Russia is not the enemy for the enemy is already here

Not since 9/11/2001 did something knock me off my perch so strongly as to what happened in Paris last Friday. I belong to that growing club where a good deal less than 9 degrees of separation separated me from my brother- law, Martin Coughlan, who was murdered in the twin towers by  terrorists that carried the banner of their actions under a form of Jihad war.  The word itself means to strive, to apply oneself, to struggle, to persevere. That is what we must do, always, and it is how we will beat the terrorists.

My only faith system is to doubt what others are so sure of, and that doubt strives me to accept that life is a fantastic journey to be enjoyed and not endured within the spirit of endurance itself. Enjoy the journey because you may not make the destination. 

This growing conflict of countries, characters and religions in this latest spat brings to the surface more dominant players. The historical suspicion of Russia’s involvement in any war, at any time and now in Syria is one thing, but Russia, I believe, has very practical intentions in the main of this fight. They are not the enemy and beyond Stalin’s historical blood lust, turned the tide against Hitler during the Second World War. I believe they would have beaten Hitler with or without the west’s help and with the ally of a Russian winter, they brought the fight back to Adolf  and won. It is a story and narrative often obscured in western objective reporting and within it lies the heart of the Russian himself. It is also Jihad in action. 

In the west we laud and cloak ourselves in an idealised moral fiction for in effect it leaves us very vulnerable to exploitation and attack. Free speech and religion is one thing but it is the latter that is the danger. For most of Ireland’s history one religion dominated and I was caught in its cross hairs after spending ten years in one of their religious prisons. I suffered a stroke at five years old and lost my brother at a young age because of what we both went through in that system. Over a quarter of a million children languished in the same way at one time or another and all under the yoke of one religious point of view. Free speech could not be found anywhere and Canon law ruled if not by legal definition, but by a skewed moral interpretation of it. It was the Sharia law of its day against the more benign version of what we have now for the people were forced to show them the error of their ways and they just happened to be Catholics.

By a practical nature I am very suspect of any religion and more so of the one called Islam today as it grows in Europe. Its commandments are not compatible with free speech or the remotest veneer of democracy and freedom; but the extremists among them will use our own laws to attack us as they have already done for our kindness is our weakness. 

By the definition of Muslim law you can be murdered legally for denying the Quran or Muhammad, or leaving the religion itself. In fact paedophillia is legal too as you can have sex with an 9 year old child; of course only after marrying her.  A non- Muslim cannot marry a Muslim woman and she will always be in a bad place as she can be beaten, mutilated and so on, but you get the picture. There are over 65,000 people in Ireland that believe in Sharia law, or some version of it and rising. The tide of those figures is in the millions in Britain and France, and pretty much everywhere else. 

The more positive aspects of this religion is that they are in the main moderates by majority just as Catholics are today.  And like the extremism of Catholicism in Ireland that had to be faced down, so too must the more brutal extremism of Islam interpretation be faced down by Muslims in a Muslim world and by those they seek to destroy.

The good news is that the dominant force of law,  for now,  within Britain, the United States,  Russia and to a lesser degree China, is that all religions have a right to practice but that they must yield to the laws of the land.

In the end it is about numbers and if the Muslim extremists or any other,  get their numbers high enough they will be the law of the land, and by Muslim tradition and law, we are the infidels and can be lied to to advance Islam. Look at the carnage the extremists have already carried out and there lies the lesson. 

Russia is not the enemy for the enemy is already among us and it is the religion and cult of extremism itself. Cause we must examine with a more jaundiced eye for we already know the effect. We must too close our borders so we can know our enemy well and decide what to do next for what we are doing is simply not working. We can handle the posturing and hand wringing by politicians but we cannot eat cake any longer. Viva la France!!

Barry Clifford