Mo



Wake up, Europe, you've a war on your hands


November 6, 2005

BY MARK STEYN SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST





Ever since 9/11, I've been gloomily predicting the European powder keg's
about to go up. ''By 2010 we'll be watching burning buildings, street riots
and assassinations on the news every night,'' I wrote in Canada's Western
Standard back in February.



Silly me. The Eurabian civil war appears to have started some years ahead of
my optimistic schedule. As Thursday's edition of the Guardian reported in
London: ''French youths fired at police and burned over 300 cars last night
as towns around Paris experienced their worst night of violence in a week of
urban unrest.''

''French youths,'' huh? You mean Pierre and Jacques and Marcel and Alphonse?
Granted that most of the "youths" are technically citizens of the French
Republic, it doesn't take much time in les banlieus of Paris to discover
that the rioters do not think of their primary identity as ''French'':
They're young men from North Africa growing ever more estranged from the
broader community with each passing year and wedded ever more intensely to
an assertive Muslim identity more implacable than anything you're likely to
find in the Middle East. After four somnolent years, it turns out finally
that there really is an explosive ''Arab street,'' but it's in
Clichy-sous-Bois.



http://www.suntimes.com/output/steyn...-steyn06.html#

On Mon, 07 Nov 2005 15:49:26 GMT, "NOYB" wrote:

Wake up, Europe, you've a war on your hands

What? where? Oh, now you mention it... Tought it were just some boys
having a bit of fun...

Well, we always turn to the US when it's to do with fighting, don't
we? So, what do you suggest...,
Make firearms more accessible to the people?
Say it's Al Qaeda and invade Pakistan?
Call 'm illegal warriors, open up some camp on an island and put all
these guys in there for years without a trial?

Surprise me,

Regards, Len.

"Len" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 07 Nov 2005 15:49:26 GMT, "NOYB" wrote:

Wake up, Europe, you've a war on your hands

What? where? Oh, now you mention it... Tought it were just some boys
having a bit of fun...

Well, we always turn to the US when it's to do with fighting, don't
we? So, what do you suggest...,
Make firearms more accessible to the people?
Say it's Al Qaeda and invade Pakistan?
Call 'm illegal warriors, open up some camp on an island and put all
these guys in there for years without a trial?

I like the camp on an island idea. But a better idea would be to get rid of
the governments in the Middle East which support or condone madrassas that
teach young Muslims to hate Israel and the West.

"Harry Krause" wrote in message
...
NOYB wrote:
"Len" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 07 Nov 2005 15:49:26 GMT, "NOYB" wrote:

Wake up, Europe, you've a war on your hands
What? where? Oh, now you mention it... Tought it were just some boys
having a bit of fun...

Well, we always turn to the US when it's to do with fighting, don't
we? So, what do you suggest...,
Make firearms more accessible to the people?
Say it's Al Qaeda and invade Pakistan?
Call 'm illegal warriors, open up some camp on an island and put all
these guys in there for years without a trial?

I like the camp on an island idea. But a better idea would be to get rid
of the governments in the Middle East which support or condone madrassas
that teach young Muslims to hate Israel and the West.





We can't even stabilize a country we've been occupying for three years
with 150,000 troops, and you want us to do the same with a dozen other
countries?

The other countries are the ones working to destabilize the one we're
already fighting in. Cut off the head and the body will wither away and
die.

"NOYB" wrote in message
ink.net...

"Harry Krause" wrote in message
...
NOYB wrote:
"Len" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 07 Nov 2005 15:49:26 GMT, "NOYB" wrote:

Wake up, Europe, you've a war on your hands
What? where? Oh, now you mention it... Tought it were just some boys
having a bit of fun...

Well, we always turn to the US when it's to do with fighting, don't
we? So, what do you suggest...,
Make firearms more accessible to the people?
Say it's Al Qaeda and invade Pakistan?
Call 'm illegal warriors, open up some camp on an island and put all
these guys in there for years without a trial?

I like the camp on an island idea. But a better idea would be to get
rid of the governments in the Middle East which support or condone
madrassas that teach young Muslims to hate Israel and the West.





We can't even stabilize a country we've been occupying for three years
with 150,000 troops, and you want us to do the same with a dozen other
countries?

The other countries are the ones working to destabilize the one we're
already fighting in. Cut off the head and the body will wither away and
die.




Iraq was supposed to be "the head", according to your master. How many more
heads do you suppose there are?

On Mon, 07 Nov 2005 13:45:21 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

May the children of all the warmongers here suffer the same horrific fate.

Got a cold chill reading this Harry.
But I agree 100% with what you mean.

Regards, Len.

On Mon, 07 Nov 2005 14:22:17 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

It is immoral to sit safe in your house while you urge that the sons and
daughters of other families be sent off to foreign lands to fight and
die in a war based on a president's incompetency, stupidity, and deceit.

