Stirring the Islamic pot a rash policy when borders are open.

By Gary Scarrabelotti

Multiple terrorist attacks in Paris, beginning on the evening of November 13, are another grim lesson in the folly of western nations and of the policies they pursue.  Bad policy brings murder in the streets.

How did the West get to be here? 

Domestics

Many and complex are the factors in play.  At the same time, they are not incomprehensible.  The main lines are clear enough and a hierarchy of policy failures has taken definite shape.  In fact, the blunders of the first rank, shared by all western nations, are (literally) bleeding obvious: 

• Culturally colour-blind immigration policies; 

• The illusion that the European experiment in multi-culturalism –  which assumed, crucially, a broadly common culture transcending ethnic and linguistic diversity – can be extended to include Islam; 

• A carefully cultivated ignorance about Islam on the part of the West’s post-Christian political and cultural elites. 

November 13 would not have happened were it not for Islamic immigration. There would be no need, moreover, for the draconian counter-terrorism laws with which we have saddled ourselves were it not for our see nothing, hear nothing immigration policies. 

Adopting a bogus moral posture, every western country — Australia self-righteously included — has inflicted immeasurable damage upon the peace and good order of their homelands.  In our own case, the political class that has led us — by the nose — since the election of the Whitlam government in 1972 has much to answer for. 

November 13 would not have happened were it not for Islamic immigration.

Foreign blunders

The second rank failures relate to foreign policy. 

In its forays into Middle East and Central Asia, the West has been stirring unconscionably the Islamic pot: a rash thing to do when your borders are open and the lure of living off the fat of a European welfare state is very powerful. 

After destroying first Iraq, then Libya; after the futility of Afghanistan hit home and the troops were withdrawn; and after pulling the plug on Egypt’s President Mubarak only to accept meekly, 30 chaotic months later, the restoration of military rule: one might have thought that the USA, and its allies, would have paused for reflection. 

But, no, dabble in Syria we must.  Freedom, democracy – or something: but not, apparently, secularism – was said to be at stake. 

Today the hapless Europeans — too weak militarily to assert the independence that their sense of superiority demands — are on the front line and copping Islamist “blow back” from America’s imperial ventures. 

It’s been obvious, since the outbreak of civil war in Syria in May 2011, that it was in the interest of western bloc nations, and especially of the Europeans, either to back Bashar al-Assad or to back off. But again we all slid in behind the Americans — though some wanted to get out in front — when, in fact, there was reason to share some serious questions with our great and powerful leader.

Please explain 

Like, given the death and destruction we rained upon Iraq, didn’t we have a moral obligation to maintain a blocking force there as a guarantor of minimum stability? 

And, after the operations of Al-Qaida in Iraq had been checked during 2006-07, what happened to all the guns and money supplied to the Sunni “Anbar Awakening”? Did the “Awakening” movement reactivate itself within Syria once the Sunni uprising broke out there?  Surely, longstanding cross-border connections between Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis suggested the possibility? 

Also, was the USA really caught off guard by the rise of ISIS and its invasion of Iraq in June 2014?  There are suggestions that US intelligence knew all about ISIS at least as far back as August 2012 and foresaw, with equanimity, the rise of an anti-Assad “Salafist principality” in eastern Syria adjacent to the Iraq provinces of Mosul and Anbar. [1]

Finally, why were we letting a NATO member, Turkey, stoke civil war in Syria and add thereby masses of Syrian refugees to those already flowing out of Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran? Wasn’t there a risk, in letting Turkey become a storehouse of refugees, that she would gain a strategic advantage over Europe if she chose to unleash them when it suited her purpose? 

Apropos, note the wince-making performance of German Chancellor Angela Merkel when, last month, she rushed to Ankara to beg of President  Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Turkey’s help with stemming Europe’s refugee crisis. She came armed with billions and a promise to fast-track Turkey’s application to join the EU. 

America has a longstanding penchant for backing Islamic radicals: Shiites against the Shah; Sunnis against the Soviets; now Sunnis against Syria’s dictator.  Getting entangled in this game is a dangerous business.  Especially if you are weak, you can get invaded by the fleeing masses. In such a condition, the prudent course today is “Don’t Bashar Assad.”