The United States and Europe, along with many willing collaborators have waged a series of wars and proxy wars stretching across much of Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia.
What the West was pursuing in reordering the post-Soviet world through conventional military means in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq beginning in 2003, it continued through somewhat less-conventional means – the so-called “Arab Spring” and the series of proxy wars that erupted afterward beginning in 2011.
Today, Western-fueled wars continue to consume Libya, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Yemen, while violence and political instability plague other nations the West has either recently meddled in or is currently occupying or undermining.
France alone – in addition to conducting military operations in Libya in 2011, and currently carrying out military operations in Syria and Iraq – has troops stationed in African nations including the Central African Republic (2,000), Chad (950), Ivory Coast (450), Djibouti (2,470), Gabon (1,000), Mali (2,000), and Senegal (430).
Eritrea and Somalia during this 15 year period have been subjected to invasions from neighboring Ethiopia – who despite being plagued by widespread poverty – has been the benefactor of US military support and encouraged to carry out proxy war upon its neighbors not unlike Saudi Arabia is now doing in Yemen.
Predictably, the result is an arc of chaos stretching halfway around the world. Also predictably, from this arc of chaos refugees flee, and they are fleeing to Europe, the only place they can go to escape the chaos.
For Africa, perhaps the most ironic aspect of the current refugee crisis besetting Europe is the fact that Libya – whom Europe conspired to destroy – had been absorbing refugees from across Africa for years, putting them to work and giving them a stable nation to live their lives in. When Libya was set upon by the US and Europe in 2011, it was predicted that Libya would go from serving as a destination for refugees, to a gateway for them, onward to Europe. And that is precisely what has happened.
Europe Created the Refugees, Europe Must Take Responsibility for Them
Without doubt, along with the US and many others, Europe is responsible for the refugee crisis. Every nation that voted for or contributed military assets to operations across North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia are directly responsible for the subsequent instability that has inevitably followed.
It was in “humanitarianism” that the West justified these wars, and now that is time to provide humanitarian assistance to refugees created by these same wars, there is now inexplicably a debate on whether or not to render aid, and to what degree.
Citing international law is moot, since one would have expected international law to have made the extraterritorial aggression that precipitated this refugee crisis in the first place an impossible proposition. But the inescapable question remains – if Europe is not to take in the refugees its own wars created, nor will its collaborators – the US, Turkey, Israel, and the Persian Gulf – who should?
Turning a Crisis into Chaos
Tens of thousands of people flooding from a trans-regional conflagration into Europe will inevitably create tension. Systems must absorb a growing number of people who need to be fed, clothed, housed, cared for medically, and eventually educated and put to work. Under the best circumstances with a reasonable and honest government, it would be a challenge. Considering that those charged with managing the crisis were those directly responsible for creating it, ensures that a manageable crisis turns to greater chaos.
Turning this crisis cynically into chaos requires three ingredients:
Fascists: First, the US and Europe have invested heavily in the spreading of “Islamophobia” in the wake of September 11, 2001, to help fuel the endless wars subsequently predicated on the terrorist attacks on New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania. Groups like the English Defense League (EDL), and the more recent “Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West” (PEGIDA) have sprung out of and have since been supported by the very engineers of the wars driving people from their countries into Europe. Ironically, this “War on Terrorism” was being waged by armies of terrorists these very same interests along with their Saudi partners were arming and funding for decades.
The EDL and PEGIDA deal in the worst sort of disinformation, lumping the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims into a single group they claim is set on “Islamizing” the planet. For the average EDL or PEGIDA member, it doesn’t matter to them that if even 1% of the world’s Muslims were violent extremists, that would constitute an army 10 million strong that would have long already “Islamized” them.
When torrents of refugees began flooding into Europe, in a climate of fear and ignorance carefully and methodically constructed over the past 15 years, it doesn’t take much to convince EDL and PEGIDA followers that the “invasion” had begun.
