| « | Fran's Sunday Ruminations: A Day Of Rest |
»
|
|
Monday, February 06, 2006
The Hour Of The Knife
Fran here. The Curmudgeon started this essay, but feeling that the subject was too important, and too emotionally intense, for his sort of circumlocution, I snatched it away from him and finished it myself.
In one of his early novellas, Gulf, Robert A. Heinlein has one of his trademarked older-and-wiser characters say to a younger one that "It's the hour of the knife." The context is the culmination of a frantic effort to find and destroy all records of the development of a "nova bomb" capable of destroying an entire planet in a single burst. The two characters are "New Men:" homo novis, an emergent human species whose superior rationality has saddled them, in their opinion, with the responsibility for guarding the less gifted but far more numerous species of homo sapiens against the consequences of the worst of its weaknesses. That responsibility entailed a great deal of watchfulness, readiness, and sacrifice.
Gulf is near-future science fiction. Eventually, Heinlein recoiled from some of its theses, though he apparently held to them at the time of its composition. But the point made above strikes your Curmudgeon as beyond all question: In times of great danger to the whole of Mankind, men of vision and ability must step forward to protect the race, even from itself. It's really only a verbalization of the immanent sense of allegiance to humanity that every decent man carries forever in his chest.
I've come to believe that this is such a time:
- An ignorant, barbaric, and quarrelsome minority has demonstrated that it cannot live with others not of its creed; its creed must be imposed on all men, willy-nilly. It works vigorously to spread its creed throughout the world, and has achieved an ominous degree of success.
- That minority has set as one of its highest goals the complete annihilation of a great, historically badly oppressed people.
- Political forces throughout the West are agitating for free and decent peoples to appease that minority through self-censorship and material propitiation.
- Meanwhile, statesmen all over the West, including in the United States, strain to perpetuate the indefensible notion that the minority is actuated by a sincere desire for peace.
This is not a light matter. Certainly it's too serious to dismiss with a hearty "Balderdash!" It goes to the root requirement of human society: the mandate that men shall refrain from violence except when required to defend themselves, their loved ones, or their honorably acquired property.
The seriousness of the matter is underscored by yesterday's Super Bowl. Many millions of Americans, and an unknown number of football fans in other countries, sat down before tables piled high with assorted delights and gave their attention to an athletic contest that involved men of all origins, colors, and faiths. That contest involved much stylized, closely regulated violence, but at the end of the game, the two teams shook hands, wished one another well, and departed to their home stadiums.
In the lands subjugated by Islam, such a contest could never have occurred. There were infidels on the field. Some of them were actually calling plays and directing defenses without the supervision of an imam. Never mind the alcohol being served to the fans, the beautiful, scantily clad cheerleaders dancing along the sidelines, or the garish halftime show.
So, as Americans enjoyed Super Bowl Sunday in our "traditional" fashion, Muslims worldwide kept themselves occupied by demonstrating angrily, spurring one another to violence, burning embassies and killing people over a set of cartoons. Seventeen Islam-infested states have withdrawn their embassies from Denmark over those cartoons, and are militating for a mass boycott of Danish products. The "elected" government of Iran has declared its intention to pursue nuclear weaponry with which to destroy Israel, and the "elected" government of the Palestinian West Bank and Gaza Strip has declared that it will never recognize Israel -- indeed, that it will shortly form a terrorist army with which to continue the intifada at an accelerated pace. Terrorists continue to accumulate in the Middle East and Central Asia, their ravening hatred for the freedom of free peoples fueled by ceaseless streams of "teaching" in mosques and madrassas that girdle the globe.
Such enemies cannot be appeased. There's no way to negotiate with someone whose unwavering aim is your enslavement or death. It is the hour of the knife.
But note: The rulers of Saudi Arabia are most distressed over President Bush's recent call for a national effort to reduce America's dependence on imported oil, while the HAMAS-majority Palestinian government, which openly calls for Israel's destruction, is furious that Israel will not release any tax monies to it, and that international aid disbursements to the Palestinians are slowing to a trickle. Money really does talk, doesn't it?
At various times in history, "the knife" has been an antelope femur, a rock, a stone axe, a length of sharp steel, a rifle, a cannon, a tank, a battleship, an aircraft carrier, or a B-29. In this year of Our Lord 2006, "the knife" is money: ours and theirs.
Whenever the United States has flexed its financial muscles to make a political point, the point has sunk home. The most recent examples are France, which was badly hurt by Americans' boycott of their products, and Germany, whose government learned the price of obstructionism by losing the greater number of American military bases and personnel situated on its soil.
