The Sword of the Prophet and Defeating Jihad - Two excellent (must read) books

[Lamed]

Biography: Dr. Srdja Trifkovic is the director of the Center for International Affairs at The Rockford Institute in Illinois and a scholar who has combined his academic interests with a distinguished and varied career in journalism and public affairs including BBC, Voice of America, U.S. News & World Report, and a Co-founder and Executive Director, The Lord Byron Foundation for Balkan Studies. Over the years he has provided consulting services to HRH Crown Prince Alexander, to the leadership of the Republika Srpska, and to Dr. Kostunica while he was FRY President. Dr. Srdja Trifkovic is currently a foreign-affairs editor of the Institute's magazine, Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture.
He's American Serb.


The Sword of the Prophet

I must confess that very few things in the world annoy me more than people that lecture others about things they know absolutely nothing about. The opponents of this book are a perfect example. Let me make one thing crystal clear to anyone that hasn't yet read "The Sword of the Prophet": The one-star reviews posted here were written by people that haven't read the book!! This book is not racist and it is not scaremongering!
This book is one of the most intelligent and well-written books I have ever read. It pulls absolutely no punches when it examines the origin, historical record, and future implications of Islam as a global force. Political correctness and other left-wing ideologies are ignored for the sake of truth and critical thinking, which is absolutely refreshing to read in this day and age of "historical ignorance" and "deliberately induced amnesia", as Mr. Trifkovic puts it. The first and second chapters examine the life of Muhammad and the creation of the Koran, which is fascinating and eye-opening. The third chapter, "Jihad Without End", is simply frightening. It chronicles the spread of Islam over the last thousand years, and the massive cultural devastation, human suffering, and loss of innovation that went with it. This chapter, more than any other, is the most savage rebuttal of people that insist that Islam is "tolerant" or a "religion of peace". Never, in its entire history, has Islam even approached anything resembling tolerant or peaceful, and anyone that has bothered to actually read history knows it. The fourth chapter shows Islamic misogyny, use of slavery throughout the centuries (and still in practice today!!), and debunks the ridiculous assertion that there was a "golden age" of Islam. The fifth chapter describes the sad and pathetic attempts of self-loathing intellectuals (many of whom are in powerful and influential postions) in North America and Western Europe that want nothing more than to tear down every Judeo-Christian tradition and belief that their country was built on. The false and twisted belief of these "enlightened" intellectuals is that all cultures and beliefs are equally valid, and to question the merits of this ideology is bigotry. A knowledge of history and a good eye for observation reveal this worldview as the hoax that it is, but these people are both blind and deaf when it comes to annoying little things like "facts". The sixth and final chapter paints the bleak picture of Western Europe and (to a lesser degree) North America as countries that refuse to open their eyes to a culture that is completely at odds with Western ideals of democracy and human rights. A war has been unofficially declared on the West (ie. the "infidels") by millions of radical Muslims, and yet many people don't even want to acknowledge that there is a problem! The immigration floodgates are open and yet no-one seems to care which people have something to offer and which people have hostile intentions!! Isn't this common sense!? For reasons that are impossible for myself (and many others, I'm sure) to understand, some people would rather commit cultural and racial suicide than attempt to address the problems that are staring Western democracies in the face! As you can see, the sixth chapter has some depressing statistics and a gloomy forecast for North America and Western Europe.
To be honest, I really can't recommend this book highly enough. I read a great deal about history and politics and I had a reasonable understanding of Islam, but I found this book concise, accurate, and enlightening. The historical record and future implications of Islam are incredibly relevant to the world we live in now, and you would be doing yourself a favour by reading "The Sword of the Prophet" and doing some serious thinking of your own about just what all this means for yourself, your family, your country, and your future generations.

