Requiem for Europe

 

Europe has survived former presses by Islam and done so with great glory. The first was when the Crusades responded to the surging Muslim Arabs out of Arabia in the Holy Land. These surges into the Holy Lands with the intent and oft success in liberating lands and even Jerusalem may not have kept the lands from eventual Islamic ascendancy, but it did prevent the further surge of Islam into Europe. Constantinople had stood for years against the battering by Islamic forces with catapults, ballista and similar siege equipment but the walls built to withstand any attack of its day did exactly that and Constantinople withstood every barrage thrown at them. It was the eventual equipping the forces of Islam with the newest of weapons, the siege cannon (see picture below) which caused its fall. These were not any normal cannons nor did it throw normal cannonballs. The stone cannonballs weighed hundreds and hundreds of pounds (or kilos) which would bounce across the ground retaining most of their speed and eventually they brought down the walls that had stood since the height of the Roman Empire. The fall of Constantinople revealed the secret weapon of Islam, the renaming; so as to end the former period and reference and restart the history, making it purely Islamic with no reference to the glories of the past. Thus Constantinople was renamed Istanbul and as Istanbul the city had no former existence as a Roman or Byzantine city; Istanbul was purely Islamic while Constantinople now no longer existed in this new history.

 

 

Great Turkish Bombard Siege Cannon
Utilized by Mehmed II in his Siege
and Breaking of the Impenetrable
Great Walls of Constantinople

 

There was another assault on Europe from the west with the moors spilling across Spain into France, appearing to be unstoppable. The Moors simply ate up one city after another and another beating one force of Christian Europe after another. Finally a French army commanded by a German set a strategy to stop the Moors. Their plan was to not fight the main body of the Moors; they simply had forces meet the main body and slowly fall back allowing them to surge forward. The French main heavy horse cavalry swept in a wide arc around the main body and set down upon the camp and supply lines and destroyed the food and reserves of weapons and destroyed the supporting military mechanism and people, leaving the front unsupported. They then set upon the fight from the rear and succeeded in breaking their lines. With no support and no food or reserve troops, the Moors assault into France had been thwarted. The commander was Charles the Hammer Martel.

 

There were pushes from the West as well with one of the most famous coming and laying siege to Vienna. The city was holding but required that the siege be broken or the Islamic Turks would extend out of Istanbul (Constantinople) and set upon the rest of Italy and threaten Rome itself. One King offered to lead his entire armies and break the siege relieving Vienna and protecting Rome. There was a catch which he demanded a set of promises from every neighbor and king of every petty fiefdom to protect his borders and hold from attacking while his entire army led by him set forth across a thousand miles and relieve Vienna. The king was the ruler of Poland, King John III Sobieski and his forces broke the siege and liberated Vienna on September 11 and 12, 1683. This stalled the push into Europe and saved Europe once again.

 

Now Islam is making a new assault on Europe and the European leaders are actually inviting Islam into their nations as their negative population growth leaves there a demand for workers; and while the economies were healthy and demanding workers, things were great all around. The surging economy of twenty years finally ground to a doldrums where growth has slowed and the demand slackened and now the young Islamic population is finding there is little demand for their employ as hiring is at a standstill. Add to this the flooding of Syrian refugees as well as refugees from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya and other places across the Islamic world. There is little work and their native society is at direct conflict with the European liberal lifestyles. This has shown itself during the New Year’s Eve celebrations where the women, who were scantily and immodestly attired which was a signal that they were loose and simply asking for lecherous treatment and were open to sexual advances. The reactions of these new refugees sent a ripple of discontent and fear through the women who were receiving treatment and indecencies which they did not understand. The police were handcuffed by demands from their superiors to not arrest the refugees as they required certain leeway and understanding while they would adjust to their new lives. Many did not adjust and expected their new societies to adjust to their demands and the rules and inhibiting societal rules from the lands they had fled. This was a clash of civilizations; one the liberal socially uninhibited modern society facing an invasion of inhibited socially, strictly structured, and socially stunted, demanding women to live shuttered existence ruled by a retrograded strictly restricted and socially shuttered life. What will be the result of this clash will depend on the worth the liberated Europeans place on their social liberated lifestyle against their refugee’s demand that their rules replace those which Europe has developed since the reformation and the renaissance and the political liberation of the people from the stunted social structure of the medieval Dark Ages. Thus far all appearances point to the replacing of liberal Europe with some dark and foreboding repression and stunting of their social fabric. This diseased repression will eventually threaten the United States and only strong leadership will be at all capable of preventing the complete closure of liberal democracies being subjugated and inhibited until they become Islamic theocracies with the stunted social structures mirroring life in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Afghanistan and possibly falling before the Islamic State as they dissolve themselves through weak and unworthy leadership. The backwards bending of the rule of law replacing it with the rule of foreign inhibitive oppression where nothing can be permitted to offend the sensibilities of the Islamic invaders, the invaders invited to conquest by the weakness and spinelessness of their leadership. Will Europe survive? They probably will not if the current actions are any indication of their future.