Our military power is an outgrowth of our economic vitality, which is unequalled anywhere in the world. Our economic strength is an outgrowth of our freedoms, which are just as singular. Time was, all Americans knew all of that. But it's a prevalent weakness of the young to ignore the wisdom of the old, and a prevalent weakness of the old to ignore the lessons they learned in years gone by.
The imperative of our time is to reduce the interaction between the West and the Islamic world sufficiently to secure us against Islam's propensity to violence and its intrinsic drive for political supremacy. This might require a quarantine of the Islamic world even more complete and less permeable than Israel's security fence against the West Bank. Certainly it will require that we render ourselves independent of anything the Islamic world has to offer. The most important such commodity is oil; Islam's weapons, when not stolen directly from the West as they were on September 11, 2001, are bought with the money Islamic states amass from selling oil.
The most praiseworthy effort anyone could undertake today is to contribute to these needs:
- By contributing in some fashion to the development of domestic energy resources;
- By contributing in some fashion to the development of oil-independent technologies for power generation and transportation;
- By striving to reduce his own need for oil and oil-derived products;
- By agitating for a reduction of the regulatory encumbrances on domestic energy production, most particularly oil extraction, natural gas extraction, and nuclear power generation;
- By arguing, relentlessly and vigorously, against all assertions that the Islamic world is what it is because we've "oppressed" or "humiliated" it;
- By denying support to politicians inclined to conciliation or sluggishness in the face of the Islamic threat.
Bright minds and articulate voices will be required. So will the courage of one's convictions -- convictions rooted in firm knowledge of contemporary events and historical facts.
No war has been declared. Apart from the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan and Iraq, no armies have taken the field. Even so, the die is cast; the Fourth World War has already begun. Teeth and blades have both been bared; one cannot doubt this without voluntarily blinding himself to the chaos sweeping the world over the Jyllands-Posten cartoons. If we are to prevent a conflagration to dwarf all the other sorrows of Mankind put together, no good man can afford the luxury of indifference or detachment. The matter is too plain, and too urgent:
Queen Margrethe II of Denmark has called on the country "to show our opposition to Islam", regardless of the opprobium such a stance provokes abroad....She said: "We are being challenged by Islam these years - globally as well as locally. It is a challenge we have to take seriously. We have let this issue float about for too long because we are tolerant and lazy.
"We have to show our opposition to Islam and we have to, at times, run the risk of having unflattering labels placed on us because there are some things for which we should display no tolerance."
"And when we are tolerant, we must know whether it is because of convenience or conviction."
The step required if this one should be shirked will be harsher still:
It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry peace, peace -- but there is no peace. The war is already begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms. Our brethren are already in the field. Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty; or give me death! [Patrick Henry, before the Virginia Convention of Delegates, March 20, 1775]
The hour of the knife is upon us.
UPDATE: This essay was followed by others that continue its logic:
- The Hour Of The Knife Part 2: Boundary Conditioning
- The Hour Of The Knife Part 3: Islam In Durance Vile
- The Hour Of The Knife Part 4: Game Time
- The Hour Of The Knife Part 5: Opening The Campaign
- The Hour Of The Knife Part 6: The Vanguard
Read on if you dare.
Comments
Hear, Hear! Well said! Fran, you continue to be an inspiration. Thank you.
Posted by on 02/06/2006 at 10:28 PMI recently referenced Gulf in a post as well (as the first place I heard of the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis). I’ve had almost total recall of that piece of writing since I read it as a teenager.
I’m with you on this, sir. And my young son is in training…
Posted by NewVictorian on 02/07/2006 at 02:51 PMYour usual excellence. Thanks.
Posted by ELC on 02/07/2006 at 05:42 PMWe have indeed finally perfected telepathy.
Next, teleportation.
Repeat after me…
“Gully Foyle is my name.
Terra is my nation......”Posted by Vanderleun on 02/07/2006 at 05:49 PMAwesome, I am not alone. I have been saying much the same thing without as much eloquence.
Thank you, sir, I will be quoting you in the coming days.
Semper Fidelis,
ASM826Posted by on 02/20/2006 at 08:02 PMAfter what seems like a very long absence, I will soon be back in “fighting” form.
I found this post through a visitor to my blog. This is extraordinary, Francis, and needs to be in “Best of”. The barbarians are not at the gates; they are within the gates and mean us no good will.
Posted by Beach Girl on 06/02/2007 at 01:30 PM
Comment Form
Commenting is not available in this weblog entry.
