Rudyard Kipling"
“When you're left wounded on Afganistan's plains and
the women come out to cut up what remains, Just roll to your rifle
and blow out your brains,
And go to your God like a soldier”
General Douglas MacArthur"
“We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.”
“It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.” “Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.
“The soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.”
“May God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .” “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
“Nobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
“It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
The Soldier stood and faced God
Which must always come to pass
He hoped his shoes were shining
Just as bright as his brass
"Step forward you Soldier,
How shall I deal with you?
Have you always turned the other cheek?
To My Church have you been true?"
"No, Lord, I guess I ain't
Because those of us who carry guns
Can't always be a saint."
I've had to work on Sundays
And at times my talk was tough,
And sometimes I've been violent,
Because the world is awfully rough.
But, I never took a penny
That wasn't mine to keep.
Though I worked a lot of overtime
When the bills got just too steep,
The Soldier squared his shoulders and said
And I never passed a cry for help
Though at times I shook with fear,
And sometimes, God forgive me,
I've wept unmanly tears.
I know I don't deserve a place
Among the people here.
They never wanted me around
Except to calm their fears.
If you've a place for me here,
Lord, It needn't be so grand,
I never expected or had too much,
But if you don't, I'll understand."
There was silence all around the throne
Where the saints had often trod
As the Soldier waited quietly,
For the judgment of his God.
"Step forward now, you Soldier,
You've borne your burden well.
Walk peacefully on Heaven's streets,
You've done your time in Hell."
Hugh Fitzgerald: Among Schoolchildren, or Islam Outreach in Japan
Monday, June 06, 2016
In Japan, concerned about “anti-Muslim hostility,” some teachers have
had the bright idea of having their pupils “learn about Islam” by
visiting the main mosque in Tokyo.
Of course, they must have thought,
what better way to have their students get an “unbiased glimpse of
Islam” than to visit a mosque, where Muslims welcome their guests,
telling these curious and credulous schoolchildren how wonderful Islam
is, and what a peaceful faith it is.
And how it teaches the equality of
all people, and how it has been so badly misunderstood because of the
actions of a few people, especially in the so-called “Islamic” State,
whose fighters only “claim” to be Muslim, or are described as having,
almost incidentally, “Muslim backgrounds,” and then the mosque members
allow those young visitors to watch as they prostrate themselves in
prayer.
It’s apparently been a stirring lesson for these students, with
fears of Islam dispelled as words incomprehensible to them are recited,
and zebibahs silently thicken, and then the students go home, satisfied
that they have learned all they need to know about much-maligned Islam,
and a good time, by Allah, has been had by all.
The dismal tale of this terminal naivete, exhibited by teachers as
well as students, is told enthusiastically in the report below; I have
included a running commentary, bold within brackets. The repetition of the epithet “unbiased” – “unbiased glimpse,” “unbiased grasp” – reminds us that we, non-Muslims, are all sunk in a media-induced miasma of islamophobic misunderstanding, which these mosque visits are intended to dispel.
Might there be a better way for students to acquire an “unbiased grasp of Islam” than to visit a mosque? How about having those students instead read, with a commentary, much of the Qur’an, including the “Jihad verses,” and some of the “authoritative” Hadith, to begin to understand Islam? Or why not have them discover what the articulate defectors from the Army of Islam – e.g., Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Wafa Sultan, Ibn Warraq, Nonie Darwish, Magdi Allam – have had to report about Islam?
Or find out what is written in Saudi textbooks, or what the Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar says about anti-Jewish verses in the Qur’an, or what leading clerics routinely preach about Jihad and Infidels in their Friday sermons?“Schools take in Tokyo mosque to get unbiased glimpse of Islam,” by Magdalena Osumi, Japan Times, June 3, 2016:
