WORLD AT WAR: 8.5.16 - A Nuclear-Armed Caliphate?

A Nuclear-Armed Caliphate? - William Kilpatrick - http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/263722/nuclear-armed-caliphate-william-kilpatrick

 

Erdogan is one giant step closer to doing what he has always wanted to do.

 

Much has been made of the Islamic State's claim to the caliphate. But the Islamic State is fast losing ground in Syria and Iraq, and without a territorial claim, its claim to the caliphate is a shaky one. According to some sources, ISIS has already been preparing its followers for the fall of the caliphate.

 

Meanwhile, an Islamist power with a much better claim to the caliphate has been gathering strength. Whether the failed coup in Turkey was the real thing or whether it was staged, as some have claimed, President Erdogan's hold over the Turkish nation has been immeasurably strengthened. As a result, he is now one giant step closer to doing what, some say, he has always wanted to do-namely, to re-establish the caliphate.

 

The last time the Muslim world had a caliphate, it was centered in Constantinople. The Turkish sultan (who was also the caliph) was the head of the Ottoman Empire-an empire that controlled far more territory than ISIS does or is ever likely to. Then in 1923, following the disarray left by the First World War, a secular government under the leadership of Kemal Ataturk came to power in Turkey and abolished the caliphate soon after.

 

To many in the Muslim world, this was a world-changing catastrophe. It flew in the face of Muhammad's intention that mosque and state should be united, and it undermined the case for Islamic law. Moreover, the overthrow of the caliphate affected not just Turkey, but all of the Muslim world. In the late 1920s in Egypt, Hasan al-Banna founded the Muslim Brotherhood with the intention of reversing what Ataturk had done. The Brotherhood came close to doing this-at least in Egypt-in 2012 with the election of Mohamed Morsi as president. But Morsi showed his hand too early and was soon deposed by the military under General El-Sisi.

 

In Turkey, also, it was the military that acted as the guardian of the secular state. And so it remained until the election of President Recep Erdogan in 2002. Even then, Erdogan moved slowly in his efforts to re-Islamize Turkey. He gradually removed top military officers and replaced them with his own men; and he did the same with the police, the judiciary, and other key institutions.

 

By 2012, some twenty percent of the country's generals were estimated to be behind bars. Then, with this month's failed coup, Erdogan moved quickly to arrest some 3,000 members of the military and 3,000 members of the judiciary. In addition, his regime sacked 9,000 workers attached to the Interior Ministry. Within a week of the attempted coup, some 50,000 soldiers, police, judges, civil servants, and teachers had been suspended or arrested.

 

Erdogan's power is now nearly absolute-not unlike the absolute power of a sultan. According to some, this has been his goal all along. One indication is that Erdogan has built himself a thousand-room presidential palace that is attended by guards dressed in Ottoman-era uniforms.

 

If Erdogan does try to establish a caliphate, where does that leave ISIS? Would they go quietly into the dark night of oblivion? Or would they find a place in the new caliphate?

 

As you may have noticed, alliances in the Middle East are constantly shifting. It's not inconceivable that ISIS would someday pledge allegiance to a neo-Ottoman caliphate-although such an event might have to be preceded by the demise of their current caliph, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The truth is, Erdogan has been something of a friend and benefactor of ISIS. As Caroline Glick observed in the Jerusalem Post:

 

Erdogan has turned a blind eye to al-Qaida. And he has permitted ISIS to use Turkey as its logistical base, economic headquarters, and recruitment center. Earlier this year, the State Department claimed that all of the 25,000 foreign recruits to ISIS have entered Syria through Turkey.

 

Turkey is also the gateway between Syria and Europe. It is through Turkey that the bulk of Muslim migrants flow into Europe. This gives Erdogan enormous leverage over the future of Europe-a continent which is already reeling from a flood of migrants and refugees. How is the leverage applied? In March, the European Union reached a deal with Turkey that would in essence turn Turkey into a buffer zone against further immigration. Here's how Foreign Affairs summarized the bargain:

 

Turkey has agreed to act as a giant refugee holding center, keeping the millions of migrants fleeing conflict in the Middle East from reaching Europe and accepting those sent back from Greece. In exchange, the EU will pay Turkey three billion euros on top of the three billion pledged last November to help care for the refugees. It will also speed up the approval of visa-free travel to Europe for Turkish citizens and revive stalled negotiations over Turkey's accession to the EU.

