[VanDeKoik]

The Crusades were a frigging joke.

They wrecked more Christian nations than Islamic.

They barely took the Holy Land, and we are talking about an area barely the size of Portugal.

They didnt hold it for very long.

But for some reason it’s seen as the ISIS of the 12 century.

[Lent]

I agree. They turned on Christendom itself. The fourth Crusade attacked the seat of the Eastern Church Constantinople, looted it and destroyed parts of it. This likely helped eventually the Muslim Turks successful victory years later.

[Sans-Culotte]

The Crusades were a frigging joke.

The First Crusade was pretty successful.

[SVTCobra03]

"The invasion of Christian territory, Muslim persecution of native Christians and pilgrims, plus the threat posed to the Christian Byzantine Empire, were all legitimate reasons to engage in defensive warfare and, and Bl. Pope Urban II cited them as justification for the First Crusade. And so in 1095, at the Council of Clermont, the pope preached an armed pilgrimage to recover the lost Christian territory of the East and specifically the Holy City of Jerusalem.

Urban viewed the Crusade as a pilgrimage, the aim of which was not to conquer but to visit the place of pilgrimage and then return home. Later popes maintained the understanding of the Crusades as just, defensive wars with the central goal of the recovery of ancient Christian territory. Heroic men and women of faith, rooted in love of Christ and neighbor, undertook the Crusades as acts of self-defense and recovery of stolen property. This is the proper understanding of these important events in Church history."

http://www.catholic.com/blog/steve-weidenkopf/were-the-crusades-just-wars