Know Your Enemy: A Primer on Islamic Jihad

National Review, by Steve King, July 25, 2015:

In the first 100 years after the death of Mohammed (

More than a century later, Islamic jihad, having conquered the Middle East and most of Eastern Europe, had surrounded and besieged the crown jewel of Western Christendom, Vienna. If Vienna fell to Islam, all of Western Europe would be likely to follow. After a two-month siege of Vienna, relief forces from Poland and Germany arrived.

The battle for relief of Vienna began on September 11, 1683, and ended with the rout of the Islamic forces the following day. On September 11, 1697, Prince Eugene caught and routed a large Islamic army and delivered a decisive blow at the Battle of Zenta.

In keeping with the September 11 theme, the British established a mandate for Palestine on September 11, 1922, and at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, eleven Israeli athletes were killed on September 11. Millions of Islamists remember the humiliations of September and seek to humiliate the “Great Satan,” the United States. Thus the attacks on the World Trade Towers and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, and on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi on September 11, 2012.

Islamic jihad can be defeated, and it can be done in less time than it took to defeat the USSR in the Cold War. Our strategy, however, must be tailored to the times and circumstances.

Islamic jihad is our enemy. It has declared war on us and will kill us anywhere it can. No American is safe anywhere in the world until this suicidal ideology is defeated. It is not impossible to defeat an ideology. Within a span of half a century, Western civilization has defeated at least four ideologies. Nazism, Italian Fascism, and Japanese imperialism all went down literally in flames in the face of a superior culture. Next in line was the far more stubborn Russian Communism, which struggled through 45 years of cold war before succumbing to liberty and free enterprise. Islamic jihad can be defeated, and it can be done in less time than it took to defeat the USSR in the Cold War. Our strategy, however, must be tailored to the times and circumstances.

We are dealing with the complexities of a long and difficult history of conflict. Religious friction has been at the heart of conflicts in this region since the time of Mohammed. The conflict between Shia and Sunni is complex enough without the overlay of the history of conflict with Christianity.

Russian-sponsored regimes must be defeated. The wealth of and need for oil fuels the fight. Anti-Semitism, with notable exceptions, dominates the region of the Middle East. We are in an increasingly global conflict as jihadists use Western technology and exploit cultural vulnerabilities to invade through peaceful migration, recruit through the Internet, indoctrinate through their mosques and madrassas, and radicalize and direct Islamic jihad.

We can defeat this ideology because we are a superior civilization. We have the ability to reason, develop new technology, grow our economy, and control the events described above. Islamic jihad has no real capacity to compete. History is on our side. Culture is on our side. Economics are on our side. Military capability is on our side. We lack only a strategy and the will.