Terrorists: The second ingredient is extremists. The United States, Europe, and its Turkish and Persian Gulf allies have invested for decades in creating terrorist groups to both act as a proxy mercenary force abroad and a means of violent, coercive fear inducement at home. Through a concerted campaign by the media, these extremists are lumped in together with the refugees – and Western intelligence agencies may even be literally lumping them into camps and enclaves springing up all across Europe.
For those that doubt this, reports of “mosques” featuring “imams” supporting the so-called “Islamic State” and even recruiting fighters from across Europe to join the fight in Syria should be of particular interest. Especially when these same “mosques” are revealed to be working with the police and government to manage these fighters when they return as was the case with one notorious “mosque” in Denmark.
The Local DK would report in an article titled, “Danish mosque doubles down on Isis support,” that:
“We want the Islamic State to come out on top. We want an Islamic state in the world,” the mosque’s chairman, Oussama El-Saadi, said in the DR programme.
El-Saadi also said that he views Denmark’s participation in the US-led battle against Syria as a direct affront not only to his mosque but to all Muslims.
“The war is against Islam,” he said.
Paradoxically, a man who should by all accounts be arrested and removed from society for providing support for a listed terrorist organization was later revealed to be the centerpiece of a Danish program rolled out to handle returning ISIS fighters from Syria. Der Spiegel’s article, “Community Response: A Danish Answer to Radical Jihad,” would report:
Commissioner Aarslev says he is proud of what they have thus far achieved, though he never forgets to praise his people and the others involved in the program. He is particularly effusive when speaking of one man: a bearded Salafist who is head of the Grimhøjvej Mosque in Aarhus, where many of the young men who left Aarhus to join the war in Syria were regulars. It’s leader is a man named Oussama El Saadi….
…these two men have joined forces in a project that is seeking to find answers to questions that are plaguing the entire continent of Europe: What can be done about radical returnees from Syria? What measures are available to counter the terror which once again seems to be threatening the West closer to home?
El Saadi role is threefold. He intentionally feeds into the narratives of the EDL and PEGIDA, fills the ranks of the West’s terrorists forces abroad, and serves as a handler for them when they return home, with a deadly array of skills and connections which can be leveraged to further inflame existing tensions inherent with any influx of refugees.
Multiculturalism: The third and final ingredient is the West’s version of “multiculturalism.” Like terrorism and far-right extremism, the same special interests have also invested in an army of NGOs to prop up their own take on what should be a fairly straightforward concept.
Far from anything resembling impartial mutual respect for other people’s race, religion, and culture, under a singular national identity, it is instead the intentional, selective, and cynically manipulative use of culture, lending it primacy not only over national identity and the rule of law, but over the cultures of others whenever and wherever convenient.
This way, those cultural characteristics found as most disruptive can be intentionally placed ahead of those that are most stabilizing and constructive, at the expense of other people’s lives and liberty. It is done intentionally to breed a sense of privilege and animosity among different cultures, races, and religions, and has historically been an integral part of any ‘divide and conquer’ stratagem.
Together, this trifecta works with devastating efficiency, turning what is already a crisis of Europe’s own creation, into chaos – chaos that can be wielded to suit the special interests behind this trifecta.
From Chaos, to Crisis, to Stability
Throughout human history, huge numbers of refugees and migrants have been absorbed into nations not only with success, but to the benefit of those who made genuine efforts to absorb these influxes. For Europe, doing likewise will be difficult but is not impossible, but several matters must be addressed.
1. End the Wars: Even under ideal conditions, the refugee crisis would be difficult to manage. As long as Europe wages or backs wars around the world, this crisis will not only continue, it will only get worse. Even as European leaders pose as victims amid their own self-made catastrophe, they are still pushing for war in Syria, allowing Saudi Arabia with absolutely impunity to destroy neighboring Yemen, and occupying with their military forces a large number of foreign nations.
Ending the wars and allowing these nations to rebuild in their own way is the only way the current deluge will be stayed. Obstructing Syrian and Russian forces in the restoration of peace and order in Syria is an indictment of the lack of sincerity expressed by European leaders regarding humanitarian concerns and more specifically their refugee crisis they are attempting sidestep.
2. Humanize the Refugees: To truly protect the refugees, they must be given an identity. Calling them “refugees” rather than humanizing them, and recognizing them not only as an “influx,” but as individuals, denies those that both created this crisis and seek to exploit it the opportunity to collectivize the influx and thus collectivize responsibility for when anyone amongst this influx commits a crime or is even baselessly accused of doing so.
For many Europeans, they cannot distinguish the difference between Shia’a and Sunni, let alone understand how Wahhabism is neither. Many cannot even distinguish the difference between Sikhs and Muslims in most cases. This ignorance is the swamp within which racism and bigotry breed. Draining this swamp is essential. Rather than attacking the most extreme and immovable edifices leading the EDL and PEGDIA in the streets, appealing to and educating the silent majority as to who is really in these camps will make it ever so much clearer who is creating trouble among a very small minority, and who came to Europe and is prepared to live within the rules to build a new future.
Pretending that out of tens of thousands of refugees no where will there be found a criminal element denies the realities of human nature itself – and by collectivizing the refugees in this matter, we aid those who seek to exploit this crisis in collectivizing responsibly among all refugees when one does ill. Assigning characteristics, good or bad, to any group is the very definition of bigotry. If one doesn’t want it wielded against the refugees, they must not wield it in their defense.
3. Reclaim Multiculturalism: Russian President Vladimir Putin himself would say in a piece titled, “Russia: The Ethnicity Issue,” that:
Any individual living in this country [Russia] should be keenly aware of their faith and ethnicity. But above all they must be citizens of Russia – and be proud of it. No one has the right to place ethnic and religious concerns above state law. The law, however, must take account of ethnic and religious concerns.
President Putin claims this is demonstrated in Russia. In Singapore, it is also the definition of multiculturalism. For Singaporeans who range from Muslims to Christians, from Buddhists to Hindus and secular, they are all first and foremost Singaporeans. Their national identity is defined by universal ideas like meritocracy, professionalism, excellence in education, and hard work. They provide mutual respect for one another’s cultures, faiths, and beliefs, neither asking to be spared from those of others, nor being forced to abandon their own. What results is distinctively different cultures and religions working together under a singular identity as Singaporeans.
The abuse of multiculturalism takes this concept and twists it. Like an imperial viceroy ruling over a colony intentionally showing favor for one tribe over all others to intentionally bait the others into attacking the former, Western “multiculturalism” is really the playing off of one culture against another – keeping all of them weak, and with mutual respect erased entirely from the equation.
Moving beyond the false ‘left-right’ pro- and anti-multiculturalism narrative, it must instead be redefined and taken back. When those defending the refugees are able to delineate between real refugees and their religion and culture, versus Western-created cartoon characters like “Imam” Oussama El Saadi and the perversions he passes off as religion and culture, the majority in the middle gravitating toward PEGIDA will finally have a rational alternative to turn to.
4. Integrate the Refugees: Leaving the refugees segregated and in legal and socioeconomic limbo ensures only further tension and incidents. Integrating them into society and allowing them to begin rebuilding their lives must take precedence above all else. In the unlikely event that Europe and its allies cease hostilities across the globe and withdraw their troops and proxies from the many nations they are now destroying and undermining, resources can then be invested in helping these people return home.
The refugees are capable and willing to work, like the many millions already doing so across Europe from over the decades and even centuries. They will become an asset to Europe and the economic threat they pose to Europeans will not exist if afforded equal protection under the law on the streets, at school, and especially at work. Additionally, by integrating them socioeconomically, they begin the process of assimilation.
Europeans who fear their nations will be changed by this influx of refugees are at least partially right. Europe will change. After all, a nation’s current state is but an amalgamation of its history. Part of that history for Europe is invading and destroying the nations of other peoples, faiths, and cultures, leaving them with no alternative but to follow the trail their futures were stolen down. The refugees will change Europe precisely because Europe has changed the nations the refugees are fleeing.
Cause, for better or worse, and effect, for better or worse, but inescapable.
Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine“New Eastern Outlook”.