 

So Turkey will keep the Syrian migrants out of Europe as long as Turkish citizens are allowed almost unlimited access to Europe through visa-free travel. The net result is that the Islamization of Europe will continue. And, of course, there's nothing to stop Turkey from opening up the refugee floodgate whenever it sees fit. Turkey's control of Mid-East migration gives it the upper hand in its dealings with Europe.

 

The other part of the bargain is the revival of negotiations to admit Turkey to the EU. If Turkey is ever successful in that endeavor, it would spell game-over for Europe. If Erdogan wants to re-establish the caliphate, and if he is so keen on union with Europe, it is likely that he envisions Europe as part of the future caliphate. This is something that the Ottoman sultans dreamed of, but were never able to accomplish. But Erdogan might be able to pull it off. There is now a very large contingent of Turks in Germany who seem to bear more allegiance to him than to Germany. And all over Europe there exists a fifth column of active and potential Islamists ready to be activated. As for the other four columns, it's worth keeping in mind that Turkey has the second largest army in NATO (the U.S. has the largest). And with many of the generals who coordinated with NATO now in jail, Turkey's loyalty to NATO is very much in question.

 

There is one other factor to consider. During and after the coup attempt, Erdogan shut down Incirlik Air Base, which is home to 1,500 American soldiers as well as other NATO troops. The Turkish government cut off the base's electricity supply, temporarily suspended flights, and arrested the base commander, General Ercan Van. The base reportedly houses 50 nuclear warheads. The bombs are controlled by the U.S. forces in Turkey, but could they by means sudden or gradual fall under the control of Turkey? And if they did, would the U.S. dare to do anything about it?

 

By many accounts, Erdogan is a true believer who, in his own way, is every bit as fanatical as the ayatollahs in Iran. The man who built a thousand-room palace for himself might well believe that a restored caliphate should possess all the weapons that befit a great world power. With Erdogan's latest consolidation of power, an already dangerous world just became a lot more dangerous.

 

Demographics and Demise: The Future of Nations - http://www.prophecynewswatch.com/article.cfm?recent_news_id=546

 

Sometimes likened to holding back the tide with your arms, the massive shifts in demographics now occurring are, in some ways, a greater existential threat to modernity and Western civilization than any other.

 

These shifts take several forms, which will be examined here, but at all levels there are forces on a global scale that undermine not only the stability but the very existence of economies, cultures and entire civilizations.

 

In some countries, the threat comes from an aging population without sufficient numbers of children to provide support. In other areas, it is instead an unmitigated flood of foreign immigration that is pushing out the native cultures with incompatible languages, customs, beliefs and values.

 

World War I, World War II and the Spanish influenza of 1918 were events of unprecedented destruction, both material and human, claiming in total more than 100 million lives, not to mention the purges in the USSR and China that followed.

 

Yet even these massive die-offs, in which some 46% of the male German population fell in World War II for example, were able, only briefly, to slow the population growth of the past century and civilizations were left intact.

 

The current changes taking place represent a level of threat that goes much farther, as it could replace European civilizations with Islamic culture while sounding the death knell for others, such as Japan. It is a truly existential threat.

 

Japan is an insular island nation with a serious population problem: the elderly outnumber the young. Recently, and for the first time, sales of adult diapers outsold those for babies, an indicator of the unbalance in the population.

 

Since the 1990s the country has been slowly shrinking with a birthrate of 1.4 per woman, well below the replacement rate of 2.1 needed to maintain a stable population. Without immigration, which would dilute the purity of Japanese society, and without increased fertility, Japan faces, in the short term, an economic crisis and, in the long term, a slow decline into oblivion.

 

Though it may seem incredible, humanoid robots are now being seriously considered in Japan to augment the workforce and care for the elderly, though the technology is not yet developed enough to go mainstream.

 

In the European Union, 2014 numbers reflect a fertility rate of 1.58 children per woman. Given that the replacement rate is 2.1 children, a positive growth rate is simply not possible with native born Europeans. However, the number of immigrants arriving in Europe in 2015 alone is estimated to be just over one million.

 

When you take the aging, native-born European population, along with a low fertility rate, and contrast that with largely destitute, poorly educated, immigrants who bring radically different cultural norms, and who are unwilling to assimilate, the result is that of civilization replacement.

 

Controlled immigration can be good and, for families desperate to escape their collapsing countries and ethnic cleansing, it is certainly a blessing. When immigration is gradual, newly arrived immigrants can assimilate and slowly adopt the culture, language, religion and social norms of the host country.

 

A 2015 Pew Study predicted the Muslim population of Europe to reach 10% by 2050, but it is already estimated to be at that level in 8 EU countries. The Muslim population is between 5 and 10% in France, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Netherlands, Austria, Belgium and Bulgaria. Once they have immigrated, Muslim immigrant families have more children on average and the gap only widens.

