Paradise Lost

 Most of us have heard of the World War II Nazi holocaust,  and many have heard of the Armenian Genocide of 1915 during World War I (WW I), but who has heard of the holocaust that occurred in  Smyrna in September, 1922, committed by the Turks - four years after the end of WW I?  Why we have not heard about it is a good question.   Paradise Lost - Smyrna 1922, the Destruction of a Christian City in the Islamic World, by Giles Milton,  is one of the most compelling history books of the century.  The book was published by Basic Books in 2008.  Brilliantly written, documented and researched, it tells the heart wrenching and most astounding story ever told - a story that will shock the reader with the brutal genocide by Turkish forces immediately after  WW I.  Man's inhumanity to man is the best example of what happened in Smyrna in September 1922.  The Turkish holocaust is only one of the astounding stories that comes alive in every page; the other example is how the Allied forces watched people being butchered in front of them and they not only refused to intervene but passively let it happen. 

Smyrna, one of the seven Biblical cities of the New Testament, was a majority Christian city that had prospered in the Muslim world of the Ottomans; it was the jewel of Asia Minor, very successful and prosperous. Its inhabitants were unlike the rest of the Ottoman world, mainly of European stock, British, Levantines, Greeks, Italians, Jews and Armenians.  Most of these people's roots went back to the Byzantine period.  Smyrna was the Hong Kong of its day.  Many of the top citizens were successful businessmen who hired hundreds of thousands of Turks to work their factories.  A port city as cosmopolitan as Paris or London with a great night life, culture, music and the arts; an oasis in a sea of Islam.

After the Ottoman Turks were defeated in WW I the European powers could not decide what to do with the defeated Ottoman Empire (modern day Turkey.  They finally decided that they would let Greece send troops to occupy Smyrna which they did in  May 1919.  After landing troops in Smyrna, the Greek soldiers, along with the majority Greek population of Smyrna, started celebrating as if they had just won the lottery.  As they're marching through the city a shot is heard.  The Greek troops go crazy and proceed to murder about 500 citizens, mostly Turks, as they shoot randomly all over the place.  It was believed that the shot was an intentional provocation by an Italian military officer stationed in Smyrna.  It is later discovered that the Italian government had supplied arms to the Turks.   After securing Smyrna the Greek Army moved to occupy a large part of the interior of Turkey.  Initially, they had many successes, but as they stretched their forces out deeper and deeper they suffered setbacks when their rear supply lines were successfully attacked by the Turks. Milton describes how the Greek soldiers committed atrocities as they rampaged through a large swath of Turkey.  When a Greek commander was questioned as to why his soldiers were committing atrocities he responded that he liked the idea.

The Greek occupation of Turkey was condemned to failure from the beginning.  They had no hope of success.  After fighting wars since 1912, the Greeks were near collapse, physically and financially.  Additionally, they were led by incompetent civilian and military leaders.  Their defeat was a foregone conclusion.  The Greeks called their adventure in Turkey, the "Megali Idea," the great idea to re-establish a Greek empire.  The British mistakenly saw them as the up and coming power in the Mediterranean.  The French and the Italians, perhaps jealous of the Greeks, stabbed them in the back by supplying the Turks with weapons and sabotaging the Greeks whenever possible. It was the most pathetic picture.  All the Turks, led by the future founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal, later known as Ataturk, had to do was bide their time; which they did to perfection.  Besides being a brilliant military commander and a charismatic leader, Kemal was a shrewd politician as well; he played the allies like a violin.  Milton describes Kemal as a heroic figure.

After the defeat of the Greek Army, the Turks advanced toward Smyrna.  They advanced as the defeated Greek soldiers moved on their own as best they could to reach Smyrna where they hoped to get on ships which would rescue them.  Milton is at his best in telling the story of what happened once the Turks arrived in Smyrna.  The Turkish Army, which included many irregulars called "chettes," were on their own and each soldier did whatever he wanted to whomever he encountered. Most soldiers acted like gangs of thugs on a rampage.  They began by robbing and raping young women.  They would force their way into a house, steal valuables, money and whatever they wanted and rape the women.  After raping the women they would kill them and dismember their bodies.  Milton is more descriptive, but to save the reader revulsion, I'll be less descriptive.  It was as worse as you could imagine it.

At other instances, armed Turkish soldiers would stop people on the street and demand all they had; if someone had nothing the person was tortured and killed.  In one instance, a man who had nothing for them to steal was hacked to death in front of the others.  As Milton describes it, the troops were completely undisciplined and without leaders.  Whether this was by design is not stated, but my impression is that this was by design.  The Turkish leaders basically told them to do whatever they wanted.

