Friday 18 August 2006

One hand behind the back, and both eyes closed

From Diana Hsieh's 'The Evils of Half-Fought Wars':
"A U.N. resolution calling for the disarming of Hezbollah in Lebanon is not the same thing as the actual disarming of Hezbollah in Lebanon--let alone the defeat of Hezbollah throughout the Middle East. And by urging Israel to end its military offensive, the administration has ended any possibility that Hezbollah will actually be destroyed. "The only way to end the threat from Islamic totalitarian groups like Hezbollah and their state sponsors is to inflict crushing devastation upon them by aggressive military action."

...The West has shown too much weakness for the jihadists to be easily convinced of any new-found determination to crush Islamic totalitarianism that the West might exhibit. That'll be the true legacy of decades of appeasement: the mass destruction required to destroy the threat of Islamic totalitarianism. It's a horrifying prospect. Even worse, it's a moot point at present: I have little hope of any Western power rediscovering the moral courage required to defend itself from the barbarians at the gates...
I fear she's right. Three-and-a-half years after Japan's suprise attack on Pearl Harbor the Japanese mainland was a smoking ruin and the militarists who had brought the destruction down upon the country had killed themselves. But now, nearly five years after the surprise attack on the World Trade Center by Islamic totalitarians, the barbarians are still at the gates and the West is looking like Neville Chamberlain without the spine.

And much though we might wish it otherwise, those barbarians are not going away...

LINKS: The evils of half-fought wars - Diana Hsieh's blog, SOLO

RELATED COMMENTARY FROM THOMAS SOWELL & MARK STEYN [Hat tip and comments from Ross Elliot's blog]:
  • Will cease-fires never cease?
    In which Sowell provides a concise, modern history of Israel and lays the blame for Arab refugees firmly at the feet of the Arabs themselves. Hot off the press.

  • Pacifists versus peace
    In which Sowell shows that "peace" movements do not achieve peace at all but enable & encourage aggressors.

  • Advocates of 'proportion' are just unbalanced
    In which Steyn argues that a proportionate military response plays into the hands of the aggressor and renders the victim impotent.

  • Islamoschmoozing
    In which Steyn identifies the vacuity of multiculturalism as a replacement for true identity, and the alacrity with which Islam fills the gap.

  • Pan-Islamism challenges idea of nation state
    In which Steyn argues that Pan-Islamism, not wars between nations, is the real threat, and that Westernism is dying by degrees, sacrificing itself upon the altar of multiculturalism.

TAGS: War, Israel, Politics-World

Cartoon by Cox and Forkum: 'Incoming'

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

the Muslim world would need to experience all the horror of overwhelming shows of force in multiple hot spots to even consider abandoning the jihad against civilization. The West has shown too much weakness for the jihadists to be easily convinced of any new-found determination to crush Islamic totalitarianism that the West might exhibit. That'll be the true legacy of decades of appeasement: the mass destruction required to destroy the threat of Islamic totalitarianism.

There is a technical term for this approach to war-fighting. It’s called "genocide". All failures can be and are explained away by the fact that we just haven't killed enough people yet. It is homicidal madness - real derangement- masquerading as some sort of serious philosophy.

Our civilization is not at risk. To think so reflects cowardice. To persuade others that we are at risk is to spread cowardice - and it has been the neocon line for years now - used to terrify fellow citizens into supporting policies they favour for other reasons. Note there has been no terrorist attack on US soil for years now.

Notice how quickly the London terror threat news disappeared from the front page - inane fear mongering is reaching critical mass and sensible people are not buying it anymore- and it's not before time.

Another neocon failure.

Anonymous said...

Well said Ruth!

Peter Cresswell said...

I note, Ruth, that despite your bagging of people whom you call 'warmongers' that you have yet to condemn Hezbollah, Nasrallah, Ahmedinejad, Syria's Ashad, bin Laaden, the late al Zarqawi, or any of the assorted Islamic totalitarians who initiated this current round of atrocities.

Your opposition to warmongering, in other words, seems strangely one-eyed: It excludes, it seems, the aggressors.

I wonder too if you would have condemned the perpetrators of the London terror threat, even if those ten planes packed with people had been blown from the skies by bloodthirsty fucking murders? Or would you still have your eyes closed and your ears covered so you couldn't hear the screams?

"Inane fear mongering"? Christ, woman, spend some time in the real world. You seem to have learned nothing from the last five years.

Anonymous said...

"You seem to have learned nothing from the last five years"

Speak for yourself.

And while your'e at it, learn to spell.