What’s the difference between the Crusades, the Barbary Wars and the Global War on Terror?
As far as jihadist Islamists are concerned absolutely nothing.
These conflicts were and are simply an excuse to murder anyone who is not like them. Like an obsessed teenager high on caffeine and sugar playing marathon rounds of Mortal Kombat, Islamists murder for sheer pleasure, the terror effect is just a pleasant byproduct for them.
Islamists have used the Crusades (four major armed Christian pilgrimages to the Holy Land from 1095-1289) as a recruiting tool with low-information Muslims, who are easily radicalized, especially if they are of meager means and background. Improving one’s standard of living or social status through joining radical terrorist movements is tough to counter if we are not in a position to do so, and are in fact running away from the fight.
Even Pope Francis seems to be calling for a Fifth Crusade, saying in response to the crisis in Iraq, over which he said he was “dismayed” and in “disbelief,” that there was a need for “a professional, well-equipped army” because “the situation is going from bad to worse.”
But the United States can’t seem to get out of it’s own way with regard to foreign policy chaos. It’s as if we’re drunken gamblers betting our shirts after losing all our money, watch, shoes, boat and home!
Politically, all the death and destruction is bad for business in the Obama camp, especially after seemingly endless foreign policy mistakes, from red lines in the sand to putting five big time Taliban bad guys back in the fight in trade for a suspected U.S. Army deserter. Trying to figure out the thinking behind these and other incredible missteps drives one to distraction!
After the bloodshed in Orlando, with over one hundred injured including at least 50 dead, the Islamic State has claimed responsibility. Their crusade continues.
If an enemy is bold enough to shoot high quality video of the beheading of an American journalist (Daniel Pearl by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, February 2002; and James Foley, August 2014) in the Middle East then they are able to do so in the streets of America, and have now done so.
Radical Muslims from around the world have answered the clarion call to join the Islamic State in their caliphate, including those from the United States, Canada, Europe, Russia, Asia and parts of Africa.
What will be our answer now?
For too long we have resisted the fact that Islamists are at war with us. We have responded with force and resolve during certain times and then responded with our heads in the sand at other times. The result? Nightclub bloodbaths in American cities.
And now? Nearly 100 dead innocents on the streets of Nice, France. 130 dead in Paris. Europe is on fire with “migrating” jihadist’s. “Home grown” or refugee, student visa or immigrant. Islamists who believe in Sharia Law are incompatible with the Judeo/Christian ethic or even socialist. Muslim theocracy is the antithesis of democracy.
American patriot Thomas Paine once said:
“Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must . . . undergo the fatigue of supporting it.”
That “fatigue” has weighed heavily on us, especially on the victims of terror and on our military community, who have borne the brunt of the burden.
President Barack Obama’s and his cabinet’s lack of military background are handicapping their decision-making regarding military action to protect and defend the interests of the United States. Barack Obama has even been recently exposed for not meeting even once with his Defense Intelligence Chief, Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn.
The modus operandi of this naïve group is to grossly politicize every single crisis after putting their proverbial licked finger in the air to determine the direction of the politically correct wind before making a statement or tenuous commitment.
The result is a weakened and vulnerable United States at the mercy of barbarians. But how we got here is not nearly as important as where we’re going and how?
It is imperative that we begin and then sustain a planned and committed offensive against the tyranny of Islamists. There should be no safe haven, no quarter given, and no mercy for the members of the murderous caliphate. But if we call it a “Crusade” what could possibly be the down side? It might even inspire a new generation of committed anti-Islamists.
In the early days of the 19th century this country battled and then defeated a former Islamist caliphate in the Barbary Wars. Barbary pirates of Northern Africa demanded tribute for captured merchant and military ships and the merchants, sailors and Marines on them. President Thomas Jefferson refused to comply, as did President James Madison. Instead, the United States sent warships and Marines to rescue our ships and personnel, and to destroy the pirates, and their will and means to terrorize us on the high seas.
In the end, our resolve and resources won the day, and after our example was set, European countries followed suit, building and then deploying some of the world’s fastest and most powerful ships at the time in a combined effort to suppress the pirates.
For Islamists to be defeated, once and for all, a combined effort is necessary. But this combined effort needs a leader.
If not us, who? If not now, when?
At home we need better vetting and/or a moratorium on immigrant and other Muslims entering the country. It sounds xenophobic, but enough is enough. We’re not being killed by little old lady Catholics, Protestants or Jews. We’re being targeted and killed by Muslim men (mostly). Enough already!
Deploying the 82nd Airborne Division and United State Marines to the Middle East may seem a drastic and painful choice, but we must stabilize the area of Islamist infiltration with a physical presence and then invoke a Middle East Marshall Plan when the dust settles and all Islamists are either dead, or no longer have the means or will to kill us.