When the Turkish military commander of Smyrna, General Noureddin finally appears on the scene, he calls for a meeting with the leader of the Greek church, Metropolitan Chrysostom.  The meeting lasts less than a few minutes.  The General turns the bishop over to the mob outside and tells them to do whatever they want with him.  The mob proceeds to hack him to death.

After a month of pillaging and killing at will, the Turks set the city on fire by bringing in barrels of gasoline, spreading it everywhere and lighting it.  The city, with the exception of the Turkish quarter, is set ablaze.  Over 500,000 screaming Christians fled to the waterfront desperate to escape.  Professor M.H. Dobkin in his book on the Smyrna genocide describes how the European powers watched from  their ships in the Smyrna harbor: "While a flotilla of twenty-seven Allied warships - including three American destroyers - looked on, the Turks indulged in an orgy of pillage, rape and slaughter; which the Western powers condoned - eager to protect their oil and trade interests in Turkey - through their silence and by their refusal to intervene. Turkish forces then set fire to the legendary city and totally destroyed it. A massive cover-up followed, by tacit agreement of the Western Allies, who had defeated Turkey and Germany during World War I. By 1923, Smyrna 's demise was all but expunged from historical memory."

No one would offer a hand.  All requests were coldly turned down by the Europeans and Americans.  As the fire got bigger and closer to the waterfront the mass of humanity could go nowhere else, they were trapped by the Turks who refused to let them escape.  No food or water was allowed to the desperate people who, by now were hysterical.  Many were driven mad and they jumped into the ocean where they drowned.  Milton describes how the bay of Smyrna was filled with bodies; yet all those warships just stood there as if nothing was happening.

There is a heroic story in the book which gives some hope for the human condition.  Milton describes the heroic exploits of a Methodist preacher from New York, Asa Jennings.  A short, diminutive man with a large face, he arrived in Smyrna determined to do all he could to save as many as he could.  In one occasion he boarded an Italian ship and confronted the captain.  He asked for people to be let on board; the captain refused, saying he had orders not to intervene.  Refusing to take no for an answer he then went to the Italian Consul in Smyrna and confronted him.  He was able to get the Italian Consul to give the ship's captain permission to take on refugees which he did.  Later on Jennings goes to the nearby Greek Island of Mytilene.  He confronted the cowering remnant of the Greek fleet and convinced them that they need to go to Smyrna to save their fellow Greeks (most of the refugees were Greeks).  Over 20 empty ships were sitting in the harbor doing nothing.

The Greek Navy was hesitant to go back to Smyrna, fearing a Turkish attack.  Jennings tricked them by saying that the American ships there would protect them, although he had no approval of this.  The Greeks gave in and appointed Jennings as an Admiral and gave him command of about 20  Greek ships.  Jennings orders all ships to head to Smyrna to rescue the desperate people who would otherwise perish within days.  Through his efforts, over 300,000 people were rescued from the waterfront.  One man, on his own, did what the Allied powers, including the Americans, should have done, yet they watched a Christian city being raped and destroyed.

Smyrna, the jewel of Asia Minor, the Paris of the near east was completely burned to the ground.  It is estimated that over 100,000 Christians were slaughtered by the Turks in Smyrna; all civilians, all innocent people living in their homes as they and their forefathers had for centuries.  160,000 were deported into the interior by the Turks, most died from exhaustion on the way and many other were shot dead at the whim of their captors.  All of this happened while representatives of all the European powers watched.  How can this have happened?

Divided We Fall

When it comes to the conflict between Christians and Muslims the lack of any cooperation among Christians stands out.  A few examples:

1.  The Byzantine Empire falls to the Muslim Turks in 1453.   The Byzantine Empire was the eastern half of the Roman Empire.  After the fall of Rome around 460 AD, the eastern empire continued and prospered until its defeat by the Muslim Turks in 1453 with the fall of Constantinople.  The Muslims had been on the march, conquering surrounding territory ever since the death of Muhammad in 632 AD.

After the Christian schism  between the Roman church and the Greek church in 1054 AD the Roman and Greek (Byzantine) churches became enemies and have never reconciled to this day.  Nothing could have been more tragic in the history of Christendom.   This is the equivalent of a family divided.   In 1453 total victory arrived for the Muslims with the conquest and destruction of Constantinople, the seat of Christianity for 1300 years.  No Christian country in Europe offered any help.   Only seven hundred private soldiers from Genoa, Italy, led by Giovanni Giustiniani, a brilliant siege commander, came to aid Constantinople; they fought valiantly against overwhelming odds until they were overrun by the superior Turkish forces.  The Muslims did not stop with the Byzantine Empire; eventually they reached to gates of Vienna Austria in 1529 in their thirst for territory. The Europeans failed to see that the loss of the Byzantine Empire was not just a loss of territory but a religious defeat that would continue to harass them to this day.  We're still paying the cost of the loss of the Byzantine Empire today.  Lars Brownworth, in his book, Lost to the West, tells the story of the fall of the Byzantine Empire.

