Latest Atrocity Proves This War Is Religious

The Sydney Morning Herald ^ | June 21, 2004 | Paul Sheehan

[quidnunc]

Paul Johnson jnr was butchered for you. Pictures of his decapitated body, with his severed head on his chest, were posted on the internet in the early hours of Saturday (Sydney time) for your benefit. So was the message that "the infidel got his fair treatment".

You were the target. The symbolism was carefully considered. The 49-year-old American civilian, kidnapped in Saudi Arabia, was dressed in an orange jumpsuit similar to those worn by prisoners of the US military in Guantanamo Bay. The method of execution was also considered for maximum impact.

The images were quickly placed on the internet to leverage the enormous power of the mass media, to instil fear, to intimidate enemies, to enlist recruits for the global conflict now underway. In this conflict, violence flows through the old barriers created by borders, armies, codes of honour.

For such murderers, respect for international law is a weakness to be exploited. Who needs armies or military victories when murder and the mass media can cast so long a shadow?

We are not in a "war against terror". That is US Government spin. Stripped down to its basics, beneath all the rhetoric, we are witnessing a religious war, the one foreshadowed by professors Philip Jenkins and Samuel Huntington.

We also have the benefit of a recent dispatch from the incomparable Robert Kaplan of The Atlantic Monthly, author of many books but most notably The Coming Anarchy, published five years ago.

Kaplan went with the US Marines when they launched an assault on the Iraqi city of Fallujah on April 5 (five days after four American civilians were dismembered by a mob in the city). He attended the final briefings on the eve of battle, when issues were compressed to their fundamentals:

"Gents, let me tell you what this is really about," said Lieutenant-Colonel Brennan Byrne. "It's about killing shitheads. The CG [Commanding General] has changed the Op Order from 'capture or kill' the enemy to 'kill or capture'. He wants the emphasis on 'kill'.

"You'll be facing interesting folk. Guys who fought in Grozny, in Afghanistan, guys who aren't all that interested in giving up. I made everyone grow moustaches for the sake of cultural sensitivity when we left Kuwait. Now I want you to shave them off. We're going on the offensive."

Kaplan continued: "Byrne stood up, signalling the end of the briefing. Everyone else stood up and shouted, 'Ooh-rah!'."

-snip-

[Cronos]

Are you Zoroastrian then? A true Irani should be a Zoroastrian/Nestorian Christian, not following a religion that was forced on the Persian people when they were conquered byArabs.

[Cronos]

I dunno I thought we could just nuke the place, but your idea seems ok too.

[Cronos]

No worries, we'll have a CAtholic-Orthodox-Baptist-Armenian-Coptic-Assyrian-Syrian-Lutheran kirk there.

[muawiyah]

It wasn't exactly "forced" on them. What had happened is the Persians had earlier brutally conquered a chunk of the Middle East. The Arabs arrived on the scene in the nick of millenial time frames and tossed them out.

The Persian leadership elite was no more popular among the Persian people than it had been among the conquered people.

At the time, the religion adjustment was a minor issue (all things considered).

[Cronos]

What had happened is the Persians had earlier brutally conquered a chunk of the Middle East. The Arabs arrived on the scene in the nick of millenial time frames and tossed them out.

Not really. The Persians were not the brutal conquerors you make them out to be. Cyrus the Great was pretty benevolent to the Jews you know. The Assyrians were cruel and so were the Babylonians. The Persians conquered them and then conquered Egypt. however, they were then knocked out by the Eastern Roman Empire. The Persians at the time of theArab invasion was Iraq eastwards, not Arabia.

The REligious readjustment was a major issue as Iranis were Zoroastrians, not people of the book (Jews and Christians) and could be slaughtered and were slaughtered like the Hindus were a bit later on.

[muawiyah]

You need to bring the Persians forward to 228AD, at least, and notice that Mithrism is the dominant religion at the time. This was when the Sassanid period began. The Parthian's preceeded them. They were not nice people.

Please bring the Arabs back in time to the 600s (7th Century).

In 651 the Arabs beat up on the Persians big time.

Islam replaced Mithrism. It also replaced Judaism in many places. To a degree it replaced Christianity.