Perhaps, due to the way the present America was taken by force from
the original inhabitants, war is in the cultural heritage of the us
somewhat seen as a legitimate and effective means to an end, much more
than in europe. Our cultural heritage is older, with much more
experience in the field of losing and of what happens if a country is
defeated but also humiliated (ww1, Germany). All european countries
have had their serious defeats and the history books tell all about
it. In europe I grew up (10 years after ww2) with a notion of "war is
hell. It must be prevented as much as possible".

But I respect that sometimes not acting is even worse than acting.
When the acting is based on lies, all legitemacy is lost up front.
Retreat is another matter, you will have to take into account what
situation will arise after that. After all you're responsible as a
world-leading nation that has started the war unilaterally.

Regards, Len.

On Mon, 07 Nov 2005 14:55:32 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

Len wrote:
On Mon, 07 Nov 2005 14:22:17 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

It is immoral to sit safe in your house while you urge that the sons and
daughters of other families be sent off to foreign lands to fight and
die in a war based on a president's incompetency, stupidity, and deceit.

Perhaps, due to the way the present America was taken by force from
the original inhabitants, war is in the cultural heritage of the us
somewhat seen as a legitimate and effective means to an end, much more
than in europe.

Puh-lease. European history is chock full of wars, some of them lasting
for incredibly long times.

The average 21 century (western-) european is very much peace minded,
and what I am trying to say is that could partly be a result of the
many wars you mentioned. America never really or literally "lost" a
war. Fighting is considered as something one should do for home and
fireplace... and it's only a few inches to the fully evolved
patriottism I read here and there.

The problem in the United States now is that we have an incompetent
president who is inept in diplomacy and who is being led by the nose by
a group of neocons with an agenda that includes a form of "world
domination."

That's how a lot of, a vast majority of europeans see it too. This
president is no world leader material. No vision of what world-policy
to develop. Just self centered aiming for own (campagne-financers)
interests. I am not even interested in the nuanced differences between
republicans and democrats. All I know I prefer a competent US
president who sometimes lets a secretary give him a blow job over a so
called morally superior, ignorant GI Joe who accidentally helps to put
the world on fire.

Regards, Len.

"Len" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 07 Nov 2005 14:22:17 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

It is immoral to sit safe in your house while you urge that the sons and
daughters of other families be sent off to foreign lands to fight and
die in a war based on a president's incompetency, stupidity, and deceit.

Perhaps, due to the way the present America was taken by force from
the original inhabitants, war is in the cultural heritage of the us
somewhat seen as a legitimate and effective means to an end, much more
than in europe.

There was a vacumn here as 80% of the origional indians in the eastern and
south easteren continental US were killed by dieases brought in by spanish
explorers. When the english and dutch sought to colonize this country there
were many unclaimed lands. For the most part, settlers encroached on indian
lands, were attacked by indians and then the indians were wiped out by the
culturally more advanced settlers.

As to war being a cultural trait, quite the opposite. Our presidents have
had to resort to many schemes to get us to go to war, even to the point of
letting ourselves be attacked. FYI when we were attacked by Japan (WWII)
our troops were drilling with wooden guns, our navy was a joke, our
torpedoes would not detonate upon impact and we lost many planes, ships and
men in the opening days of the war. We were not prepared! Our military was
so shocked by that they have forever demanded that we be prepared.

Our cultural heritage is older, with much more experience in the field of
losing and of what happens if a country is
defeated but also humiliated (ww1, Germany). All european countries
have had their serious defeats and the history books tell all about
it. In europe I grew up (10 years after ww2) with a notion of "war is
hell. It must be prevented as much as possible".

We were shocked again by 9/11, the result is what we have now. Iraq in
large part is necessary as a forward support base for the middle east. We
can not support troops from 2000 or more miles away. In the opening days of
the Afganistan war we couldn't get support from countries in the region
without threatening them.

But I respect that sometimes not acting is even worse than acting.
When the acting is based on lies, all legitemacy is lost up front.
Retreat is another matter, you will have to take into account what
situation will arise after that. After all you're responsible as a
world-leading nation that has started the war unilaterally.


What lies??? Poor intelligence yes, another reason for invading Iraq is the
intel missions that are now being staged out of Iraq into neighboring
countries. We now have a feel for the region that wasn't possible before.

One of the reasons that there was such a push to get Saddam to either allow
inspections or for us to invade was that our troops couldn't fight with
poison gas protective gear on during the summer months. Saddam knew if he
stalled another 4 weeks we would have to cancel an invasion util the next
year.

Regards, Len.

Perhaps, due to the way the present America was taken by force from
the original inhabitants, war is in the cultural heritage of the us
somewhat seen as a legitimate and effective means to an end, much more
than in europe.


That's an interesting idea, maybe true.


Jeff Rigby wrote:
There was a vacumn here as 80% of the origional indians in the eastern and
south easteren continental US were killed by dieases brought in by spanish
explorers.

???

Do you actually believe this stuff, or do you pick it up on some secret
"wishful thinking" history website for fascist morons?

I suggest reading a basic U.S. history text... 5th grade is probably
about right.

DSK