Some say that "war is not the answer."  The Europeans believed this and did nothing, but war continues to be waged upon Christians to this day without ceasing.  There are those who see a mountain and refuse to recognize it.  This is what most Christians are doing today when it comes to their Muslim opponents.

2.  At the end of World War I, the European allies, which included Britain, France, Italy, and Greece defeated the Ottoman Turks and Germany.  After 500 years, the Europeans had a chance to reverse all the Muslim advances of territory conquered by the Muslims.    When the victorious allies of WW I sat down to decide what to do with the defeated Ottoman Turks, they squabbled and could not come up with a cogent decision.  Finally, they acted - they decided to let Greece occupy Smyrna, a coastal city in Turkey - called Izmir today.  The Greeks, desiring to re-occupy their Byzantine land lost in 1453, moved out and occupied a large portion of Turkey.  They blundered militarily very badly and were crushed by the Turks, who took horrific revenge on anyone not of Turkish descent; committing unspeakable atrocities, including the genocide of 1.5 million Armenians.  No one knows of the atrocities committed by the Turks after the end of WW I.  We've heard of the Armenian genocide but not anything else.  I will review the book Paradise Lost, Smyrna 1922 in a later post.  This book details the Turkish atrocities in Turkey after they defeated the Greeks.

3.  Today, we still face a hostile Muslim foe.  The difference today is that it is not one country against another, but a fanatical part of Islam, in the name of Al Qaeda, Jihad and many others who still fight against the infidel, non-Muslims.  This war exploded on 9/11/2001 when Muslim terrorists attacked and murdered 3,000 Americans who were busy working at their desk in New York City.  Whereas before armies would attack and overrun territories, today the Muslim terrorists attack innocent people wherever they are. and murder them at will.  Muslim terrorists also attack other Muslims they disagree with such and they do in Pakistan and Iraq.

Historical Amnesia

According to the politically correct worldview, anyone who opposes the building of the World Trade Center Mosque, is intolerant, a bigot, or a racist; perhaps all of these.  When Bill O'Reilly appeared on the "View," a daytime soap opera of a TV talk show, two of the very liberal hosts, Joy Behar and Whoopie Goldberg, were so incensed when Bill suggested that building a Mosque next to the World Trade Center was an abomination that they stormed out of the set.  I'm sure they thought that Bill was all of the above.

I'm afraid that most people, including Bill O'Reilly, are for the most part, ignorant of history.  I find that most people I talk to are about the third grade level when it comes to history.  This is devastating to our worldview and our culture.  You cannot have a proper world view without knowing basic history.  Let's review here quickly why a Mosque near the World Trade Center in not appropriate.

 1.  Since the beginning of the Muslim religion, around 632 AD, the Muslims have made it their goal to conquer, convert, destroy and obliterate all vestiges of Christianity and replace it with Islam.   Why were we attacked on 9/11, for instance?  Whom had the United States attacked?  What was the reason for Pearl Harbor type of an attack on the United Sates?   When the Muslims conquer an area or a people, the will destroy all vestiges of the conquered people's religion, including churches.  They will take a Christian church and turn it into a Mosque. Historically, Muslims will erect a Mosque on the spot where there used to be a church, such as, Constantinople, Jerusalem and Cordoba in Spain.  Why did they call the Ground Zero project, "The Cordoba House"?

Let's take some examples of this destruction of conquered people's religion.  In the Sudan, there has been a war on Christians for over 30 years.  The goal of the Muslims in the Sudan is total elimination of Christians in Sudan.  Does Darfur mean anything to you?  A genocide against Christians is going on right now.

In 1974, Turkey, a Muslim country, forcibly conquered the island of Cyprus.  They've occupied half of the island ever since.  The other half is semi-independent.  The entire island, with a small Turkish minority had been Christian majority.  The Turks have demolished most, if not all of the Christian churches in their occupied half of the island. 

