By Grant Jones
FrontPageMagazine.com | October 14, 2004
Last month Daniel Pipes, a leading scholar on Islamic terrorism, wrote an article entitled, “They’re Terrorists—Not Activists.” In it Pipes catalogs twenty evasive terms used by the media for the word “terrorist.” A twenty-first euphemism is now coming into vogue: “the Iraqi resistance.” Michael Moore has become a cheerleader for the “resistance.” He states on his website, “The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not ‘insurgents’ or ‘terrorists’ or ‘The Enemy.’ They are the Revolution, the Minutemen...” (michaelmoore.com, April 14, 2004).
Actually, those that are trying to re-establish the secular Baath dictatorship, or its Islamist equivalent, are pure evil. They are nihilists. In 1990, President George H.W. Bush referred to Saddam’s Baath dictatorship as Fascist and Nazi. He was not far off the mark as Saddam’s behavior certainly qualifies. Saddam’s aggression against Iraq’s neighbors has cost over one million lives. Saddam filled trenches with the bodies of hundreds-of-thousands of innocent men, women and children.
Fruit does not fall far from the tree. The origins of Saddam’s dictatorship date back to World War II. On 3 April 1941 Rashid Ali overthrew the Iraqi government, which was friendly with the British and Allied cause. As the result of the 1932 treaty establishing Iraq’s independence, the British maintained bases at Basra and Habbaniya (not far from Falluja). The latter base was attacked by units of the Iraqi army and laid under siege. The situation was serious, “By 13 May [1941] new decrypts revealed that German aircraft with Iraqi markings had arrived in Syria, the next day they began bombing the British forces which were entering Iraq...” (John Keegan, The Second World War).
This was consistent with “Hitler’s Directive No. 30. Middle East” dated 23 May 1941: “The Arab Freedom Movement is, in the Middle East, our natural ally against England... I have decided to push the development of operations in...support of Iraq...it may later be possible to wreck finally the English position between the Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf.” (Winston S. Churchill, The Grand Alliance) Meanwhile, “In Syria a committee was formed to mobilize support for the Rashid Ali regime. This was the nucleus of what later became the Ba’th Party, rival branches of which came to govern both Syria and Iraq.” (Bernard Lewis, The Middle East)
Fortunately for the world, Winston Churchill did not wait for the results of a “Global Test.” He immediately moved troops, which were badly needed to stop General Erwin Rommel’s Africa Corps in Libya, into both Syria and Iraq. The British and Indian troops made short work of Iraq’s army. Rashid Ali fled to an appropriate hiding place: Berlin. This was Ali’s second fall from power. Less than a year after gaining independence, in 1933 Ali became Iraq’s Prime Minister under King Faysal. At this time there was an uprising of Assyrian Christians, concerned about their place in the new nation. While the King was out of the country, Ali proceeded to use harsh measures, “In clashes with the Iraqi troops several hundred Assyrians were brutally killed.” (Encyclopedia Britannica: Macropedia, 1984 edition q.v. “Iraq”) Loyal to his roots, Saddam Hussein had resurrected Rashid Ali as a hero of Baathist Iraq.
It is not surprising that both the secular Fascists of Syria and the medieval theocrats of Iran and Al Qaeda should unite in attacking those that would bring freedom and democracy to the Middle East. Nihilists united in hate recognize their common ambitions and enemies. Their purpose is to destroy what chance there is for democracy in Iraq, after which they will fight it out for power. A classic example of nihilists uniting to destroy freedom is the Enabling Act passed by the German Reichstag on 23 March 1933. This act made Hitler dictator of Germany by a vote of 444 to 84. On the surface it seems peculiar that Communists delegates would vote for such a measure along with the Nazis. But only on the surface, the Nazis and Communists were just two different gangs with a common enemy, the first democracy Germany ever had, the Weimar Republic.
Nihilism is an accurate term for Communists, Nazis, Baath Party Fascists and Islamist terrorists. According to Webster’s: “Nihilism, The doctrine which denies any objective ground of moral principles; called also ethical nihilism...The doctrine that conditions in the social organization are so bad as to make destruction desirable for its own sake...In loose usage, revolutionary propaganda; terrorism.” Or as Faust defined the nihilist credo, “All that exists, deserves to perish.”
Then there are the nihilist enablers who should know better. There are: Michael Moore, quoted above; Markos Zuniga, at his “Daily Kos” website, who wrote “screw them” in reference to the Americans murdered in Falluja, characterizing the victims as “mercenaries;” Kofi Annan who pursues the U.N’s anti-Western vendetta while sub-Sahara Africa burns; International Answer referring to the terrorist killer Ahmed Yassin as “a political leader;” International Solidarity Movement, who in solidarity with terrorists, sends human shields into Gaza to protect the terrorists’ communication tunnels; Nicholas “Million Mogadishus” De Genova of Columbia ranted, “The only true heroes are those who find ways that help defeat the U.S. military.” De Genova defines “peace” as “a world where the U.S. would have no place.”
The American Left, and their ally the lamestream media, refuse to identify evil as evil. They compare President Bush, who has vanquished two loathsome dictatorships of both the secular Fascist and Islamist type, with Hitler. Simultaneously, psychopathic baby killers in Iraq, Israel and Russia are referred to as “the resistance” or “insurgents” or “fighters” or “militants.” This is the Left’s declaration of moral bankruptcy, their leap into the abyss of nihilism.
