The Religion of Peace Launches Its Blitz
The latest battle in the world-wide war against radical islam as a philosophy and a culture (let us not pretend that this war is about anything else) is being fought in London as I write.
It appears that several cooridnated explosions, involving both IEDs and suicide bombers, struck London's transporation infrastructure. The explosions targeted the financial, publishing, and theater districts and several major tube hubs, as well as one of London's signature double-decker buses. Although there is no independent confirmation yet, there can be little doubt that this was an act of muslim terror--a battle in today's Fourth World War.
The attack appears carefully orchestrated and brilliantly symbolic. Of course, it was aimed in part as a message against G8 at Gleneagles. It was also clearly intended as a message that the city that just won the 2012 Olympics based largely on its transporation and communication infrastructure is vulnerable to crippling attacks. The Underground is completely shut down. So are the surface bus lines. Heathrow and Gatwick are open, but essentially at a standstill because the transportation lines that feed them are down. London's cell phone and public phone nets are down--as in NYC after 9-11, due to traffic volume, not deliberate attack, but this was certainly an intended indirect effect of the bombings (or at least would have been if I'd been planning such an attack...)
Unconfirmed rumors from Fox News and CNN suggest that a previously unfamiliar North African terror organization allied with al-Qaeda claims responsibility. This seems plausible: East London houses over a million North African muslim immigrants. Terror groups have doubtless found fertile ground for recruiting there.
And this points out one of the West's central vulnerabilities: its liberal attitude toward accepting muslim immigrants. The US is not immune. It has over a million muslim immigrants living in places like DC and NYC, as well as in a broad band across the northeast of the US. Every single individual in each muslim immigrant community throughout the West is a potential threat. A significant proportion of those within these communities are actual threats, even though they also may be educated, hold jobs, and send their kids to the same schools as your kids.
There is little to be happy about this day. No word on casualties yet--perhaps they will be light. In the longer term, perhaps this battle will shake us out of our current Aruba-obsessed complacency. WE ARE AT WAR. Perhaps this attack will bring that reality back home to us.
It will never persuade many on the Left, of course. I will take bets on how long it takes Leftist pols and other spokescreatures to claim that our focus on Iraq allowed us to let our guard down against al-Q, as John Fitzgunboat Kerry claimed during the '04 Presidential campaign. I give it about six hours. Since these types understand nothing about military doctrine or history, they do not realize that it's nearly impossible to defend against a determined attacker--all one can do is blunt the attack, re-direct its target, and/or mitigate its consequences--and that sacrificing the offense to try to defend everywhere is a guaranteed recipe for defeat. "The bomber will always get through," as it were.
Blair has just delivered an admirably strong statement: "we shall prevail and they will not." It remains to be seen whether the Brits in general have the backbone to continue the resistance he has vowed. The Spanish folded like a lady's fan after similar attacks. The Brits may too if the current government falls. I have little confidence in any European, even in those who are our staunchest allies.
Perhaps Europe will finally awaken to the reality that it has allowed--even encouraged--a mortal enemy to move into its midst. Since we are trying to establish the context for civilized society within islam itself, we must be very careful how we retaliate against muslim amongst us. But sooner or later we in the West will be forced to deal with a reality that we cannot ignore: these people are a collective threat that must be dealt with. The best, most humane answer in the long run may be forced deportation. Let muslims educated in and living off the West take their skills and capital into islam itself and help to reform and improve it. If the war continues escalating as it inevitably must, we cannot continue living together.
This war proves that one of the Western liberaldom's central sacraments is a lie: diversity can be a threat and not everyone can be accepted.
Monk
Update: Well, that didn't take long--about four hours. Marvin Kalb on Fox News (!) just made the libs' new-central-talking-point-to-be twice: "the President said last year that we fight in Iraq so as not to have to fight at home, but now the British have to fight in Iraq and at home..."
Update 2: Britain's premier paid quisling for extremist muslim interests , George Galloway, is the second to hit the left's new meme:
Can we shoot this slimey Limey sonofabitch now?
Update 3: Jonah Goldberg at The Corner answers a reader, correctly I think:
Update 4: Proud and--I hope--prescient words from the Lord Mayor of London, who until now has been a wet on the war:
I greatly admire the bulldog spirit that Brits are displaying in the wake of the attacks. I hope the mood lasts. I fear it will not, however. Sadly, I expect that John Derbyshire will untimately be right:
I expect America--that is always to say, real America, Red State America, not the traitors and quislings in the Blue Parentheses--will stand alone very shortly. As I've said before, I think this conflict will untimately come down to Joshua Chapter 10. We are now one step closer...
Update 5: Chris Muir at Day By Day puts things well in cartoon form:
Meanwhile, Christopher Hitchins in Slate has further reflections:
I can think of one way to disrupt the enemy's control of pace and rhythm. It involves a few old, cobalt-salted city busters, with the yields dialed way up...
Update 6: Prominent barking moonbat and former Hanoi Jane-hubby Tom Hayden issues a leftist party line appeal for appeasement:
Well...some in this government might just push back, Tom, myself included. Do you feel lucky, traitor?