Smyrna, a coastal city in Asia Minor, part of Turkey, was majority Christian until 1922.  After the Ottoman Turks lost WW I they blamed the Christians of Smyrna for their troubles and accused them of undermining them.  They systematically killed all of them and burned the city to the ground.  This story is told in the new book "Paradise Lost" by Giles Milton, published in 2008.  This book is a compelling story that cannot be put down.  Superbly researched and written.  Milton recounts how the Christians were forcibly removed from their homes and marched through the desert until they died from exhaustion or were summarily murdered in cold blood.  Reading the story of Smyrna is a human  tragedy and a Holocaust of epic proportions, yet no one knows anything about it.  After the destruction of Smyrna, one of the seven cities of the seven churches of the New Testament, they re-named the city Izmir.  The Turks also renamed their capital of Constantinople - a thousand year old city, to Istanbul at the same time. Could there have been an anti-Christian reason for it?  Constantinople had been the capital of Christendom until it was conquered and destroyed by the Turks in 1453.  Smyrna, as noted earlier, was one of the original seven churches of the New Testament.  The entire country of Turkey was conquered from the Christian Byzantine Empire and made into an Islamic country.

2.  Amnesia, is a condition where one cannot remember even  one's own name.  The ignorance of history, especially the history of the persecution of Christians by Muslims is another amnesia.  This amnesia will do grave damage to our country.  Does anyone care?

3.  We can agree that not all Muslims are terrorists nor do they share the hatred of the United States. However, the Muslims of the world, in general, and the the Muslims of the United States in particular have failed to condemn the Muslim terrorists.  On the contrary, after 9/11, the Muslims of the Middle East celebrated the murder of US citizens. The developer of the Ground Zero Mosque, Faisal Abdul Rauf, stated in an interview by"60 Minutes" stated that the United States shares responsibility for 9/11. Click here to watch what he said.  He also refused to say if Hamas was a terrorist organization. Additionally, he refuses to discuss where the finances come from for the Mosque.

We Have Met the Enemy and it's Us

We just lost one of the best military commanders of our day, General Stanley McChrystal, the last commander in Afghanistan.  Those of us who love history and learn from it, know that no military, no matter how large or competent, can win without a brilliant military commander.  A good military commander is crucial to winning.  There are many examples:  General David Patreaus in Iraq.  As soon as General Patreaus was appointed to lead the Iraq war, he turned it around and we were successful.  General Norman Schwarzkopf the brilliant commander of the 1991 Gulf War.  It was in no small measure the ability of General Schwarzkopf that the US and coalition forces had such blitzkrieg success.

In World War II, it was the brilliance of Generals Eisenhower, Patton (check out this youTube video on Patton) and the British General Bernard Montgomery that the US and its allies won the war decisively.  On the German side, it was the brilliance of Generals such as General Erwin Rommel that they had the success that they had.  If you study the war in North Africa, you can see the military brilliance of this, one of the greatest military mind of all time.  Another brilliant German commander was General Friedrich Paulus, the commander of the German Sixth Army at Stalingrad in the Eastern Front.  Although the Germans lost this battle, it was not because of the leadership of General Paulus, but the insanity of Adolf Hitler who, basically condemned those who perished there to an avoidable death.  Hitler refused all advice by the commanders on the ground that they could not succeed given the weather, lack of equipment, food, proper winter clothing, and the obstacles that they faced.  Hitler refused to have his forces withdraw and condemned them to death.  The battle of Leningrad is, perhaps the saddest story in military history. Man's inhumanity to man screams out at you when you watch a documentary of this battle.  About two million soldiers and civilians died in 900 days of the siege.  Many starved to death or died of the freezing weather. Among the dead were soldiers from Russia, Germany, Italy, Hungary, Romania and other European countries.

In Roman days, the Battle of Cannae in 216 BC stands out.  A better equipped,  trained and numerically superior Roman Army was defeated by a lesser army commanded by one of the most brilliant military commanders of all time - Hannibal, the famous Carthaginian General and son of another famous Carthaginian General, Hasdrubal.  The Romans lost most of their 50,000 troops who engaged Hannibal at this site, the worst military defeat the Romans had ever had.  Again,  Hannibal won by his military brilliance over his Roman counterpart, the Roman Consul Varro.  When the battle was over, there were an estimated 60,000 dead bodies on the battlefield.  In comparison, the United States lost 59,000 dead in 10 years of the Vietnam war.  The battle of Cannae was so significant for military strategy that the US Military studies it to this day in the War College.

Back to General McChrystal.  As you are aware, the General was forced to retire after an unflattering article by the leftist magazine, Rolling Stone, called "The Runaway General."  Rolling Stone and their supporters are anti-war and  set out to sabotage the US military.  They caused our best general to leave the field.  As the saying goes:  with friends such as these who needs enemies.  The left is an enemy of the United States.  They only care for their ideology, not for the welfare of the United States - they are the enemy as much as the Taliban.