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Defeating Jihad

Serge Trifkovic is fast becoming a leading authority on Islamic militancy and how to respond to it. His The Sword of the Prophet (2002) was an important look at militant Islam. In this sequel volume to that incisive work, Trifkovic continues his hard-hitting analysis coupled with a sober realism about the struggle we are in.
This volume is broken into five parts: a brief review of Islam, its founder, its beliefs and practices, with special reference to Jihad; a lengthy examination of the crisis in Europe; an assessment of conditions in America; the global situation; and a series of proposed solutions.
Taken together these five sections offer a comprehensive and informed overview of the nature of Islamic Jihad and the response of the West. The book offers, in short, a workable understanding of, and plan for, an effective response to the war on terrorism.
And the author is quite right to begin by assessing the threat. A good deal of the problem lies in the fact that many Western intellectualoids refuse to even admit that there is a problem, or are much more inclined to blame the West for the current crisis.
For example, the "9-11 Commission", the US Government report on terrorism, does note that Islamist terrorism is the main worry, but then goes on to argue that the reformist wing within Islam needs to be encouraged while the fundamentalist wing needs to be resisted.
But Trifkovic argues that this distinction between a real, peaceful Islam and an a violent Islamic aberration is false. Jihad and terrorism, argues the author, are intrinsically imbedded in the Koran, hadith, and Sharia. The jihadists are fully acting in accord with their faith. Thus the real question is not, Are there moderate Muslims? Yes there are. But the question to really ask is, Is Islam itself moderate and peaceful? Trifkovic thinks not. Thus talk of reforming Islam becomes a questionable, if unobtainable, goal. It is this understanding of the real nature of Islam that explains so much about the current crisis in Europe and the incredibly weak and short-sighted Western response. Europa is quickly becoming Eurabia because most Westerners do not understand the real nature of Islam. Peace in Islam can ultimately come when all of the Dar-al-Harb (world of unbelievers) is converted - one way or another - into the Dar-al-Islam (the world of Islam). Thus Islam is in a permanent state of war with the Western infidels until it finally reigns throughout the globe.
While the European response has been woefully inadequate, the American response has not been much better. Basically a policy of appeasement at home and saber-rattling abroad is in place. Fear of offending American Muslims has resulted in a superficial response at home. Foolish notions of tolerance, diversity and multiculturalism have failed to deal with the Islamic threat. Moreover, the West fails to understand that Muslims are unable or unwilling to properly assimilate and integrate into the West. Instead, Muslim conclaves are springing up all over the West, with the inevitable tensions which follow.
And US foreign policy has been confusing at best. Washington seeks to placate and cozy up to various Muslim states, often with counterproductive outcomes. Trifkovic doubts that the democratization of the Middle East is possible. Just as it was delusional to believe in détente with the former Soviet threat, so the idea of exporting democracy to the Islamic world is fraught with danger.
Like the Marxist world before it, the Islamic world is totalistic and implacably hostile to co-existence with the West. And for democracy to be exportable presupposes a framework of ideas that are amenable to it. Islam is fundamentally anti-democratic. The rule of Sharia law alone is the Islamic ideal - democracy is simply heretical.
Trifkovic offers a number of proposals to at least contain the Islamic threat in the West. He favours racial and ethnic profiling as a sensible and necessary feature of our security. He believes mosques should be monitored, sermons examined, and all preaching be conducted in the host-nation's language.
He believes that Islamic activists should be denied citizenship, or that it be rescinded if already given. He urges Western nations to follow the lead of Switzerland which has one of the toughest naturalization policies in the world. You cannot even apply for citizenship in Switaerland unless you have first lived there for 12 years, paid your taxes, and have no criminal record.
Other get-tough measures are proposed. But the author concludes with a more important requirement. The West needs to know itself. What does it believe? What are its values? What does it stand for? And it needs to realize that the historic, core Western values are ultimately not compatible with the Islamic worldview. Say Trifkovic, "Islamic beliefs, ideas and intentions as such pose a threat to our civilization and our way of life".
Thus the author reminds us that the first step in dealing with the war of terrorism is to recognize the fundamental differences between Western ideals and Islamic ideals. And then we need to ask ourselves, which are worth preserving and defending? Which are worth fighting and resisting? Unless the West can accurately and carefully answer those questions, it will not be well prepared to cope with the terrorist threat - nor with any other major threat for that matter.

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