Update 7: Michalle Malkin, who's had excellent coverage all day, has a good summary of sadly predictable lefty reactions.
It appears that several cooridnated explosions, involving both IEDs and suicide bombers, struck London's transporation infrastructure. The explosions targeted the financial, publishing, and theater districts and several major tube hubs, as well as one of London's signature double-decker buses. Although there is no independent confirmation yet, there can be little doubt that this was an act of muslim terror--a battle in today's Fourth World War.
The attack appears carefully orchestrated and brilliantly symbolic. Of course, it was aimed in part as a message against G8 at Gleneagles. It was also clearly intended as a message that the city that just won the 2012 Olympics based largely on its transporation and communication infrastructure is vulnerable to crippling attacks. The Underground is completely shut down. So are the surface bus lines. Heathrow and Gatwick are open, but essentially at a standstill because the transportation lines that feed them are down. London's cell phone and public phone nets are down--as in NYC after 9-11, due to traffic volume, not deliberate attack, but this was certainly an intended indirect effect of the bombings (or at least would have been if I'd been planning such an attack...)
Unconfirmed rumors from Fox News and CNN suggest that a previously unfamiliar North African terror organization allied with al-Qaeda claims responsibility. This seems plausible: East London houses over a million North African muslim immigrants. Terror groups have doubtless found fertile ground for recruiting there.
And this points out one of the West's central vulnerabilities: its liberal attitude toward accepting muslim immigrants. The US is not immune. It has over a million muslim immigrants living in places like DC and NYC, as well as in a broad band across the northeast of the US. Every single individual in each muslim immigrant community throughout the West is a potential threat. A significant proportion of those within these communities are actual threats, even though they also may be educated, hold jobs, and send their kids to the same schools as your kids.
There is little to be happy about this day. No word on casualties yet--perhaps they will be light. In the longer term, perhaps this battle will shake us out of our current Aruba-obsessed complacency. WE ARE AT WAR. Perhaps this attack will bring that reality back home to us.
It will never persuade many on the Left, of course. I will take bets on how long it takes Leftist pols and other spokescreatures to claim that our focus on Iraq allowed us to let our guard down against al-Q, as John Fitzgunboat Kerry claimed during the '04 Presidential campaign. I give it about six hours. Since these types understand nothing about military doctrine or history, they do not realize that it's nearly impossible to defend against a determined attacker--all one can do is blunt the attack, re-direct its target, and/or mitigate its consequences--and that sacrificing the offense to try to defend everywhere is a guaranteed recipe for defeat. "The bomber will always get through," as it were.
Blair has just delivered an admirably strong statement: "we shall prevail and they will not." It remains to be seen whether the Brits in general have the backbone to continue the resistance he has vowed. The Spanish folded like a lady's fan after similar attacks. The Brits may too if the current government falls. I have little confidence in any European, even in those who are our staunchest allies.
Perhaps Europe will finally awaken to the reality that it has allowed--even encouraged--a mortal enemy to move into its midst. Since we are trying to establish the context for civilized society within islam itself, we must be very careful how we retaliate against muslim amongst us. But sooner or later we in the West will be forced to deal with a reality that we cannot ignore: these people are a collective threat that must be dealt with. The best, most humane answer in the long run may be forced deportation. Let muslims educated in and living off the West take their skills and capital into islam itself and help to reform and improve it. If the war continues escalating as it inevitably must, we cannot continue living together.
This war proves that one of the Western liberaldom's central sacraments is a lie: diversity can be a threat and not everyone can be accepted.
Monk
Update: Well, that didn't take long--about four hours. Marvin Kalb on Fox News (!) just made the libs' new-central-talking-point-to-be twice: "the President said last year that we fight in Iraq so as not to have to fight at home, but now the British have to fight in Iraq and at home..."
Update 2: Britain's premier paid quisling for extremist muslim interests , George Galloway, is the second to hit the left's new meme:
1513 Respect MP George Galloway says: "We argued, as did the security services in this country, that the attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq would increase the threat of terrorist attack in Britain. Tragically Londoners have now paid the price of the Government ignoring such warnings."
Can we shoot this slimey Limey sonofabitch now?
Update 3: Jonah Goldberg at The Corner answers a reader, correctly I think:
TODAY, YEAH. TOMORROW? NOPE [Jonah Goldberg]
Question from a reader:
Jonah, Would it be inappropriate for the president to point out that this is what the people in Gitmo would rather be doing?
Update 4: Proud and--I hope--prescient words from the Lord Mayor of London, who until now has been a wet on the war:
"I know that you personally do not fear to give your own life in exchange to taking others [that is why you are so dangerous] ... but I know you do fear you may fail in your long-term objective to destroy our free society ... in the days that follow, look at our airports, look at our seaports and look at our railway stations ... you will see that people from the rest of Britain, people from around the world, will arrive in London to become Londoners, to fulfill their dream and achieve their potential ... whatever you do, however many you kill, you will fail."
I greatly admire the bulldog spirit that Brits are displaying in the wake of the attacks. I hope the mood lasts. I fear it will not, however. Sadly, I expect that John Derbyshire will untimately be right:
BLITZ SPIRIT? [John Derbyshire]
The interesting question now is: Will Britain do a Spain?