Mosque at Ground Zero & No Church in Saudi Arabia

In my last post I argued why it is a very bad idea to build a Mosque at Ground Zero in New York City. The mind boggling contradictions are never ending and stupefying as to why no one notices them. For one, in Muslim countries, Christians are not only persecuted but it is illegal to bring a Bible into one. In Saudi Arabia, as in all other Muslim countries you cannot build a Christian church anywhere. Can you imagine if we in the West had this rule? Can you imagine how the Muslims would be rampaging everywhere? Yet in Christian lands this discrimination goes unnoticed. We approved a Mosque on the site where the Muslims committed the worst atrocity in U.S. history, but no one complains about Christian persecution in Muslim lands.

The United States provides billions of dollars in aid to Muslim countries such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and so on yet we allow them to persecute our Christian brothers and sisters. Since 1979, for instance, the United States has provided Egypt with over one billion dollars in military aid. Just this past January, Egyptian Muslims killed six Christians as they were leaving their church. No one complains. Why does no one raise one finger against this?

In 1991, the United States went to war to liberate Kuwait, a Muslim country. Later in 1994 the United States went to rescue Muslims in Yugoslavia. In both campaigns many American soldiers were killed and the U.S. spent billions of dollars yet, we allow our Christian brothers and sisters to be persecuted in these same lands. In 2003, the United States went to war in Iraq to liberated the people from a murderous despot, yet no one notices all the atrocities against our Christian brothers.

Check out this short video on how Muslims like to build Mosques on sites they've conquered.

Condemned to Repeat it Again

Those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it as the noted philosopher George Santayana famously stated. We have a perfect example of this today. As you may have heard, American Muslims are trying to build a Mosque on the Ground Zero site in New York City. City fathers, including the current Mayor Bloomberg have approved the project. How can such an abomination go without notice, you may have asked? It boggles the mind to think that these city fathers are totally blind, deaf and dumb to history. I may have the answer to this blindness. I believe this is because the political left does not think critically, but emotionally. According to the left, if we are just nice to our enemies they will become our friends. President Obama is a big believer in this. His idea of dealing with Iran, for example, is to speak nice to them and negotiate ad nauseam. "Stupid is as stupid does" said that other philosopher, Forrest Gump. This tactic has never worked - it is known as appeasement. History has shown that this is a bankrupt policy; just ask Neville Chamberlain, the British Prime Minister in 1939.

Let's start with a little history. Muhammad charged his followers to conquer and kill the infidel according to Surah 9:5 in the Koran. When the Muslims first conquered what is now the area of Israel, they built their most important Mosque, the Dome of the Rock, on top of the Jewish Temple, the holiest site in Judaism. They did this for two major reasons: To show the world that they had replaced Judaism and Christianity as the only true religion and to show the world that they now rule - it was an "in your face" show of force and raw arrogance. Such humiliation of Judaism and Christianity later led to the Crusades.

To put this act in modern day terms, this Muslim act would be like having a Muslim army conqueror Rome, demolish the Vatican and build a Mosque right on top of it. Can you understand the arrogance of it?

Fast forward to what we talked about at the beginning of this piece. The scene is New York City. In the year 2001 AD Muslims hijack numerous American commercial jets full of travelers and crash them into the World Trade Center, a site very much representing American economic success and power. This murderous act killed over 3,000 innocent Americans. Now, nearly 10 years later, they want to build a grand Mosque on the site their followers destroyed in their attempt to kill the infidel. The city fathers not only not object but approved the project. Stupid is as stupid does. There is no other description here.

The Bankruptcy of Socialism

Socialism is a bankrupt political and economic philosophy. This is not just an opinion but is borne out by history and facts. Let's look at a socialist country such as Italy. In Italy, for example, unemployment in the last seven years has been between 7.5% to 9.10%. What is most disturbing though, is the youth rate of unemployment which usually hovers around 30%. This is devastating to any economy.

Why is this the case? It is very simple. A socialist system such as in Italy, discourages employers from hiring. This is due to the fact that unions have a virtual stranglehold on the economy. You see, in Italy workers are practically guaranteed a job once they're employed. An employer cannot fire them unless there are unusual circumstances. It is not hard to figure out that no employer would hire a worker, knowing that he can never get rid of him/her, so employers do not hire. This in turn has the devastating consequences that follow. In the United States, we just had an example of what socialist policies can do. One of the biggest companies in the world, GM, had to be rescued from bankruptcy by the U.S. government. The main reason for this failure was that the unions strangled GM into bankruptcy. GM was paying nearly full salaries to workers that were laid off - a requirement of the union. What started out as a movement to aid the workers, has resulted in the workers getting shafted by unions. Unions only care about their own power, they care little for the common man.

Despite this glaring example, socialism is on the rise in South America and now in the United States with the Obama Administration. Socialism flies in the face of sound economics policy, yet we keep on going to it. This type of behavior is self-destructive. When will they learn? They never will because socialism is not about sound economic policy, it's about making people feel good, it's an emotion not a reasonable position. Socialists will never understand this. This is what we have coming to America.