 

The problem is assimilation. In French, the word banlieue is the equivalent of the English suburb. In the country of France, these have become isolated and crime-filled ghettos populated by Muslims dotting the country, which are a hotbed for anti-French sentiment, crime and terrorism.

 

On January 1st his year, Muslims celebrated the new year in France by burning over 800 cars, in addition to the 940 they had torched during the year.

 

European youth are abandoning Christianity in record numbers just as new mosques are being built. Saudi Arabia maintains strict control of its immigration, but in a show of solidarity with Europe it offered to help alleviate the European Muslim immigration crisis.

 

And how do they define help? To fund the building of 200 new mosques across Europe to replace churches. It is the slow construction of "Eurabia", as some have coined the new nation. It is part of what is being called 'civilization jihad'.

 

A stunning contradiction to everything happening in Europe is found in Israel and demonstrates the power of demographics to change the political reality on the ground, dramatically, in a short period of time. For years the argument of the left has been that if Israel doesn't change its ways it would be 'bred out' of its land as Arab and Palestinian fertility rates were much higher than the Jewish population.

 

Over the past two decades that has changed dramatically and the Jewish fertility rate is now 3.11 children. Palestinian fertility rates have fallen to 3.7 in the West Bank from 5.6 in 1997, and to 4.5 from 6.9 children in the Gaza Strip, according to the Palestinian statistics bureau.

 

It is estimated that in the next 5-10 years it could be even, thus eliminating what has been called Israel's demographic time bomb and, in the process, one of the arguments for giving the Palestinians their own state.

 

"There will be no demographic time bomb," according to Israel's defense minister Avigdor Lieberman. "Birthrates in the Arab and Jewish sectors will continue converging, while we also hope that a considerable part of Jews from Western Europe, and also from North America, will come here." Jewish immigration last year, from countries such as France and Ukraine, was at the highest level since 2003.

 

Israel's baby boom represents a puzzling exception to the world's demographic trends. Usually, as countries become wealthier and as women become more integrated into the workforce, fertility rates plummet.

 

But in Israel, even as per capita income soared above the European Union's average over the past decade, families began having more children. This gave the country, by far, the highest fertility rate among the world's advanced economies. Israeli Jews nowadays have more children, on average, than Egyptians, Iranians or Lebanese.

 

"This is the uniqueness of Israel that you will not find in any other society in the world. It's a fact of life--we are different," said Arnon Soffer, a professor at Haifa University and one of the country's leading demographers.

 

In the United States, the great shift is the decline in the White Protestant demographic. Once again, the answer as to why the most powerful political and cultural group in American history is now fading is: demographics.

 

Immigration and a loss of religious faith are mostly to blame. Although still the largest single racial and religious group, White Christians (including all denominations) now comprise only 47% of the United States population. As in Europe, change is on the horizon.

 

Though the Muslim population is rising in North America, it is not yet the crisis that Europe is witnessing. Instead, it is the slow erosion of power and influence of Christianity and the values it represents, ceding to the nonreligious and dozens of other faiths in a loss of identity through demographics.

 

In the case of Europe, this great demographic shift is in the process of doing what two world wars, an economic collapse and a global pandemic (Spanish flu) could not: erase European culture from the map.

 

Like the frog tossed into a slowly boiling pot, only very recently have the alarm bells begun to sound, though immigration shows no signs of slowing nor have birthrates changed.

 

Ultranationalist politicians may rise up to combat what amounts to an existential threat to Western civilization. Walls will go up and xenophobia will increase. In Europe, we are certain to see continued social unrest as countries struggle with large, impoverished populations hostile to European culture.

 

Liberal globalists will push back with cries of racism and privilege and the clash of civilizations will tilt further towards the brink as the Islam colonizes the modern world. So what can be done?

 

European nations have taken many steps to encourage births and Japan is developing robots to augment its workforce. But unless Europeans, Christians and Jews stand up for their culture, stand up for their languages, stand up for God and stand up for their values, these will all fade away in an inexorable rising tide of demographic change.

 

The dream of a global Islamic Caliphate might just be a matter of time as Europe comes to an end--not with a bang, but a whimper.

 

The New Pact with Russia - by Hal Lindsey - http://www.hallindsey.com/ww-7-29-2016/

 

Since before the Syrian civil war began in 2011, the United States has been working for regime change there.  The Russians have been on the opposite side - doing all they could to prop up President Bashar al-Assad's government.  In fact, if the Russians hadn't intervened in the war last year, Assad might well have fallen by now, ending the deadly war.

