Over the last few weeks, I have been haunted by these questions:
1. How long will the war against Islamofascism last?
2. How many people will die as a result?
3. Will the Islamofascists win, or will their non-Islamofascist opponents win?
I'm interested in what you think — please contribute your own views. My answers are:
1. 10-15 years, though it may drag on for several more decades.
2. Somewhere between 500,000 and 20 million will die, but I will guess 2-3 million. My reasoning goes as follows: over a decade, the Islamofascist regime in Khartoum killed 1 million Christians and animist "rebels" in southern Sudan. I believe that there will be two or three similar genocides, given the number of countries in which the Muslim radicals operate, and the large populations involved. The low number seems far too optimistic. A nuclear war with Iran, Israel, and/or Pakistan involved as belligerents could easily kill 15-20 million.
3. We will lose, and the Islamofascists will win.
Four years ago, I would have strongly disputed the last point. But four years ago, I thought that the "War on Terror" would be an interlude after which we would go back to arguing about abortion or a flag-burning amendment or whatever else.
It isn't working out that way. We now live in a post-post-September 11 world. Americans were willing to support a "War on Terror" as long as it meant wiping out or containing regimes that promote terrorism. When we slaughtered the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and deposed the terrorist-supporting regime in Iraq, the public was willing to support it.
But we are facing an enemy determined to wear us down, in the classical Arab fashion of avoiding direct battle and harassing their enemy with raids until his will is broken. Our Western tradition of seeking a decisive military confrontation — a tradition that stretches back at least 2,500 years to the ancient Greeks — chafes at the idea of patiently rooting out a malign force and supplanting it with congenial institutions. Westerners want the "War" to cease so they can get back to their daily lives. But jihadis don't have day jobs, because their countries' economies are moribund. They have plenty of time on their hands for mortal thoughts.
You may think I am referring to Iraq, but I am thinking further down the road. Iraq is neither the first nor the last time that we have faced an insurgency enmeshed with the local population. Nor is it the last time we will confront jihadi thugs. In the next couple of years, Iran will get nuclear weapons. Those weapons will give them newfound influence to wreak great evils in the world. And the United States, and every other free nation in the world, won't do a f——— thing about it.
That is because to most Americans, the "War" doesn't exist. Few people are affected by it directly. It consumes very little of our gigantic economy's abundance, and has (relative to our population of almost 300 million) produced low casualties from a historical perspective. There is no sense of urgency, and little desire to prevent Iran from getting its nukes.
Knowing this, Iran will continue to expand its sphere of influence in the Middle East and Central Asia. Iran's allies will continue to kill Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan, and elsewhere as opportunities present themselves. Bit by bit, piece by piece, they will consolidate their gains until they are the Islamic superpower they aspire to be, vouchsafed by their nuclear deterrent. Muslim states, out of fear and religious solidarity, will side with Iran or at least do nothing to antagonize it.
The only thing that might jeopardize this plan is another clumsy, September-11-style terror attack. That might rouse Americans and other free peoples into action. Iran will studiously avoid this mistake.
Besides nuclear technology and thuggery, the Iranian regime and other Islamofascists have another advantage: culture. No, not high culture; they have no interest in art, architecture, literature, music, or any other beautiful thing. I mean culture in the most primitive sense, the soil in which they grow and thrive. There are few truly secular Muslim countries. Some nominally secular states do exist in the Muslim world, but their populations are sustained by an essentially Islamic worldview. States were not sanctioned by the Koran, so they have no real standing to a pious Muslim, unlike in Christianity where they have a temporary but divinely-sanctioned role in human life.
Within Islam, the only sanctioned institution other than the teachings of Mohammad himself is the family. Religion and family reinforce each other and provide a strong cultural basis for Muslim societies. Today, these societies are often anemic and dysfunctional, and the more anemic and dysfunctional, the more likely they are to produce Islamofascists. But religion and family are far more powerful and enduring influences than secularism and consumerism, the chief twin values of Western elites. In the long run, the men animated by stronger forces will wear down the men sustained by weaker ones.
As I said above, I did not believe that the "War on Terror" would last more than a couple of years, as I did not think it represented a true challenge to our civilization. Like many others, I spent the 1990s thinking that the challenge was mainly from within: lack of faith in God, lack of confidence in, and knowledge of, the four pillars of our own culture (Greece, Rome, Judaism, and Christianity).
Now we face a determined enemy bent on our destruction, and we do not have the internal strength to resist. Either Western civilization will recover and renew itself by embracing the Cross once again, or it will perish eternally. The only other alternative — that Islamofascists will lose their appeal, and will not use suicide bombers and nuclear devices to work their will — is highly unlikely.