The Turks Aim for Europe

The New York Times reports today that Turkey is nearly ready to join the European Union. I have no doubt that Turkey will be admitted sooner or later by the Europeans. What is a puzzle is that Turkey is still regarded as a legitimate country at all. Turkey was established by the conquest in 1453 of the Byzantine Empire, a Christian country. As you may remember, Constantinople was the center of Christianity for a thousand years. Today, Christians are persecuted in Turkey and can't even have a seminary. Christian churches, the very few that have not been demolished, cannot even ring a bell without permission, usually not approved.

The Muslims, remember, had their goal since Muhammad to conquer all non Muslim lands. From the seventh century on the Muslims pursued this goal with reckless abandon. When in 1453, the rest of Europe slept and refused to help their Christian brothers in Constantinople after numerous desperate pleading from the last Byzantine Emperor, Constantine XI, the Ottoman Turks took advantage of the weakness and conquered this sovereign Christian country. "War was not the answer" then too.

After conquering Byzantium, the Turks proceeded to commit genocide on all Christians and turn all Christian churches to Muslim Mosques. Today, the non-Muslim world is careful not to offend the Muslims. Funny, that the Muslims have never had this problem. They've left no opportunity to crush Christians at every opportunity. On the other hand, in the West, if someone speaks ill of anything Muslim they are targeted, yet when Muslims persecute and eliminate Christians no one even notices and no one says anything nor complains. What am I missing here?

When Will They Learn?

Have you noticed how socialism has experienced a strong resurgence in the world? If you look at Europe, socialism reins unabated. All European countries have socialized medicine. All of them, with few exceptions, have a political system that can only be described as hard left. Just look at Spain and Greece for instance. Both countries have socialist governments; both are nearly broke and waiting to be rescued by their sister Europeans. Let's move to South America. All South American countries are ruled by socialist regimes. All of them, with the exception of Chile, are nearly broke. The only reason Chile is not as bad as the others is because Chile has followed a more capitalist form of government and because it follows free market economics more than the others. How about Venezuela? Ruled by a self-proclaimed socialist and lover of Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez has succeeded in ruining this rich country.

Let's now look at our own back yard, the USA. With the administration of Barack Obama, a swing toward socialism has begun. Just look at all the spending that has happened in the last year. Are we better off today than when this spending started? NO.

Now, the important question. Can you name one socialist country that has been an economic success? NO. Then why have we not learned our lesson? This is a rhetorical question that I keep asking. I've found no answer. Socialist like Keynesian economics - the idea that government spending is what will cure economics problems. Question again: When has a country, and which one, has had any success with government spending? The answer is none. When will they learn?

Repeating Another Economics Mistake With Obamacare

Philosopher George Santayana stated a now famous proverb that "those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it." The best current example of this is what just happened in the United Sates with the huge government spending in rescuing the criminals of Wall Street who took us over the financial cliff by their irresponsible speculation, led by Wall St. big-wig, Bernie Madoff. Madoff was the only one to go to jail so far, the rest got bailed out by the taxpayers and the socialist policies of President Obama. If this was not enough, Obama has now passed health care reform, commonly referred to as"Obamacare;" increasing government spending like drunken sailors on a night out.

Historians have confirmed that the heavy government expenditure by the FDR administration during the depression of the 1930s did nothing to end the depression. In today's Wall Street Journal this point is well documented in an article titled "Did FDR End the Depression?" After all the spending made by the Roosevelt administration in its first eight years, the unemployment rate in 1939 was at the same rate as in 1932 - 20%. Obviously we've failed to learn from history so we have been condemned to repeat it. In Europe where they did not have such government spending the unemployment rate was 12% during the same period according to the article.

Another historical economics lesson we've failed to learn is minimum wage laws. In his popular book, "Basic Economics" economist Thomas Sowell states: "By the simplest and most basic economics, a price artificially raised tends to cause more to be supplied and less to be demanded than when prices are left to be determined by the free market." Economist in the US, Europe and Canada have long known that minimum wage laws have the opposite effect, increasing unemployment, yet we routinely keep passing these damaging laws. The main reason, for this is thought to be that this is popular for politicians and will gain them goodwill from the voters, even though it makes no economic sense.

The Crusades: Facts vs. Fiction - A Very Brief History of the Crusades

If you were asked to explain what the Crusades were could you give a clear response? The Crusades are the most misunderstood, maligned and falsified historical story ever told. If you’re a product of a U.S. University or any other school system you’ve probably been told that the Crusades were a Christian atrocity committed against the Muslims and that is why they hate us today. Since this is a huge subject I will try to be brief in what I discuss. First, I want to clarify what the Crusades were in fact, second I want to provide some documentation and examples of what really happened. Finally, I will make an objective assessment of the Crusades as well. As Sergeant Friday of Dragnet fame would say: “Just the facts ma’am.”

