(Commentary by Mathias Dapfner CEO, Axel Springer, AG)
A few days ago Henry Broder wrote in Welt am Sonntag, "Europe - your
family name is appeasement." It's a phrase you can't get out of your head
because it's so terribly true.
Appeasement cost millions of Jews and non-Jews their lives as England and
France, allies at the time, negotiated and hesitated too long before they
noticed that Hitler had to be fought, not bound to toothless agreements.
Appeasement legitimized and stabilized Communism in the Soviet Union, then
East Germany, then all the rest of Eastern Europe where for decades,
inhuman, suppressive, murderous governments were glorified as the
ideologically correct alternative to all other possibilities.
Appeasement crippled Europe when genocide ran rampant in Kosovo, and even
though we had absolute proof of ongoing mass-murder, we Europeans debated
and debated and debated, and were still debating when finally the Americans
had to come from halfway around the world, into Europe yet again, and do
our work for us.
Rather than protecting democracy in the Middle East, European appeasement,
camouflaged behind the fuzzy word "equidistance," now countenances suicide
bombings in Israel by fundamentalist Palestinians.
Appeasement generates a mentality that allows Europe to ignore nearly
500,000 victims of Saddam's torture and murder machinery and, motivated by
the self-righteousness of the peace-movement, has the gall to issue bad
grades to George Bush... Even as it is uncovered that the loudest critics
of the American action in Iraq made illicit billions, no, TENS of billions,
in the corrupt U.N. Oil-for-Food program.
And now we are faced with a particularly grotesque form of appeasement...
How is Germany reacting to the escalating violence by Islamic
fundamentalists in Holland and elsewhere? By suggesting that we really
should have a "Muslim Holiday" in Germany.
I wish I were joking, but I am not. A substantial fraction of our (German)
Government, and if the polls are to be believed, the German people,
actually believe that creating an Official State "Muslim Holiday" will
somehow spare us from the wrath of the fanatical Islamists.
One cannot help but recall Britain's Neville Chamberlain waving the
laughable treaty signed by Adolf Hitler, and declaring European "Peace in
our time".
What else has to happen before the European public and its political
leadership get it? There is a sort of crusade underway, an especially
perfidious crusade consisting of systematic attacks by fanatic Muslims,
focused on civilians, directed against our free, open Western societies,
and intent upon Western Civilization's utter destruction.
It is a conflict that will most likely last longer than any of the great
military conflicts of the last century - a conflict conducted by an enemy
that cannot be tamed by "tolerance" and "accommodation" but is actually
spurred on by such gestures, which have proven to be, and will always be
taken by the Islamists for signs of weakness.
Only two recent American Presidents had the courage needed for
anti-appeasement: Reagan and Bush.
His American critics may quibble over the details, but we Europeans know
the truth. We saw it first hand: Ronald Reagan ended the Cold War, freeing
half of the German people from nearly 50 years of terror and virtual
slavery. And Bush, supported only by the Social Democrat Blair, acting on
moral conviction, recognized the danger in the Islamic War against
democracy. His place in history will have to be evaluated after a number of
years have passed.
In the meantime, Europe sits back with charismatic self-confidence in the
multicultural corner, instead of defending liberal society's values and
being an attractive center of power on the same playing field as the true
great powers, America and China.
On the contrary - we Europeans present ourselves, in contrast to those
"arrogant Americans", as the World Champions of "tolerance", which even
(Germany's Interior Minister) Otto Schily justifiably criticizes. Why?
Because we're so moral? I fear it's more because we're so materialistic, so
devoid of a moral compass.
For his policies, Bush risks the fall of the dollar, huge amounts of
additional national debt, and a massive and persistent burden on the
American economy - because unlike almost all of Europe, Bush realizes what
is at stake - literally everything.
While we criticize the "capitalistic robber barons" of America because they
seem too sure of their priorities, we timidly defend our Social Welfare
systems. Stay out of it! It could get expensive! We'd rather discuss
reducing our 35-hour workweek or our dental coverage, or our 4 weeks of
paid vacation... Or listen to TV pastors preach about the need to "reach
out to terrorists. To understand and forgive".
These days, Europe reminds me of an old woman who, with shaking hands,
frantically hides her last pieces of jewelry when she notices a robber
breaking into a neighbor's house.
after hundreds, and hundreds of years of fighting each other; now they don't have the stomach to fight. we shall see when the terrorist start hitting them.
__________________
MOE! LARRY! THE CHEESE!
Life Member the Elmer Fudd Hunt Club
just so you all know, Switzerland will kick the bajeebus out of anyone who f**ks with them. they aren't neutral because they don't want to fight, they're neutral because nobody wants to fight them!
The Europeans did not seem to be in a great hurry to stop the "ethnic cleansing" when Yugoslavia fell apart. And that was IN Europe!
