Sunday, February 15, 2015

Are We Seeing History Repeat Itself?


By Alan Caruba

“Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it” is the famed quote of George Santayana, a Spanish philosopher (1863-1952).  I am beginning to think that the world is making its way toward a future that repeats the horrors of the last century’s wars and earlier times when Europeans battled Islam to free Jerusalem, to protect their homelands in Europe, and to eject Muslims from Spain.

In his book, “Jihad in the West: Muslim Conquests from the 7th to the 21st Centuries” historian Paul Fregosi documented the history of Islam and its attacks on European nations, characterizing jihad as “essentially a permanent state of hostility that Islam maintains against the rest of the world.” It is a Muslim sacrament, a duty they must perform.

Occurring at the same time is the agenda of the global environmental movement and on February 4 Christina Figueres, the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, said “This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves; which is to intentionally transform the economic development model, for the first time in human history."

"This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for the, at least, 150 years, since the industrial revolution.” (Italics added) 

Figueres was wrong. The objective of the 1917 Communist revolution that began in Russia and Mao’s “Great Leap Forward” (1958-1961) was the same that is now being openly embraced by the United Nations in 2015. The result of both was the death of millions.

Humanity is under attack from an Islam that intends to impose its barbaric seventh century Sharia law and from the environmental movement’s intention to end capitalism and replace it with the income distribution central to Communism.

Both spell a terrible future for the people of the world.

The President of the United States is devoted to pursuing both of these goals as the defender of Islam and the opponent of “income inequality.”  We have twenty-two months to survive Barack Obama’s remaining time in office.

Obama was first elected on the promise to end the U.S. engagement in conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. After many years Americans welcomed the prospect of ceasing the loss of lives and billions those wars represented. With the rise of the Islamic State (ISIS) they are now seeing the true price of that policy. Just because we don’t want to fight a war doesn’t mean our enemy will cease to pursue it.

We are at a critical moment in time because it is evident that Obama wants to provide Iran the opportunity to build its own nuclear weapons arsenal. It is a time as well when the military capability of the U.S. has been diminished to what existed before the beginning of World War II. All of Europe and much of Asia would have fallen under the control of Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan if the U.S. had not stepped up to the task of defeating them.

Relentlessly, Obama has done everything he can to reduce the size of our military fighting force and the ships, planes and other weapons needed to protect our security or support that of our allies. He has withdrawn the U.S. from its position of global leadership and left behind allies that no longer trust us and enemies who no longer fear us.

Raymond Ibrahim of the Middle East Forum wrote on February 5 that “approximately 100 million Christians around the world are experiencing the persecution by Muslims of all races, nationalities, and socio-political circumstances.”  

At the same time, we are witnessing a new exodus of Jews from Europe, mindful of the Holocaust in the 1940s.  According to the Pew Research Center, as of 2013 the Jewish population worldwide was approximately 14 million. Just over 6 million reside in Israel, another 6 million are U.S. citizens, and the rest are in Europe and elsewhere around the world. What has not changed from the last century, however, is the level of anti-Semitism and it appears to be on the rise.

What we are witnessing is a full-scale attack on the West—Christianity and Judaism—and upon Western values of morality, democracy, and freedom.

Whether it will erupt in a new world war is unknown, but if history is a guide, we are moving in that direction.

© Alan Caruba, 2015

3 comments:

Harry Dale Huffman said...

It is worse this time, because there is no common thread of good, calm reason to hold the United States and other Western nations together in the confrontations we are seeing now, including even basic science. Instead, the many inherently divisive dogmas to which peoples have been addicted throughout history are now in ascendance over good, objective reason; even those dogmas seemingly overcome long ago are being resurrected and brought to the fore by those committed to them, and all of our institutions and supposed authorities have been so suborned by false reasoning as to now be fundamentally uncertain and ineffective in confronting the hate that has been raised in the name of those various dogmas. Too many people just don't want to hear the truth now, in any public debate, for the truth to prosper, much less for it to be upheld as the solid, reassuring standard for all. Of course it must end in war; with Obama and the Insane Left, it has in fact already started in earnest, as a war of subterfuge and unending, divisive lies fed to an ignorant and fearful populace. The wolves are herding the sheep, while dressed in sheep's clothing.

TexasFred said...

I hate the very thought of WAR, even a necessary and needed one..

Just think; had Obama and Company been in power in 1941 we would have surrendered immediately and half the nation would be speaking Japanese, with the other half speaking German, or possibly Russian...

curiousone said...

We know all that happens in the world today and the Pravda media carefully focus our attention on certain incidents.. However, no one notices that we are undergoing a change as sweeping as the industrial revolution of 2 centuries ago.
The gigantic difference is the new age of electronic innovation, predicted years ago by Marshall McLuhan who had studied the effects of the industrial revolution and technology on society. His predictions are rapidly coming true...We are a global village where everyone knows instantly what's happening in the world...We have cheaper ways of learning via online instruction and you can do it anywhere you have electricity and a computer...You don't have to live in a city to do business, thanks to markets like Amazon....Robotics is being developed to bring back industrial production to the US. (My university has a grant by Wal-Mart Foundation along these lines and so does Georgia Tech who is developing robots that sew clothing...This new age is of recent vintage, but is already decentralizing just about everything.. Stock trading no longer requires that you go to NYC or London. A distant central government makes less and less sense in this new age....(Libertarianism is exploding among the population as a result. That's why the old guard stuck in the 20th Century hates people like Ron Paul, but Dr. Paul was warmly welcomed by the young people.)
Scaremongering has always existed, but today, thanks to the web, we can find the truth about scams and about the history of scams....One big scare is 'terrorism' but count how many people in the West have died due to that versus street gangs in our big cities? Obama and his thugs are trying to divide us by ethnic grup, income level, etc.. into warring camps. The Muslim students I knew when the Shah sent them over here to learn engineering in his modernization effort were friendly, fun-loving, moral and great friends. Now we are being encouraged to hate all Muslims??? Everyone outside our 'ethnic group'????
We have less than 2 more years under this Chicago Marxist who hates everything we stand for...We will rebuild after he is gone....