A fateful calculation?

De Rigeur

All power to the Yanks. We have to gird our loins anyway, unfortunately, for the conflict coming in our own country, brought down on us by those who refuse our culture and civilisation.
Maybe the apocalypse can be delayed by some further appeasement to their sensibilities, but I doubt it.
But it is clear that we must not make the first step.
Sorry to sound a touch gloomy. Can't honestly see it any other way.

Max Kaye

If (sorry, when) Pakistan falls, it will allow the West (and India) a freer hand in tackling extreme Islamists without the incumbrance of a useless and venal 'ally'.

Neil

9/11? Wasn't that orchestrated and perpetrated by Saudis? Isn't Bin Laden himself a Saudi national?

I find it odd that the US military didn't use shock and awe tactics against Riyadh. Or would that have been bad for the arms and oil deals that the Bush administration had so carefully cultivated with its Saudi friends? Surely not!

Rob

Good article, an example of clear thinking. I just wanted to say thanks for the Brits. I don't think they are perfect, I was named after Montgomery, and I sure dont think he was perfect, but consider the alternatives. Remember, we have won in Iraq, and the Brits were critical to that for all their weak finish in Basra. We have done a lot of smackdown in Afghanistan and the Brits have done their share. Who else is fighting?? Who else? The Marines, Poles, Canadians and the Brits. Bless em I say.

epaminondas

Afghanistan cannot be won without CRUSHING the Talibs and Talib like in the NW Terr./Swat/Bajaur region.

Pakistan is currently avoiding exerting its sovereignty for reasons similar to to Britain's fear of Pakistani instability.

We might be seeing the Pakistanis GIVE UP any pretense of having power there and turning their backs as the USA uses air power in a steadily increasing crescendo to obliterate the entire infrastructure.

Ian G

Anyone read Rageh Omar's article on the subject? http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/pakistan/5011978/Rageh-Omaar-on-why-the-West-should-fear-the-Taliban-and-al-Qaedas-hold-on-Pakistan.html

It's equally as depressing.

Hayward

Neil,
Why was no shock and awe visited on the House of Saud but only on the Land of Iraq After all there were 15 Saudi Wahabi Salafis, 2 from the Gulf States and one each from Egypt and Lebanon. However no Iraqis!
The strange fundamentalist Wahabi sect has a cosy "Church and State" arrangement with the House of Saud. The House of Sud gives them state backing and finance for their particular brand of Islam. They give the full religious backing to the House of Saud. Cosy ain't it!

Dixon

This is all hair-splitting and nit-piddlin. The way to deal with unruly regions such as Afghanistan AND Pakistan, to prevent them being used as vehicles for war upon us, or indeed Pakistani nuclear weapons, is to render them unhinhabitable. First by the extensive use of nuclear weapons against all centres of population. Then maintaining a regime of continual biological and chemical weapons deployment in order that no Human life can sustain itself in the region.

This is how our forebears in previous centuries would have dealt with such problems had they had such tools at their disposal. It is how such matters will be dealt with in future by our eventual Islamic overlords, when they seek to put down remnants of "infidel" resistence at the fringes of the New Caliphate.

At some point, "morality " has to go out the window and things will "get real". The only question is, will it be us or them?

Actually, theres no doubt really, its not going to be us doing it to them, its only the reverse that is at all conceiveable.

Anne-Kit

Rob, Australia has troops in Afghanistan as well as Iraq. 10 have been killed so far, just two days ago a 21 year old soldier, newly married and with a 4-week old son.

Tragic.

logdon

Two strands here. One in Afghanistan, the other here in Britain.

When the British army left Basra to hunker down in the airport base, the militants filled the gap, putting our efforts back to square one.

The subsequent storm of action by US and Iraqi military subdued the place again and according to the BBC, Basra is now a relative safe haven with businesses springing up and a semblance of normalcy emerging. Ipso facto mass force utilising an indigenous military works/ a PC talking army does not.