Helping to rebuild the infrastructure and self-esteem of people exploited and terrorized by Islamists will win hearts and minds, as it did against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.
We still have troops in countries we defeated in World War II over 70 years after the end of that war. These countries are now among the most peaceful and prosperous in the world, not in spite of our presence, but because of it.
Peace and prosperity should be enticing rewards for those who currently choose violence and destruction. The alternative we are living now is unacceptable, the price already paid by our military members and their families and loved ones too great.
So, if our enemies call it a Crusade, why not at this point fulfill their dreams of 72 virgins and play along? Nothing else is working.
Saving Grace at Guantanamo Bay 
America declaring a crusade against Islam would be Isis’ wildest fantasy come true. I get your pain and anger, but hatred, violence and revenge have never, in the history of humanity, rendered anything else except more hatred, more violence and more revenge.
I am not judging you for your article. i think the fact you sat down to write something after such a horrible event means you and I have a major thing in common. We process our thoughts through sharing ideas.
Committing to open battle is a decision to send thousands of americans to their death. While action is required, I encourage you and other Christians to re-read the sermon on the mount. Find love for your enemies. It doesn’t mean be a wimp. it means realize that all humans are human, even the ones acting like monsters.
Again, my love goes out to you. I feel the pain in this post, and though I disagree with you, I stand with you in sorrow on this day.
I am grateful for and respect your comment. However, Sermon on the Mount or not, we have successfully defended this country and her interests many times, even against jihad on the high seas. This is a violent, dirty and unfair world, and to survive one must be willing to sacrifice everything. We did so in our Revolutionary War against oppressors and tyrants, we did so in the War of 1812, we did so in the two Barbary Wars, we did so in two World Wars, we did so in Korea, we did not do so and so failed in Vietnam, we did so and succeeded in Panama, Grenada, and in the First Gulf War. We even did so in Iraq and Afghanistan until we pulled out. The sacrifice must continue until all Islamists are dead or no longer have the will or means to kill us. Which great modern Muslim leader will rise to the occasion and lead his people out of violence and death? Who among them will take responsibility for the bloodshed, come forward and say, “Enough!”?
Dear Kirk, U don’t feel our pain at all! U r playing the Christian card to confuse the masses. Our world as we know it is in the balance and u r saying love the inhumane savage unregenerate animals from the stone age? To hell with u and ur hypocrisy. If God Almighty rejected Esau the father of the Arab nation, (Malachi 1:3) then I think we should learn something from Him and not spew off our own personal feelings regarding islam. For all I know u could be one of them cause u talk like the original father of the lie, Lucifer. His name means light-bearer and u speak like a snake. He always mixes some elements of truth in with his lies. Such like we see in the main stream media, you and Obama. Yes he is an imposter. What president in his right mind would fight to destroy his own country and subvert the constitution of the USA? Unless this is not his country and he was just an enemy plant. They’re all owned by the god of this world anyway. That’s why Obama can’t say radical Islam. That would be so hurtful to the muslims, expose his own brothers What about us Americans? We see Barack’s trans-gender queen read her emails during the Pledge of Allegiance so what are we to think? They have no love for this country and the liberties that are ours as a free nation under God, and That’s the God of the Bible not some foreign muslim diety. Without God we will be one nation under. That’s what u and the globalists want, isn’t it?
Amen.
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The world at present has no leader that is fit to lead us to a victory once and for all time. Islam and caliphate have raised their barbaric heads once again and they will NOT stop until they succeed in either dominating the world or be destroyed and sent back to hell from where they came. Why is Putin the only leader left on this planet who understands their objectives. They are a barbaric savage stone age culture and are therefor unable to integrate into Western society. Come on sheeple; Mohamed was no holy man. If he was, tell me what miracles did he perform? Did he heal the sick? Did he supernaturally feed the hungry or ever raise the dead? Mohammed was a pedophile and a bloodthirsty murderer. No wonder that his followers are the exact copy of the original. Rapists and cowardly murderers. Islam is not a religion. It’s an excuse to appear righteous through ritual washing and yet rape, decapitate infidels and terrorize the world. “Houston, we have a problem.”
How will the world deal with this plague? Yes, it”s as deadly as it gets and it has to be eradicated. If it is not, the burden will fall on our children and the odds for success will be totally different. Our governments must act immediately to save the human race from total Islamic domination, with sharia law and our daughters fathering more extremists.