The popular answer at the moment is that they will not. The Brits will summon up the spirit of the Blitz, face up to the enemy fearlessly, and soldier on.
I don't feel at all sure about this, and if I had any money, would bet the other way.
The Blitz was an entirely different affair. A neighboring power was sending bombers over to break Britain's will, so that they could take the country over and run it as a satellite under puppet rulers, or as a province of their empire. So the British believed in 1940. The choice was to stand and fight, or go under. Of course, they stood and fought, fortified by a strong, proud sense of national and cultural identity.
Now, it may indeed be that the Jihadis think they can break Britain's will and take the place over. It may even be that they are right. Problem is, very few people in Britain believe this. The threat doesn't seem dire. We can deduce this -- the fact of the threat not seeming dire, whether it actually is dire or not can be deduced from the fact that extremists have not been interned or expelled, as would be done if Britons at large felt their nation under threat. They don't.
To the British, jihadism is just a nuisance -- as the IRA was in the 1970s-1990s... and, come to think of it, as Hitler was in 1938. How do the British instinctively react to this kind of (as they perceive it, rightly or wrongly) non-nation-threatening nuisance? They appease it. They pay the Dane-geld.
All the fine words we are hearing about "not giving in to terror" sound very grand. Yet in fact, the last terror campaign in Britain -- the one run by the IRA -- was very successful. Gerry Adams is not dead; he is riding around in chauffered limousines, paid for by the British taxpayer. The IRA front party, Sinn Fein, is doing very well in elections all over Ireland, North and South. Tony Blair sold out to them completely, with the entire approval of the British public.
If it's solely up to Tony Blair, Ken Livingstone, and the rest of the Brits (I'll make a few exceptions, but they are not very important), Osama bin Laden will be riding around in a chauffered limousine ten years from now, and having tea with the Queen. Fortunately America's in the fight too... and I very much hope that word "fortunately" is not just wishful thinking on my part...
I expect America--that is always to say, real America, Red State America, not the traitors and quislings in the Blue Parentheses--will stand alone very shortly. As I've said before, I think this conflict will untimately come down to Joshua Chapter 10. We are now one step closer...
Update 5: Chris Muir at Day By Day puts things well in cartoon form:
Meanwhile, Christopher Hitchins in Slate has further reflections:
My son flew in from London at the weekend, and we were discussing, as we have several times before, why it hadn't happened yet. "It" was the jihadist attack on the city, for which the British security forces have been braced ever since the bombings in Madrid. When the telephone rang in the small hours of this morning, I was pretty sure it was the call I had been waiting for. And as I snapped on the TV I could see, from the drawn expression and halting speech of Tony Blair, that he was reacting not so much with shock as from a sense of inevitability.
Perhaps this partly explains the stoicism and insouciance of those Brits interviewed on the streets, all of whom seemed to know that a certain sang-froid was expected of them. The concrete barriers around the Houses of Parliament have been up for some time. There are estimated to be over 4 million surveillance cameras in the United Kingdom today, but of course it had to be the Underground—"the tube"—and the good old symbolic red London bus. Timed for the rush hour, and at transit stations that serve outlying and East London neighborhoods, the bombs are nearly certain to have killed a number of British Muslims. None of this, of course, has stopped George Galloway and his ilk from rushing to the microphone and demanding that the British people be removed "from harm's way" by an immediate withdrawal from Iraq.
It is ludicrous to try and reduce this to Iraq. Europe is steadily becoming a part of the civil war that is roiling the Islamic world, and it will require all our cultural ingenuity to ensure that the criminals who shattered London's peace at rush hour this morning are not the ones who dictate the pace and rhythm of events from now on.
I can think of one way to disrupt the enemy's control of pace and rhythm. It involves a few old, cobalt-salted city busters, with the yields dialed way up...
Update 6: Prominent barking moonbat and former Hanoi Jane-hubby Tom Hayden issues a leftist party line appeal for appeasement:
So much for Tony Blair's hope to "put Iraq behind us." The dustbin now awaits George Bush's argument that "we must take the fight to the enemy over there so we don't have to fight them at home." Imperial fantasies, as shattered as the London transit system. The G-8 leaders feign innocence while the innocents die.
But reality will quickly sink in. Already Denmark and Italy are warned that they are next. The "coalition of the willing" has dwindled from 34 to 20, and will continue to disintegrate, leaving the US with 20,000 stateless mercenaries subsidized by America's tazpayers as the largest ally in Iraq.
It is time for the peace movement and congressional allies to show solidarity with the British people by getting to the bottom of the Downing Street Memorandums scandal which the smug American media continues to downplay.
It is time for dialogue with the 82 Iraqi parliamentarians - one-third of the American-sponsored regime - who are calling for a timetable for American withdrawal.
When governments, through their march to folly, fail to protect their own citizens, it is time for those citizens to push their governments aside and become the peacemakers.
Well...some in this government might just push back, Tom, myself included. Do you feel lucky, traitor?
Update 7: Michalle Malkin, who's had excellent coverage all day, has a good summary of sadly predictable lefty reactions.
posted by Monk | 06:09
