Mark Steyn's new book America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It has received a lot of praise, and it's one of the books I hope to get to soon. In the meanwhile, this review by Steven Warshawsky in The American Thinker is an eye-opener.
Warshawsky admires Steyn's book as an excellent guide to the nature of the crisis presented to us by Islamic jihad, but he criticizes Steyn for not following his thesis to its logical conclusion. Warshawsky argues that if Steyn is right we are headed ineluctably toward a global war and that as a matter of national security we, and Europe, must immediately stop Muslim immigration.
Warshawsky writes:
Steyn reports that Western women in Europe have an average of 1.4 children, whereas Muslim women [in Europe] have an average of 3.5 children. The result is a "baby boom" among Muslims that, within our lifetimes, will completely change the European countries in which they live. Steyn's analysis strikes me as right on the mark.
Yet after spending page after page highlighting the demographic disaster that awaits Europe (and to a much lesser extent the United States), Steyn fails to state the logical conclusion, which is that Muslim immigration must be stopped. Period.
If one believes, as Steyn clearly does (with strong support from the evidence), that Muslims as a group not only are not assimilating into Western culture but are actively hostile toward the very principles upon which our societies are built, then it is "suicidal" (a term frequently used by Steyn) to permit millions of Muslims to take up residence within our countries.
Warshawsky recognizes all the problems such a drastic measure entails, but, he argues, unless we prefer to live in a state of denial about the threat posed by radical Islamism, such a step is imperative for the security of our nation.
He notes that:
It should not be surprising, then, as Steyn emphasized in a recent column, that the vast majority of Muslims worldwide feel primary loyalty to their religion ("Pan-Islamism"), instead of to the particular nations in which they live. For example, according to a recent poll (cited by Steyn), only 8 percent of Muslims living in Great Britain consider themselves British first, whereas 81 percent consider themselves Muslim first. Given the stark differences between what it means to be British and what it means to be Muslim, these poll results portend a disastrous future for the British nation. Indeed, given the gulf that exists between Western culture and Islamic culture, the growing size and influence of the Muslim world portends a disastrous future for us all.
It might be argued that Christians would also claim to be Christians first and Americans second, but the difference is that Christianity is largely compatible with the fundamental principles upon which this country was founded and until we stray further from those principles than we have so far Christians will be content to live as Americans. This is not the case with many Muslims who find the ideas of the American experiment theologically repugnant. The concept of human equality, freedom of religion, free press, and separation of Church and state are irreconcilable with their interpretation of Islamic law and tradition.
Whether we like it or not, large parts of the Islamic world have declared war on the West. Because Muslim countries, to date, have lacked the military and economic capability to wage conventional warfare against us, they have engaged in vicious acts of terrorism designed to intimidate and undermine Western society. They may soon be in position, through developments in Iran and, perhaps, Pakistan, to commit acts of nuclear blackmail or actual nuclear warfare. (And just imagine if, a few decades from now, a Muslim majority took control of France or England's nuclear arsenal, with the capability to destroy large parts of the United States.) The West can either submit to this violence and intimidation, or we can fight back. But what does "fighting back" mean?
Steyn offers ten measures we can take to "fight back" but Warshawsky notes that at least four of them amount to a tacit declaration of war against the Muslim world. In other words, we seem to have only two options: submit or fight. The only question for those not inclined to submit is what form, exactly, should fighting back take.
The debate over this question will be, I think, the most important political and cultural undertaking of the next ten years.