If you listen to the popular culture of today you hear that the Crusades were a Christian holocaust against the Muslims and we, as Christians, should not only be ashamed, we should apologize. In fact Pope John Paul II in the year 2000 did apologize to Muslims for the Crusades. Muslims, in turn, say that their hatred of the West is due, in part, to the Crusades. Former President Bill Clinton, when he spoke after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on the Twin Towers in New York City made this statement: “Those of us who come from various European lineages are not blameless” vis-à-vis the Crusades as a crime against Islam. He then summarized a medieval account about all the blood that was shed when Godfrey Bouillon and his forces in the First Crusade, conquered Jerusalem in 1099.[i]  This is representative of what our culture today believes about the Crusades. Most people have bought into the lie. The truth is that the Crusades were not unprovoked, as you will see here.

First, the Crusades were not a Christian holocaust or genocide against the Muslims, it was quite the opposite. Let’s start from the beginning. After the death of Muhammad in 632 AD, the Muslims began a military conquest that started in modern day Saudi Arabia. In what became known as his farewell address, Muhammad told his followers: “I was ordered to fight all men until they say, “There is no god but Allah.”[ii] The Muslims aim was to conquer the entire world and make everyone convert to Islam. They proceeded to conquer militarily all of the Middle East, Asia Minor, modern day Turkey, and large parts of Europe, including Sicily, Southern Italy, Cyprus, Sardinia, Corsica, Crete and Spain. North African, also fell to the Muslim onslaught. All of these conquered areas were Christian territory.

When the Muslims conquered Jerusalem, they desecrated all Christian shrines and murdered all the Christians and Jews that they found there. Many were brutally butchered like animals. The holiest site in Jerusalem, the Temple, was desecrated and replaced with the Muslim Dome of the Rock, still standing today, to symbolize that Islam had succeeded Judaism and Christianity; the dome was built between 685 to 691 AD.

The Crusaders had some military successes but all were short lived. The Muslims, in turn, showed no mercy. In 1266, in a battle in Egypt, the Crusaders were forced to surrender. They negotiated surrender to the Muslim commander named Baibars. Baibars agreed to allow the Crusaders to leave unharmed if they turned over the fort they occupied. The Crusaders agreed, opened the gates and let the Muslims in. The Muslims, in turn, failed to keep their promise, seized all the Crusaders and beheaded all of them. In 1268, this same Baibars, conquered Jaffa, in modern day Israel, and butchered all the inhabitants.

The Christian Byzantine Empire which was surrounded by the hostile Muslim Turks, appealed to the Europeans for help since the Turks had conquered a large part of their empire. The Europeans were becoming very alarmed. On November 27, 1095, Pope Urban II, in the French City of Clermont, in front of a large crowd, gave an impassioned speech that moved the large crowd. He called for the First Crusade, in large part due to the Muslim conquest and the slaughter of all the Christians, but also because of reports that Christian pilgrims to Jerusalem were being murdered along the way. Rodney Stark, in his book God’s Battalions, lists some Muslim atrocities of Christian pilgrims: Early in the eighth century, seventy Christian pilgrims were murdered. Shortly thereafter 60 pilgrims were crucified in Jerusalem. In 796 Muslims burned to death twenty monks in front of the Monastery of Mar Saba. In 809 multiple attacks occurred in many churches, convents and monasteries in and around Jerusalem, many were raped and murdered.[iii]

By the late 11^th Century, the Christians of Europe were well aware of all that Christendom had lost, as well as the atrocities committed against their brothers and sisters. They had seen the Holy Land conquered and their fellow Christians murdered, crucified and annihilated like street dogs. They had seen the land of the New Testament, modern day Turkey, conquered. Most Byzantine Christians were forced to flee their homes and country, knowing that the Muslims would persecute or kill them outright. Today, the population of Turkey, the land of the New Testament and the Seven Churches is 99.8% Muslim. The few remaining Christians live under severe oppression and religious persecution.

Warfare during the period of Muhammad and the Middle Ages, was exceptionally brutal. They had no Geneva Convention that we have today where we prescribe rules for treating combatants and prisoners. In this period, for example, if a besieged city failed to surrender upon request and the attacking forces were successful in overrunning it, they would slaughter everyone they found in the city as an example to others. Everyone would be killed, men, women and children. Not one person or animal would be left standing. The Muslims used this tool to deadly effectiveness wherever they conquered. After all inhabitants were killed, the city would be burned and razed to the ground. Today, Muslims complain that we have prisoners of war in Guantanamo, Cuba where they’re treated like honored guests at a five star hotel. President Obama ordered it closed so that the world would like us better and they would stop attacking us.

It is no secret that Muslim governments practice religious persecutions against Christians. These persecutions go on today unabated. In an article in the “Weekly Standard” February 1, 2010 issue, entitled “Bare Ruined Choirs,” it describes the persecution going on in the island of Cyprus. In 1974 Turkey attacked Cyprus and still occupies half of the island today. During this time Turkey has destroyed many Christian churches: “Some of the recent destruction, such as the bulldozing of St. Catherine Church in Gerani in the summer of 2008, and cannibalizing for buildings in the nearby village of Trikomo. Incidentally, the razing of St. Catherine is not an isolated case: In the past five years 15 churches have been leveled.”

The Crusades were private armies recruited by nobles, knights and individuals. Most Crusaders were French, and a smaller percentage were German. The French were commonly referred to as Franks. King Richard the Lion Hearted of England led the Third Crusade from 1188 to 1192. King Richard was a brilliant military commander and he had the best success against the Muslims, due in large part to the exceptional discipline of his troops and his leadership ability. King Louis of France, who later was made a saint, St. Louis, led two Crusades from 1249 to 1252. In all there were eight Crusades from 1095 to the beginning of the fourteenth century, around 1305 AD. The Crusaders were motivated by piety – they wanted to reclaim the Holy Land from the infidels. Crusaders had to raise their own funds. Most sold all they had to go on the Crusades. Most Crusaders never made it back home. In the First Crusade, it was estimated that 130,000 departed. Only 15,000 survived to return home. About half of the casualties were due to health, disease or the stress of the trip, the other half died in battle.

I want to make it clear here that I am not approving of the Crusades or what they did, on the contrary, the Crusades were a bitter disappointment and a monumental disaster of epic proportions. Every one of the eight Crusades committed atrocities, not only against Muslims, but also against their own Christian brothers and sisters and Jews. The Crusades were a very sad chapter in human history. What they did cannot be excused. So what did they do? Right from the beginning, as some Crusaders left Europe, they committed atrocities that were totally uncalled for or necessary.

The Crusaders that left Europe made it a point to meet in Constantinople so they could martial their forces before heading towards Jerusalem. From the start, they committed unspeakable atrocities against Jews and other Christians. For example, in the First Crusade, led by Peter the Hermit, as they left Germany along the Rhine Valley the Crusaders attacked and slaughtered the Jewish populations of Speyer. In another German city of Worms, the Bishop tried to protect the Jews, the Crusaders broke down the walls of the Bishop’s compound and murdered about 500 Jews. This was repeated again in Cologne and in Metz.[iv]

In the modern city of Split, former Yugoslavia, this Christian city was attacked and plundered with many Christians murdered like dogs. Constantinople itself, the jewel of Christendom of their day was attacked and plundered by Crusaders of the fourth Crusade. The City was burned to the ground and robbed of most of its treasure. The list goes on and on.

Conclusion

The Crusades were a total disaster in any human term, but they are not what Muslims say they were or why they hate us today. They are not what our popular culture tells us today. The Crusades, even though a complete and total failure, were started with good intentions due to the fact that they had lost so much Christian territory and so many fellow Christians to the Muslim sword. It is fine to give an opinion on the Crusades, but first we must be informed with the truth. Good intentions are not enough. They must be followed with good works. We cannot say that about the Crusades. We cannot deny the truth.

Recommended Reading and References

1. Stark, Rodney, God’s Battalions, The Case for the Crusades, Harper One, 2009

2. Madden, Thomas F., The New Concise History of the Crusades, Rowan & Littlefield Publishers Inc. 2005.

3. Brownworth, Lars, Lost to the West, Crown Publishers, 2009

4. Pod cast by Lars Brownworth on the history of the Byzantine Empire called 12 Byzantine Rulers can be downloaded on iTunes or at: http://www.losttothewest.com/ Although this deals with Byzantine Empire it also covers some great information of the Crusades. This 17-part pod cast is terrific. Brownworth is a master storyteller.

5. Why You Are Wrong About the Crusades, by Lars Brownworth is a short article on his “Lost to the West” web site mentioned earlier. 

6. Ibrahim, Raymond, Sword and Scimitar, 14 Centuries of war between Islam and the West, Da Capo Press, 2018.  This book lists all the famous battles and goes into detail of all the atrocities. Highly recommended.

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[i] Stark, Rodney, 2009, God’s Battalions, The Case for the Crusades, Harper One, p.5.

[ii] Ibid, p.12

[iii] Ibid p.85

[iv] Ibid p.126