A similar occurrence emerged in Faluja as the US tried the softly softly, only to end up with the place riddled with AQ insurgents. Again a massive attack was required to retake the town with use of extremely lethal force. Again it worked. As Osama said himself, 'people will follow the strong horse'.

So what we are seeing is that as long as the local army is involved along with allied military, annihilating force does work. However if British commanders act as armed, pc jargon spewing social workers we are viewed as passive and weak. That, unfortunately is human nature and the way of war.

As for our home grown 'talibs', are sharia seeking Pakistani immigrants now running our foreign policy? If Pakistan collapses it is nothing to do with Britain whatsoever, therefore all action by these disgruntled immigrants using the depredation of the place as excuse should be treated with the civilian version of 'crushing force'.

The alliance of this sector to Britain is nil therefore accusation of alienating them is spurious, they already are virtual aliens living cuckoo-like in our country.

Along with that, we must strengthen and defend the position of moderates who actually love Britain. Up to now Gov policy in this area has been quite disastrous, siding with the wrong guys and sending out a message of incoherence. Listening to these so called 'spokesmen' you get the impression that the whole of British Muslim society is oppressed and victims of an islamophobic state yet talk to an average muslim in business, a shop or workplace, especially a woman and a different picture emerges.

Syeda Warsi talked of this precise phenomena the other week on QT. Her view of the MCB for instance was pretty deprecating, stating that they do not in any way, shape or form represent her or the average Muslim for whom they purport to speak.

They are basically a hard line Deobandi organisation, worshipping at the foot of Maududi whose aim was a global caliphate operated along fascist/communist totalitarian lines. Western leaders admired by him included Hitler and Stalin so not much wriggle room there yet the MCB and others continue to get away with the most outrageous of proclamations with no appropriate retaliation from HMG.

We are entering a new and ever changing epoch. Getting it more or less right now will save us from a tsunami of trouble down the line. Getting it wrong will result in anger, riots, civilian strife and an even worse uphill battle to correct the mess.

Trouble is who will step up to this challenging plate?

Sam Armstrong

Dixon, how would we deal with the subsequent uprisings in the British-Pakistani community following our rendering of their homeland uninhabitable?

Dixon

Sam Armstrong
March 20th, 2009 12:05pm
Dixon, how would we deal with the subsequent uprisings in the British-Pakistani community following our rendering of their homeland uninhabitable?"

Ruthlessly. Before-hand.

Herbert Thornton

Dixon is right.

The indigenous populations of Britain & the west have been so misled by Politically Correct establishments and media that they are no longer conscious of the worthwhile values of their own civilisation. They have been prevented from thinking for themselves, so that despite the massive changes in the composition of their countries' population taking place before their very eyes, they see no future harm coming from it. They have not yet grasped how seriously they and their children are in danger. Instead, they keep voting for their own destruction.

Brian

Dixon - you've just advocated the extermination of 160 million people. I presume by "our forbears in previous centuries", you mean Hitler, Stalin and Mao. You're either a troll or someone bereft of humanity.

Herbert Thornton

Brian - instead of posting personal abuse, why don't you contemplate the clear intention of extreme Islam to exterminate us - and then ask yourself what you would want done after they've vapourised a couple of western cities?

Dixon

Dont worry Herbert, whilst I am happy that you agree with me, Brian is right up to a point...I only value my own friends and selected community. Nothing else.

My position, which I have often stated in these discussions, is that when "push comes to shove", only very, very exceptional individuals will sacrifice themselves for an abstract notion of the well-being of others. Rather than pretend to be such a hero, I admit up front that I am only Human, that to be Human is to be weak and that given the choice between being tortured and pressing a button that will wipe out 160 million people unknown to me, I would press that button every time. All too many people, no doubt including Brian, would like to think they would refuse, but after the first few electric shocks in sensitive places, they too would press that button! I just believe in being honest about it from the outset and ordering my world-view accordingly.

So if 160 million must die to keep me in comfort, so be it!

