The shocking murder of Father Hamel, his throat slit by an ISIS terrorist whilst saying Holy Mass, in the church where he served as an auxiliary priest, Saint Étienne-du-Rouvray, Rouen, France, on July 26, has confirmed even to liberals that the West is in a religious war. We have been since 9/11, but it has taken this latest atrocity to get liberals and the media to grasp the fact.
I respectfully agree with Archbishop Fisher of Sydney that Father Hamel died in odium fidei, i.e. because of his faith, making him a martyr. He should be declared a saint by the Vatican, but we can bank on the Jesuit Pope Francis holding up sainthood. The martyred priest was a Catholic, don’t forget, not a Jesuit.
The killers were two ISIS terrorists, Adel Kermiche and Abdel Malik Petitjean, each known to the French authorities. Kermiche was on a tag, for heaven’s sake! The terms of his tag allowed him to roam free to murder priests between the hours of 0830 and 1230. Presumably, murder after lunch is frowned upon by the French authorities. Kermiche had previously tried, twice, to travel to Syria, doubtless with a view to murdering more people there.
Who are we fighting?
There has been hideous confusion in the minds of liberals, weanies and the media (some people are all three, of course) since 9/11. In particular they do not understand Islam. When national security experts talk of a Clash of Civilisations, they are not talking of a war against all of Islam.
Islam is an even more divided religion than Christianity. For a more detailed response you would need to ask a theologian, but broadly speaking your basic Moslem will be one of six different types: Shi’ite, Sunni, Salafi, Sufi, Wahhabi or Ismaili. Even that basic categorisation is disputed – Salafism is sometimes referred to as a Sunni sect, e.g., and Salafis are often described as Wahhabis, although the latter sect grew up in Saudi Arabia and Salafism kicked off in India.
We are not at war with all of these sects, only the Shi’ites, the Salafis and the Wahhabis. To be more precise, since they started it, they are at war with us. Those who deny the existence of a Clash of Civilisations remind me a little of those on Sunday December 7 1941 who didn’t think that America was at war with Japan. Maybe not, but Japan sure as hell was at war with America. Dusty Miller worked it out pretty quickly, grabbed the nearest 50 cal. and started shooting at Japs, God Bless him. Others’ thought processes were a little slower.
Sufis and Ismailis tend to be quite nice people. There are nice Shi’ites and nice Salafists as well, just as there were nice Nazis, but that doesn’t mean that we’re not at war with them.
The erroneous idea that if someone is nice or charming they cannot be the enemy has been pervasive for decades. Heinrich Himmler was quite charming and threw a great drinks party – I’ve known at least two people in my time who were at that famous drinks party he threw at the ’37 Nuremberg party rally. That didn’t mean that he wasn’t evil.
It’s as silly as a liberal man saying that Germany could not possibly be in a quasi-war with us, as he’d met a bloke called Herman in a gay bar in Hamburg and he turned out to be very nice, and a great shag. I’ve met at least six nice ‘Jerries’, one of them the then German Ambassador, but that doesn’t mean that Germany’s not the enemy.
Many Moslems will have been appalled by the murder of Father Hamel, indeed the local imam refused to bury one of the Islamic terrorists who murdered the good father. This does not mean that there is not a Clash of Civilizations. The minority of murderous Islamic fanatics is simply too large.
Moslem leaders have known since 9/11 that they needed to sort out their fanatics, and that if they didn’t they’d be in a full-scale religious war. They did nothing and now they’ve bought themselves a war.
Just as many good Moslems will side with the West in the Holy Crusade Against Evil which is the Global War on Terror, and have sided with us (Abdul Haq in Afghanistan springs to mind – he was a man of considerable quality), so too does being an atheist or an agnostic not excuse you from siding with the Good Guys. I’m not religious – I’m an Anglican, for heaven’s sake – but I know which side I’m on.
The Nazis were the Bad Guys in World War II and also happened to be atheists. That did not mean that atheists in Britain and America had an excuse not to fight.
The good news is that God is on our side, because we’re the Good Guys, and with His help we’re going to win. The Islamic enemy are going to lose, the suckers.
The consequences
These are going to be severe. The likeliest political consequence is a large number of Catholic voters going over to the National Front. Marine Le Pen was always likely to reach the final two in the French presidential race next year, but now she’s looking like the winner. The Islamic enemy may then find out that, to coin a phrase, Le Pen is mightier than the sword.
There is also likely to be a tightening up of French internal security. Too many Islamic terrorists have been getting inside help for someone in DGSI not to have noticed. Hollande isn’t going to do anything about the German black agency in Paris, but if Le Pen wins, she might.
All Western countries are going to have to review their immigration policies. Donald Trump has a point. Too many Moslems have failed to integrate and importing more just makes the problem worse. We need to concentrate on better integrating those already here into our societies, and deporting those who threaten national security.