Limiting immigration like Germany has started is a noble attempt to deal with terrorism and sexual crimes. The cowards get their jollies by hunting down our western women and inseminating them with their seed. Does this get any more perverse? Our wives and our daughter’s will be their property and in their harems. We will be slaves serving their perverted desires with regular beheadings. If the west falls, China or Putin will nuke them. It is a matter of survival and the only “compassionate thing to do”. I cannot see any other military resolve that would be of any significance. If we “carpet bomb” them into submission like we did in Iraq, they will only regroup for a future generation to deal with.
I am also challenged to put this into my Christian world view and ask myself, “where is all this in bible prophecy and the book of Revelation”? It could very well be that we are at the Seven Seal Judgements of God where pestilence, (also interpreted as conquest) famine, war and death are unleashed upon the earth through the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. We have plenty of pestilence. It’s really bad when our food is sprayed with Round Up. We have starvation all over the globe with malnutrition being the number one cause for infant mortality. How about wars? Yup, we sure have a lot of those too aways facilitated by DEMS. Yes, and a lot of death as well. The majority of us all have family who have died as a result of wars and sickness. So that is fulfilled as well.
If the world does not act quickly and ISIS gets a hold of a nuclear device which Iran will now be able to happily provide, they will have the capability to take out the power grids of any country through a Magnetic Pulse. Their resent worldwide attacks are just a rehearsal for the main event. The simultaneous detonation of dirty bombs with high altitude jet aircraft available from their Saudi cousins.
If we do nothing and let time go by, they will be able to realize their goal possibley within the year, depending on how much enriched uranium they already have. Why is Putin the only one who realizes the danger to civilization as we know it? I think that he hit the nail right on the head when he spoke out against Clintons’ hush money from the Saudis’ and how Washington and the media have been compromised with payoffs. They sold out for greed and the “love of money.” I know first hand what oppression is; being born in Communist Poland to Jewish parents who survived annihilation during Hitler’s Nazi reign of terror. I like Putin and Danial understand the signs of the times. You cannot go to bed with a harlot and not have your clothes burned. Proverbs 6:27 Be warned America!
Thank you for your thoughtful comment. I concur.
You are very welcome. Thank you for your inspiring article “Answering Jihad.” It was a great read!
🙂
That is exactly right on! They also lack a very important aspect of life called self-control.
A few days ago, I was surfing the channels and settled in on “The Cross and the Crusades” on the Military History Channel. While it had some very interesting detail of the formulation and the players involved from Europe, and the trials and tribulations, the deal making and intrigue involved, the Islamic historian made some interesting comments.
Seems after leaving the meetings in Turkey with the Eastern Catholic ruler, the first few cities attacked had all the inhabitants slaughtered, men, women and children, indicating even the local Christians and Jews who “lived at peace” with the local Muslims.
The thread throughout the rest of the program indicated the Crusaders were really just blood thirsty avengers, interested in gaining territory for to build their own kingdoms. The Scholar indicated how, to this day, stories in Muslim homes tell of the barbaric attacks the Christians made on the Muslim lands, and therefore, the word “Crusade” is a word that strikes fear in the hearts of Muslims, thinking it means we will come and purge them from the Earth, as “we” did before.
While it had some good historical context to how the operations ran, it barle mentioned a word about how the Muslims came to hold all the territory it did at that time, having held it for over 4 centuries by this time. The context was not balanced at all, so it’s one more “documentary” that strongly implies the Christian World was just our to take the land away from the Muslims.
Seeing as how the Middle East does not have the access to the massive amounts of history that Western nations do, the stories told in the family enclaves hold sway over their thinking. Amazingly, the evidence of today by Western nations entering the Middle East having not gone door-to-door killing Muslims, but caring for them and taking extreme measures to not put them in a crossfire have no effect on the mindset of what happened a millennia ago.
Until that shift occurs, we will be locked in this struggle, with the West thinking “why are they doing this?” and them thinking: “They are going to kill us all if we don’t kill all of them first!”
Sad.
Yes, thank you for your observation. Each side probably embellishes. Facts are facts, though, and Muslim invaders conquered much of the Mediterranean and surrounding lands. The Barbary Wars saw a resurgence of Islamist aggression. Now they are infiltrating Western Europe and the United States. Muslim nations rarely help other Muslim nations, which is why refugees are not fleeing east or south, only to the west and north. “Crusade” should strike fear into the hearts of Islamists. Peaceful people need not fear us, and they know this, why else would they risk their lives coming to us?
No estudo de Alves et al. (2013) verificou-se que as primordiais ações de escora dos acompanhantes são de conforto físico e emocional, facilitar em atividades como realizar massagens, acompanhar
na deambulação e no banho terapêutico. http://www.chictopia.com/ellisonhoff8