Why do the European nations continue to ignore the genocides in Africa? Why does the European Union refuse to intervene in current the Sudanese emergency?
I mean, beyond the OBVIOUS reason...
__________________
"Good. Bad. I'm the guy with the gun." - Ash
gunssb - I think it is head up the butt instead of sand - probably the same difference. They are elitist peices of char - they think thier pooh do not stink and they couldn't be more wrong. They don't see it because they do not want to see it. It screws up thier perfect world.
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They should have stopped at "Congress shall make no law"
The Europeans did not seem to be in a great hurry to stop the "ethnic cleansing" when Yugoslavia fell apart. And that was IN Europe!
Why do the European nations continue to ignore the genocides in Africa? Why does the European Union refuse to intervene in current the Sudanese emergency?
I mean, beyond the OBVIOUS reason...
Not just the "European" nations, it was the United Nations,
America included.
The term "ethnic cleansing" entered the English lexicon as a loan translation of the Serbian/Croatian phrase etničko čišćenje (IPA /etnitʃko tʃiʃtʃʲeɲe/) (notice that literal translation of the phrase is "ethnic cleaning"). During the 1990s it was used extensively by the media in the former Yugoslavia in relation to the Yugoslav wars, and appears to have been popularised by the international media some time around 1992. The term may have originated some time before the 1990s in the military doctrine of the former Yugoslav People's Army, which spoke of "cleansing the territory" (čišćenje terena, IPA /tʃiʃtʃʲeɲe terena/) of enemies to take total control of a conquered area. The origins of this doctrine are unclear, but may have been a legacy of the Partizan era.
This originally applied purely to military enemies, but came to be applied to other ethnic groups as well. It was used in this context in Yugoslavia by the Serbian media as early as 1981, in relation to the policies of the Kosovo Albanian administration allegedly creating an "ethnically clean territory" (i.e. "cleanly" Albanian) in the province. However, this usage had antecedents.
The earliest known usage of it may been in May 16, 1941, during the Second World War, by one Viktor Gutić, a commander in the Croatian fascist faction the Ustaše. An article in the Hrvatska Krajina newspaper[1] (http://www.pavelicpapers.com/documen.../ndhn0004.html) describing the visit to the Franciscan monastery in Petrićevac quotes Gutić's speech:
Every Croat who today solicits for our enemies not only is not a good Croat, but also an opponent and disrupter of the prearranged, well-calculated plan for cleansing [čišćenje] our Croatia of unwanted elements [...]
The Ustaše did indeed carry out large-scale ethnic cleansing in their time, similar to other warring parties in Yugoslavia in the Second World War. It is possible that the revival of nationalism in the 1980s reintroduced ethnic cleansing into Yugoslavia's political debate and language.
A similar term with the same intent was used by the Nazi administration in Germany under Adolf Hitler 50 years earlier. When an area under Nazi control had its entire Jewish population removed, whether by driving the population out, by deportation to Concentration Camps, and/or murder, the area was declared judenrein (lit. Jew Clean): cleansed of jews. (cf. racial hygiene.)
Not just the "European" nations, it was the United Nations,
America included.
I am afraid that you misunderstood my point. Even when confronted with a situation requiring military intervention immediately within their own backyard the European governments avoided taking action until the situation had escalated to catastrophic proportions.
By the time they acted, through the UN and NATO, the United States was also directly involved, even though the US is much further removed from the situation than the Europeans.
I interpret this to be a tacit admission by these governments that they are unable to take military action without the leadership, support, and involvement of the US. At the same time they are openly critical of the US for this behavior. Countries like the United Kingdom and Poland are criticized as “lap dogs” for daring to intervene as well.
__________________
"Good. Bad. I'm the guy with the gun." - Ash
"We believe that America is weaker than Russia and from what we have heard from our brothers who waged jihad in Somalia, they found to their greatest surprise the weakness, frailness and cowardliness of the American soldier. When only eight of them were killed they packed up in the darkness of night and escaped without looking back"
just so you all know, Switzerland will kick the bajeebus out of anyone who f**ks with them. they aren't neutral because they don't want to fight, they're neutral because nobody wants to fight them!
look at the guns they make!
how do you know that ???
the Swiss have not been in a conflict for hundreds of years. how do you know if they are up to snuff if they were forced to fight??? so they got good toys, don't mean the soldier has what it takes.
__________________
MOE! LARRY! THE CHEESE!
Life Member the Elmer Fudd Hunt Club
"We believe that America is weaker than Russia and from what we have heard from our brothers who waged jihad in Somalia, they found to their greatest surprise the weakness, frailness and cowardliness of the American soldier. When only eight of them were killed they packed up in the darkness of night and escaped without looking back"
from Wikipedia..search "Ethnic Cleansing" 