In the UK Moslem immigration is largely dependent upon four factors – the UN Refugee Convention, the European Convention on Human Rights, the European Economic Area order and arranged marriages. All four routes into the UK need to be closed off.
The US should also denounce the UN Refugee Convention, in favour of a policy of regional asylum, emphasising temporary refuge. Granting refugees permanent resident status or citizenship is madness. The Refugee Convention was designed to deal with very different circumstances in the wake of World War II. It is badly drafted, outdated and needs to go.
Finally this shocking murder will increase the impetus to go back on the offensive in the Global War on Terror. Father Hamel’s violent death points out the failure of President Hollande’s and President Obama’s policy of appeasing terror.
MH370 Update
I predicted in 2014 that we would continue to see bogus ‘evidence’ re the loss of MH370. There isn’t a government in the world with the guts to face up to the fact that the airliner was shot down by the Chinese PLA/Navy.
Canberra is running as far away from the truth as everybody else. In recent months we have been favoured with mysterious bits of wreckage turning up on beaches. This week’s nonsense is a report from Aussie air accident investigators, so slow on the uptake that they still haven’t worked out that those DH86As before the war were sabotaged, suggesting that Captain Shah had plotted a route over the Indian Ocean on a home simulator.
I think we will find that the route was entered after he was murdered as part of the cover-up of Chinese involvement in the shoot-down, but it matters not. As Canberra well knows, since the alleged route over the Indian Ocean was within range of the RAAF’s excellent Jindalee Over The Horizon Radar network, MH370 never went anywhere near the Indian Ocean.
Tony Abbott, likely to be Oz’s next Prime Minister, after that clown, no offense intended, Malcolm Turnbull, is thrown out by his party room, also knows this, partly because I tipped him off, through a cut-out. Time to come to the party, Tony – why not use this latest nonsense as the trigger for a no-confidence vote?
Movie Review: Twelve O’Clock High (1949, dir. Henry King)
Recently repeated on British TV this great war movie repays watching again. It’s easy to forget how good it is. If you haven’t seen it, you should.
Gregory Peck, one of my all-time favorite actors, gives one of the greatest performance of his career. There is also a great supporting cast. Dean Jagger rightly won an Oscar for his portrayal of Major Harvey Stovall. He comes across as an immensely sympathetic character, despite being a lawyer (no wonder he won an Oscar!).
There are also standout performances from Gary Merrill as Colonel Keith Davenport and Millard Mitchell as Major-General Pritchard, a character modeled on the great, ‘Kraut’-killing, air commander Major-General Ira Eaker.
Much of the air combat footage is actual wartime combat photography. The take-off, flight and landing sequences by the B-17s look real because they are. The movie-makers managed to find no fewer than 12 B-17s, one of them flown by the legendary Paul Mantz.
He died, probably after the plane he was flying was sabotaged, during the filming of the Flight of the Phoenix (the first iteration, starring Jimmy Stewart). A famous aviation stunt-man, he had also planned the recon flight during which Amelia Earhart was shot down by the Japanese.
He was probably murdered because he knew too much, including the swapping of the planes after the Honolulu crash (the plane Amelia was flying was much faster – the original Electra could not have made the flight times of some her sectors) and the fitting of the cameras by Lockheed at Burbank, CA. It’s covered in Spyhunter.
It’s a drama, and the producers needed to put bums on seats. To describe it as ‘realistic’ would be to go over the top. However it was based on real events, and it was sufficiently realistic in its portrayal of the air war over Germany and France not to attract criticism from the late, great General Curtis LeMay, a friend of a friend. He didn’t praise the movie, but avoiding criticism from Curt LeMay was praise in itself. He didn’t hand out praise with the K-Rations.
Last but not least there are heart-warming scenes of German strategic targets being bombed and Luftwaffe fighters being shot out of the sky. Showing it just after Brexit made a lot of sense. There is a mood in this country at the moment to kill Germans, nicely of course.
Twelve O’Clock High is one of the greatest war-movies of all time.
Michael Shrimpton was a barrister from his call to the Bar in London in 1983 until being disbarred in 2019 over a fraudulently obtained conviction. He is a specialist in National Security and Constitutional Law, Strategic Intelligence and Counter-terrorism. He is a former Adjunct Professor of Intelligence Studies at the American Military University.
Read Articles from Michael Shrimpton;
ATTENTION READERS
We See The World From All Sides and Want YOU To Be Fully InformedIn fact, intentional disinformation is a disgraceful scourge in media today. So to assuage any possible errant incorrect information posted herein, we strongly encourage you to seek corroboration from other non-VT sources before forming an educated opinion.
About VT - Policies & Disclosures - Comment Policy
Comments are closed.