Western Victories Over Islamic Hordes

11/14/02 | Sparta

[PeoplesRepublicOfWashington]

Churchill would be a nice guy to have on the world scene right now.

[Wombat101]

Thank you for the correction...I had forgotten...

[xJones]

Isn't it wonderful? Just when the Cold War was over, the Islamists attacked.

[billybudd]

First of all, it's spelled "hordes". Yes, in the minds of many Arabs, there is still some sort of antagonism between Islam and the West. However, we don't think that way. We couldn't care less about Islam, the religion. We only want to defend ourselves from being attacked again. So, from our point of view, there is no sense in calling the war a religious war - we're not fighting about religious beliefs, we're fighting about self-preservation.
Now, about your contention that the West doesn't comprehend the terms of battle. The United States has the most powerful military in the world. The next most powerful are in Europe. If we were fighting wars in the same spirit they were fought 1000 years ago, we could wipe out all Islamic countries in the blink of an eye. But of course, we won't do that. That's my point - that the current conflict has nothing to do with past conflicts. The battles of the past have nothing to do with the terrorism of the present.

[RLK]

Perhaps we do not live in the same solar system. We don't seem to have visited the same reality.

[Burdened White Man]

I have no problem with Muslims per se, I just I have a problem with those who want to kill me because of my religion and those who deny religion is not a cause of the problem. If they are a religion of peace, they need to show examples of this and denounce the terrorists openly and honestly.

Couldn't agree with you more! The big problem I have with American Muslims is I've seen no evidence that they are not secretly rejoicing in their Mosques whenever a terrorist strikes. I don't trust them in our midst.

[Sparta]

The big problem I have with American Muslims is I've seen no evidence that they are not secretly rejoicing in their Mosques whenever a terrorist strikes. I don't trust them in our midst.

Couldn't agree with you more.

[RLK]

Rome regularly defeated desert armies (Carthage, Egypt, Assyria, etc).

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That would be a major point except Mohammad wasn't born until 500 years later.

[MattinNJ]

Your absolutely right. I cannot believe that Thermopylae is not required reading by 9th grade. If those 300 Spartans (and 3,000 other assorted Greeks) hadn't held, there would not have been a Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Alexander, etc...The Romans never would have been able to build on what the Greeks accomplished and there would have been no Renaissance because there would have been no Western Civilization in the first place. Last but not least, no Romans, no USA. Allbecause Lenidas had the testicular fortitude to tell the Persian "Molon Labe".

[Wombat101]

You assume the Cold War actually ended.IMHO it didn't - what we're seeing now is the aftermath of the Soviet Union's collapse. These new conflicts are things that WOULD have happened if the competing superpowers had allowed them. These guys were all clients of one side or the other, and we held them on a pretty short leash. Add to this fact that the real hotspots today were former Soviet clients that bought into and adapted Soviet ideology to their own circumstances. Now that Soviet ideology is as dead a Lenin himself, these people are pissed off. Since no one likes to take blame for making a bad decision, they're trying to pass the buck onto someone else -- the Westerners who made the RIGHT ideological decisions. Just an opinion, and probably poorly expressed, but there it is.

[billybudd]

I just can't believe how ignorant of history you are and, moreover, how boldly you make your incorrect assertions. The West was "tolerant" and Islam was "unaccepting"? Hahahahaha! It's more like the other way around, if there was any tolerance (everyone was intolerant in the middle ages). Please, read up on your history, and don't just rely on random factoids about Lepanto to give you an aura of knowledgeability. By the way, none of what you said answers my main point, that the "West" vs. "Islam" conflict of today bears no relation to the conflicts of the past.

[jdege]

The religion of Islam is only being used as ideological propaganda to support the Arabic rulers' ambitions.

I don't see that. In fact, what's noticable about modern Islam, and why we're having problems now, when we haven't for so many years, is the idea, created by Sayyid Qutb, that the Arab rulers were the enemy, as well as the West.

Osama, et al., are out to rid the Arab world of its current leadership, fully as much as they are out to destroy the West.

[MoGalahad]

Is Daniel Pipes an expert on World History? The statement that you agree with has significant subjectiveness in it. Beware of what you believe; ideas have power.

[Sparta]

In Louisiana, we got to world history in 10th grade and spent only a few weeks on Ancient Greece. We spent almost an entire semister on Islam.

[Wombat101]

My remarks had nothing to do with Islamic armies, I was referring to ARAB armies. I'm perfectgly aware of when Mohammaed was whelped, thank you.

[Ann Archy]

There was a great big, loooong article this morning on FR on Mohammadism and the wars!! Verrry interestng.

[xJones]

I don't assume that the Cold War ended, it's just the exchange of names of one campaign for now another.

[MoGalahad]

So the pot calls the kettle black! Since when did you become an expert on Islamic culture or are you just parroting the party line?