 

While Europe appears to be lost, or at least failing to act in self-defense, and failing to stand against the waves of barbarians; the United States may fair better if they choose the proper leadership. Fortunately, the United States, as usual, is running as much as a decade behind Europe. The threat is likely to advance upon the United States somewhat faster than a ten year delay as the current leadership is taking the right steps to allow the United States to admit large numbers of potential disruptors who will attempt to impose their stridently restrictive societal rules upon America. The American societal structure is more independent than the somewhat stunted European societal structures and thus more difficult to over whelm, but that does not make America invulnerable as nobody is immune to societal disruptions. With Europe poised to collapse before Islamic hordes crashing their shores and stunting their societal freedoms in an attempt to refashion their society into an Islamic one, they will rename the great structures making the great Cathedrals into Mosques and rename the iconic buildings removing their former references and now have them attest to their Islamic greatness. The Leaning Tower of Pisa could be renamed the Bent Minaret of the Caliph, the Eiffel Tower simple redone in a Green Patina Eiffel Tower and Big Ben might be renamed the Great Clock of Allah with Buckingham Palace named the Grand Mosque of London; that is assuming London is not renamed as was Constantinople. The great museums will be destroyed and the art works burned, the statues smashed, the David transformed into marble ruins and the Vatican transformed into Mecca II and the place the Europeans will be permitted to use for their Haj.

 

 

Eiffel Tower from the Past to the Future?

 

Europe managing to turn the tides around and salvage their history and societies will only happen if they find the soul which made Europe great and capable to strive into a future with any promise. The likelihood that the Europeans will find that spark depends on whether they are willing to return to the Christianity which permitted their survival and resistance to Islam in periods past. Without such a return to their religion, Europe will lose as those who are fighting for something greater than themselves will always defeat those fighting for comfort and personal existential existence. Those fighting for Islam and Allah will defeat those fighting for nothing more than their comfortable, secularist, laissez faire, free society as such a lifestyle are designed around this abhorrence for violent behavior, the only thing which could save Europe. Will the United States be willing to fight the good fight or will America also fall due to their abhorrence to fighting the good fight which will take generations upon generations with no end in sight. There is a Chinese curse which decries that one live in interesting times, well; we are indeed living in interesting and dangerous times. Will the survival of a society outside of Islam come down to China and Asian nations or will it fall to the world against Israel, a battle already written about almost two thousand years ago with an ominous tale which depends on miraculous forces beyond out mere mortal imaginations ability to behold. These times may get more interesting than anybody is capable of imagining. The first battle will be fought in Europe, assuming the Europeans actually believe their lifestyle and societal norms are worth fighting for. Will they fight or simply fold without even a whimper?

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

One Shot Out of Four is All We’ve Got

 

Europe appears to be hell-bent on committing suicide and not exactly taking the slow road about it. The introduction was all Angela Merkel with her promise to have room to absorb 800,000 Syrian refugees a year for the foreseeable future. The invitation appeared to reach a few more than the planned 800,000 and apparently somewhere towards three or four times as her presumed limit. The response was so monumental that every European country could have been a new home to their own half a million and some received that gratis before they could act to close their borders. A few countries saw sanity and kept their borders closed except for those on a train passing straight through without even stopping for a break and a brew. Now Europe in many parts is experiencing the pleasures of refugees running wild, and it is not a reality show title but the reality running loose on their streets. New Year’s Eve celebrations had some extra and unwanted gusto especially for any native women venturing out anywhere, especially the central train stations in any city, sizeable or quaintly small. There are many looking to the United States hoping that the electorate will realize the threats now straining the bounds of civility poised to dissolve all sanity along with all the Western World’s graciousness. The threat is impolite, boorish and horrifically violent. But the American public appears to be enamored with electing a high school senior class president than a leader of the democratic, free, liberal Western World.

 

