Information Related to "A Page on the World: The West's Last Chance"
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A Page on the World: The West's Last ChanceTony Blankley's subtitle asks, "Will We Win the Clash of Civilizations?" (2005, ISBN 0895260158).Reviewed by Melvin Rhodes"In much of the West, and particularly in Europe, there is a blind denial that radical Islam is transforming the world. Most European elites and far too many American politicians and journalists believe that our challenges are business and politics as usual." These are the words of Tony Blankley, a former Brit who now lives in the United States and is editorial page editor of The Washington Times and a regular panelist on PBS' The McLaughlin Group. They are taken from his new book, The West's Last Chance: Will We Win the Clash of Civilizations? Don't let the first chapter put you off reading the rest of the book! Mr. Blankley begins, incorrectly I thought, by suggesting a fictional scenario that finally makes people realize there really is a clash of civilizations taking place between radical Islam and the West. That aside, the book is an excellent read. It is thought-provoking, shocking, sobering and even depressing all at the same time. How have we come to this point? Massive numbers of immigrants from Islamic countries have been arriving in the West since the end of World War II, filling the labor shortage gap created by two world wars and a rapid expansion of Western economies in the last six decades. These immigrants, their children and their grandchildren have now been living in their adopted homes for many years. It is all that the second and third generations know. But they are not assimilated as other immigrants have been. Moreover, they suffer from a major identity crisis, unable to reconcile the teachings of their Islamic religion with the liberal, permissive attitudes of the West. Mr. Blankley points out, "We need to grasp the idea of discontinuity." Life as it has been lived the last 60 years is not going to go on indefinitely. The problem of Islamic radicalism has been growing for three decades, is spreading in influence and is building up to a major crisis—the clash of civilizations we have often written about. "The first discontinuity we must recognize is that the mortal threat we face comes not merely from Osama bin Laden and a few thousand terrorists. Rather, we are confronted with the Islamic world—a fifth of mankind—in turmoil, and insurgent as it has not been in at least five hundred years, if not fifteen hundred years. "The magnitude of this cultural upheaval cannot yet be measured. Efforts to count the ‘jihadist' percentage are pointless, if not dangerously misleading. There is a dynamic process under way that may peter out before it touches one in a hundred Muslims. Or it may impassion a vastly greater number. The latter is more likely." We should be thankful that at least one media figure is correctly reminding us that the death of a single terrorist, no matter how influential, is not going to make any difference in this growing conflict. Pointing to historical precedents, Mr. Blankley writes of how our world could suddenly be turned upside down, even more so than on Sept. 11th five years ago. "King Darius of Persia never imagined—even as he faced Alexander at the Battle of Issus in 333 B.C.—that within three years he would be dead, his Achaemenid Dynasty ended, and the great hegemonic Persian Empire crushed and conquered as a result of that outnumbered Macedonian upstart. American farmers in 1860 never dreamed that within months their husbands, sons, and brothers would be killed in battle and that America would be transformed by continental war. And Londoners in the summer of 1939, my parents included, never expected that forty thousand of their fellow Londoners would soon lie dead in the streets from German bombings, and that within five years Great Britain would never be great again." It is difficult for most people to comprehend that we in the United States could now be living through our own summer of 1939 with our world about to come crashing down. These are sobering words, but necessary ones. This is a much-needed reality check for everybody enjoying the liberties we have in the West at this time—a warning that they may not continue for much longer! Mr. Blankley brings attention to Europe's low birthrate compared to the very high birthrate in Islamic countries. "Europe's problem is compounded by its below-replacement birthrate. Until recently, European elites expected to make up for this potential taxpayer shortfall through immigration, largely from Islamic countries. Now it is beginning to dawn on Europeans that the combination of a shrinking ethnic European population combined with an expanding and culturally assertive Muslim population might lead to the fall of Europe's Western civilization within a century." He also helps us understand the role the Internet has played in encouraging the spread of terrorism. The Internet has made terrorist training camps redundant—terrorists can now train in the comfort of their very own homes. "The number of explicitly terrorist-supporting Internet sites has risen from twelve to over two thousand in only a few years. The number of websites engaged in general Islamic argument and propaganda are too numerous to be counted." Although Mr. Blankley writes from a purely secular viewpoint, it is amazing how his words keep bringing the readers' thoughts back to Bible prophecy, especially the clash of civilizations between the kings of the North and South prophesied in Daniel 11:40-44. The author also sees clearly the creation of a spiritual vacuum in the West by the decline of religion and how this has contributed to the present crisis with militant Islam. The book is a must-read for anybody who wants to understand fully the dilemma we are in at this time! WNP |
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