Hugh at February 26, 2008 6:35 PM

OK Hugh, fair points and I don't disgaree with them. But what I am saying is that we should be asking what if's about the situation we face now. Here's one such question:

What if the powers that be are in full knowledge of what they are doing, including with Islam?

Why is nobody asking this question? It seems that everyone believes the west is being led by fools who know nothing about Islam but I'm just not buying it.

Another one: What if there are people in our midst who are deliberately and knowingly trying to dismantle the west and all it stands for? E.g. The EU. Or even, the NAU.

You then mention AGW. As I understand it, there is no such thing as AGW. 400 scientists from the IPCC have strongly condemned the hyteria being created about this and are asserting that for the last decade, the earth has been cooling.

Another: What if AGW is yet another way to exert control over people and distract them from what is really happening?

One of the biggest problems facing the planet is over-population. This is a far greater threat to humanity than AGW. No one talks about it. Because one of the consequences of this is that the west is now becoming a dumping ground for excessive thrid-world populations, especially Europe and this is another reason why Islam is winning this war.

Demographics as has often been stated is one of the most effective weapons of jihad.

What if we fail to address this problem?

Posted by: Britannia's Lion at February 27, 2008 5:50 AM