As you ask, Brian, the forbears I was thinking of were people like Kitchener, who showed how these things should be done. I have no interest in extermination for its own ends, as Hitler sought, or to enforce an ideology, like Stalin, only in defence of valued states, insitiutions and communities.

phil

this is pretty powerful stuff by dixon and logdon but at least they are facing up to what we are in the middle of -a state of war with militant Islam ,who I have no doubt would treat us in exactly that way if they could .I think our job is to motivate the Muslims to listen to the wise words of Baroness Warsi as I cant see anyone really having the stomach to obliterate millions of innocents ,neither morally nor practically and sorry guys not in my name -Dixon I understand your anger but I do not believe you would do it either .Brian need not worry .

Dixon

Phil, that seems a pretty sympathetic response of yours to what is one of my avowedly extreme positions. Its not anger on my part. In fact, these days the only anger I feel is provoked by the people I have to encounter in my day to day affairs. I dont feel anger towards the Taleban, et al, at least they exhibit a clear and ruthless logic in their actions. It just happens that I dont want what they do want.

When it comes down to it, how many in our society really do want outfits like the Taleban to have their way. But at the same time how few really want to face up to what that means in practice.

What is the point of sending tens of thousands of people to a hell-hole that our only interest in is to prevent it being used as a platform by our enemies when it could be accomplished using technology at a safe distance. Why have hundreds or thousands of our people die in the Sysiphian process of a "humane" "policing" approach? When the "good guys" we are defending are barely any different from the people we are defending them from. For example, handing out death sentences to converts to Chritianity and now persecuting that woman who dared to dance a little bit whilst singing in their equivalent of the X-Factor. Do we really want to waste our blood on such vermin? Would it not be a LOGICAL approach simply to wipe the entire region clean, like removing offensive, racialist, sexist, bigoted, mediaevalist graffiti from a blackboard?

And the same for all similar regions.But I hasten to add, not of any particular peoples. I am definitely not advocating genocide or racial distinctions. Simply protecting the modern world...not the West...but all aspects of modernity, including China and India, from what breeds in the iniquitous pockets of festering darkness of which Afghanistan and Pakistan have to be the worst. Just wipe them clean.

Unfortunately, we are now utterly interpenetrated by the overflow of such cesspools, without whom, running the NHS for example, our society would grind to a halt.

This is merely an indication of how blind and stupid we have been. It is also another application of my personal inclination towards figuring out the most extreme version of all solutions. I no longer believe in the NHS, which I think should be wound down and dismantled. Along with most departments of government.

But what we do need is a very well armed and ruthless territorial militia.

Herbert Thornton

The apprehension evident in this thread is very much like that in James Forsyth's thread - 'Pakistan, the sum of all fears' (qv).

I remember that when I was much younger, I used to hear engineers say when they were discussing the reckless use of overstressed machinery - 'Something's got to give'.

Pakistan is simmering like an increasingly blocked pressure cooker, and there is no knowing when it will blow. Almost as worrying is that there is much sympathetic simmering going on in Britain - and when Pakistan does blow, the peace is going to be very much disturbed in Britain too.

Geoff Miller

"Britain’s desire to appease its Pakistani-origin population for fear of further terror – thus laying the groundwork for further terror through pusillanimous short-termism -- sounds all too horribly familiar."

Spot on.

Are we really Amerioca's ally ? Or just a has-been nation run by cowards and soft minded Socialists who are more concerned with "looking the part of an Ally" whilst protecting their muslim voter base than truly standing up against Islamic terrorism ?

Meanwhile our soldiers continue to die whilst our exposure to increased Islamic terrorism is greatly increased.

Our, rather, your exposure - I left the UK in disgust 5 years ago.

Original Tony

I agree with Dixon...nuke them..Brian, you are a softy-left-winger; a group as a whole that is the root cause of the mess the world is in.

Appeasement and negotiation with hardliners of any type has NEVER worked.

And if we have to deal with radicals in OUR country then round them up, put them into football stadiums near the ocean as a temporary storage points (easy to guard) and then put them on ships back to their beloved homelands.

Or, if a homegrown radical does something in Britain, his relatives must be deported.