There were seventeen Republican candidates and four Democrat candidates well into the campaign and we are now down to four apparent survivors and three of the four would be just as Americentric as President Obama has been with a similar isolationist policy outlook. Their presidential outlook would stop at the border and would only differ in their treatment of the southern border with Mexico where one promises to build a wall while the others would install an easy access walkthrough with neon lights claiming open for business. The only one who understands the threats facing our world and the distinct possibility of a new dark ages shrouding any further scientific advancement ending the hopes for a bright future with promise of medical miracles and exploration reaching out and taking the first baby steps into the cosmos all hanging by a thin thread which requires our constant vigilance and protection, our constant mending and reinforcement; otherwise it breaks and we plunge back into the darkness of suspicions and loss of curiosity. That begs the question of what are the possibilities that civilization which prizes curiosity and ventures into the unknown always striving to find the next challenge and then meeting it with inventiveness and spirit constantly striving to know more, to understand why, how and sometimes even what might be the next discovery, the next level to strive and reach beyond what the last generation accomplished. That is what hangs threatened and with it the hope for cures for diseases, crop yields and fresh water derived from land now unusable and water unpotable, new energy generation which is green, plentiful and affordable. The world of machines with artificial intelligence and automation replacing tedious jobs freeing mankind to chase dreams and pursue that which was beyond belief just a few decades back. What is at stake is whether we will continue to strive for new technical heights and progress matching or exceeding that which took us from Kitty Hawk and a flight of 12 seconds and 120 feet to the moon in 66 years. Where will man be when the next sixty-six years has passed and it is 2035? Will we be reaching Mars and have built a space station with space dock for building the next generation of space travel built in space purely for space and have a moon base with monitoring telescopes of every variation taking advantage of the lack of interfering atmosphere? Will we be chasing a thousand dreams or will we be locked in an eternal conflict pitting one against his brother where no one wins and society and advancement are the biggest losers? Where do we wish to go with the future? That is the only question which should be on the minds of every voter in the United States, Europe and the entirety of the advanced industrial and information world as there truly are clouds on the horizon and that horizon is falling closer and closer and in some places it seems to have arrived bringing the threat of an eternal darkness. We have choices. They neither are not necessarily pleasant choices nor are they easy choices. Nobody enjoys even discussing the choices but we have been here before and we had better not make the same mistakes again as the consequences are far more dire this time around the merry-go-round.

 

 

One in Four
Knows the Score
For if Wrong you Choose
Your Freedom You Lose

 

 

Every election which comes will be the choice and we need to choose studiously and with great caution. The last time we faced such a threat it was from amongst our own house and we almost threw away our last hope. We cannot afford to make such a mistake again as the weapons of war have changed and even an intelligent high school science whiz-kid is capable of building an atomic bomb for his science fair project. Such a bomb would be clumsy, large, and require a cement truck to carry it making it undeliverable, but such could still be driven in said cement truck to its target. We played games and pretended that it is beyond the scientific and industrial ability for North Korea to produce a deliverable weapon and we now realize how wrong we were as they are capable of placing a device on a medium range ballistic missile and striking anywhere in Japan, South Korea, China, Hawaii, Australia or anyplace within that radius and within a few years that missile will be an ICBM capable of reaching anywhere on the planet with a thermonuclear warhead. We are pretending currently that Iran is thus limited and that is a pipe dream which could be turned into a nightmare at any time. The reality is that these countries have scientists just as capable as any in the free world as they attended the same universities often at our expense as a matter of if we allow them scientific advancement they would be less likely to wage war. What if we were sorely mistaken? After all, we allowed North Korea to advance and produce such weapons and the means to deliver them very soon to anyplace on the planet, likely they already are capable of such. While we are listing nations in some of the trouble prone areas known to have nuclear weapons we can add Israel, Pakistan and India to the list. These are in addition to the United States, France, Britain, Russia, China and with the technical knowledge we can add Japan, Canada, Taiwan and likely quite a few more if they felt a pressing need. All in all the world is armed to the brink of turning much of the planet into a smelting pot of smoking ruins incapable of supporting much if any life, let alone human life. The world has never been closer to the theme of the movie On the Beach as it is today and the one guarantee is each day places that alternative that much closer. Where nuclear disarmament is a wonderful idea and would be a great stride towards a safer world, until there is a surefire method of assuring complete compliance worldwide it is just that, a nice dream.

 

The time is approaching where we begin to be on the wrong side of the warning given by Winston Churchill when he explained the choice fast approaching his England and the free world of the 1930s, the same world which relegated him to obscurity as they called him an old fool and a war monger and then turned to him to save them when they realized almost too late the monster they had allowed the time needed to become all but unstoppable. We should heed that warning as well as Winston Churchill stated to his peers saying,

 

Still, if you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves.

 

My driving question is where is and who can be our Winston Churchill as we need to find that individual before it is too late. Reviewing the leaders of our carious nations and there are a few candidates but none who possess the full range of guts, intellect, eloquence, command of language and that spark necessary to lead into the teeth of adversity with steadfastness and audacity all while bringing forth the nest from others elevating all in their midst. The combination required comes around only once a century and I pray it is not so soon that Winston Churchill was that person for our time as well. One need remember that he warned of Hitler when none cared to listen, he warned of communism and coined the phrase Iron Curtain which he said had fallen over half of Europe and opposed FDR and the virtual surrender to Stalin but bowed to necessity of a second front and he warned of another dehumanizing catharsis which took on the disguise of a religion. Perhaps he was the man for our season as well and we will have to take his guidance and fight for his memory and allow his words to steel our nerves for the storm that approaches. There is a storm brewing on the horizon and we can only hope there will be sunlight when we reach the other side.

 

Beyond the Cusp