 

So why did Secretary of State John Kerry announce on July 15th that the United States and Russia would be working together in Syria?  What common cause do the two nations have there?  Both sides claim to be fighting terrorists, but the U.S. wants to aid the so-called "moderate rebels" in their fight to overthrow Assad.  Russia is on Assad's side.  They fight against everyone trying to get rid of him.

 

Kerry says the two sides have agreed to coordinate their battle against al-Qaeda's Syrian branch, known until this week as the al-Nusra Front.  He said the agreement was intended to "significantly reduce the violence and help create the space for a genuine and credible political transition" in Syria.

 

In the last few days, al-Nusra leader Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, announced a split from al-Qaeda.  He said his group will now be known as "Jabhat Fateh al-Sham," or "The Front for Liberation of al Sham."  According to CNN, "U.S. officials quickly dismissed the rebranding as a public relations ploy."  The pact with Russia will continue.

 

Secretary Kerry refused to give any specifics on how Russia and the U.S. will be cooperating.  He said, "The concrete steps that we have agreed on are not going to be laid out in public in some long list because we want them to work."

 

Defense Department leaders then did something almost unprecedented.  They openly scorned the foreign policy branch of their own government.  Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said, "The Secretary of Defense has been clear that he has been skeptical of Russia's activities in Syria and we have reason for that.  There are plenty of reasons for that skepticism.  And I think he maintains that skepticism."

 

On Syria, the Obama Administration looks like a "house divided."  So what's going?  Though Secretary Kerry refused give details of the agreement, it obviously centers around the military.  State Department employees won't be coordinating attacks with the Russians.  It will be members of the armed forces.

 

Defense Secretary Carter correctly believes Russia's presence has extended the war, and the misery.  He said, "We had hoped that they would promote a political solution and transition to put an end to the civil war, which is the beginning of all this violence in Syria...  They're a long way from doing that."

 

President Obama and Secretary Kerry know that anything we do to help the Russians helps Assad.  This, then, looks like a significant shift in U.S. policy toward Bashar al-Assad, Syria, and the civil war.  With only a few months of his presidency left, Barrack Obama may have given up on Syria.  Earlier this year, he said, "Syria has been a heart-breaking situation of enormous complexity, and I don't think there are any simple solutions."

 

Frederic Hof, writing in The Atlantic, said, "Syria's 'complexity' is the administration's last-ditch defense for an astounding five-year bottom line: Not one single Syrian protected from the merciless, unrelenting, and deliberate campaign of mass homicide and collective punishment inflicted by the Assad regime against millions of Syrians."

 

Few U.S. presidents have ever seen a foreign policy disaster quite like Syria.  In June fifty-one State Department diplomats released a memo that severely criticized the Obama Administration's handling of the civil war.  In the New York Times, Max Fisher characterized the basic disagreement between the diplomats and the Administration.  "Current policy has little answer for how to break out of a status quo that is disastrous and steadily getting worse."

 

To express the depth and magnitude of Syrian despair, we're reduced to the use of statistics - mere numbers to account for human lives.  By February of this year, 11.5% of Syrians had been killed or injured according to the Syrian Centre for Policy Research.  That group estimates that by February, 470,000 people had died.  Forty-five percent of Syria's population has been displaced by the war.  In 2010, life expectancy for Syrians was at 70.  By 2015, it had dropped to 55.

 

It all started with the "Arab Spring" - something the Obama Administration's State Department, then led by Hillary Clinton, encouraged at every turn.  They mistakenly saw the "Arab Spring" as democracy taking root in the Muslim Middle East.  They believed an era of freedom and human dignity was about to flourish all across that troubled region.

 

Their mistake was in not understanding the nature of Islam.  The "Arab Spring" quickly became an excuse for brutal despotism.  Nation after nation fell to violence.  Most have not recovered.  New terror groups such as ISIS were born, and old terror groups such as al-Qaeda were strengthened.

 

On the other hand, those who think we can safely ignore crises in other countries don't understand just how small our world has become.  America totally withdrew from Iraq, and did as little as possible in Syria.  Those two actions created ISIS, opened the door to the Russians, and sent millions of refugees surging out of Syria and the Middle East, and into the rest of the world.

 

So what do we do?  The short answer is, pray.  The long answer includes repentance.  The Old Testament gives ample evidence that when God withdraws His favor from a land, intractable problems become the norm.  Our hope today - our only hope - is in God's mercy.  And that's how we should pray.