The EU, Turkey, and the Islamization of Europe

The article below by the Austrian scholar Harald Fiegl was posted on May 15 at EuropeNews. Many thanks to JLH for translating it from the original German.


The EU, Turkey, and the Islamization of Europe
by Dr. Harald Fiegl

A drastic change for the worse. What do Islam and full EU membership for Turkey mean for the European model of life?

The EU regards itself as a community of values, a region of security, freedom, prosperity and law and as a unique peace project. The Christian-Western value base is not considered a “settled norm,” but the moral sensibility and cultural inheritance are a condensation of Christianity and Enlightenment. As such, it is in stark contrast to Islamic and oriental-patriarchal lifestyles with their group identity.

Seen from the outside, despite its economic difficulties, the EU is still an economic partner and an immigration destination. It is also in demand as a source for financing developmental aid projects. A place where human rights receive more recognition than in other parts of the world. It is not, however, a political power, a “global player.” Furthermore, it lacks a common domestic and foreign security policy, and so a common demeanor.

The new European foreign service (EAD) with its 8,000 (?) employees and 130 delegations will only be capable of a united front when the common external and security policy (GASP) materializes.

Economic significance with political weakness makes the EU an object of desire for other political powers. At the head of the line stands the Islamization of Europe in combination with Turkey’s intent to dominate Europe — specifically the EU. This country is preparing the way for itself. There is no “give-and-take” exchange. Turkey wants a Turkish Europe!

The EU is in the same position as Byzantium before its conquest by the Turks. Then as now, an opponent fighting with all means at its disposal was facing a disunited, absolutely self destructive entity.* The

Islamization of the entire world is being pursued by Muslims with determination at all levels. As an Islamic country, Turkey strengthens this tendency by adding its own expansive nationalism.

How Can These Claims Be Perceived?

• By the structure of the EU
  
• By the structure of Turkey and the worldwide spread of Islam
  
• By the claims of hegemony in the community of nations

The Structure of the EU

At every opportunity, there is talk of commonalities and the unification, indeed re-unification of Europe and with that, the absolutely imperative expansion of the EU to a minimum of 40 members. In fact, however, these commonalities are absent and so is the prerequisite for a successful expansion. In the absence of common successes, it appears that the EU is seeking its salvation in expansion, even if the expansion finds little agreement in the European population. that is brought on by the expansion. Add to that the fact that the will of the majority of the European population has no voice in the decisions of the EU organs of governance. Is the EU just a cornucopia for skilled lobbyists and a high level employment agency?

This is especially true of the decision to accept Turkey as a full member.

In other words, the oft-mentioned “European Spirit” is moribund. But only something like it can create a self-conscious Europe which will play a decisive role in the world.

• After the fall of the Iron Curtain, the EU did not make lasting use of the possibilities for new and independent connections with Russia, and thus supported the return of the Russian mindset to its own geopolitical claims. Russia sees expansion of the EU as part of the US encirclement policy, of which Ukraine and Georgia are especially blatant examples.
  
• The independent policy of French president Sarkozy is a vivid example of national interests. Sarkozy is thinking French and not European, when he speaks of the Mediterranean Union and when he promotes French military alliances or treaties over nuclear cooperation with countries of the Mediterranean region.
  
• The new members from Eastern Europe see their foreign policy support in the USA and align their foreign policy with US wishes.
  
• Great Britain sails in the wake of the USA.

Expansion — together with globalization — has brought heightened pressure on the majority of the European population to produce, often combined with lower income to the point of financial starvation. Jobs are lost, foreign capital is decisive in European industry (China, Libya and other Arabic countries). For a large part of the European population, the EU now offers a very modest living standard.

The “Lisbon Goal” is a true declaration of bankruptcy. The EU was supposed to be the most innovative and economically significant area of the world. Now that the impossibility of this plan is obvious, the goal is being postponed by 10 years and summarily re-named Strategy 2020.

Though the EU still comes up trumps through comparatively significant economic successes in international tests of strength, disillusion has set in this area too, through accumulation of debt across the entire EU, especially in the PIGS — Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain. Dramatically rising unemployment — caused not least by outsourcing — intensifies this disenchantment.

The Special Case of Turkey

• Between US-NATO wishes and a split of interests in member states, Turkey was granted membership in the Council of Europe in 1999 in a confidential paper which was not available to the public. In December 2004, 407 representatives in the EU parliament voted for negotiations with no further delay. Only 262 voted against. On October 3, 2005, negotiations began with the goal of full membership. (This counterintuitive position has been held to this day with no regard for public opinion. The granting of asylum to Turkish citizens is not seen as a contradictory indicator.)
  
• Despite a lack of progress in meeting entry requirements, Turkey continues to receive signals of a foreseeable time for entry.
  
• In the beginning of 2010, the Turk, Mevlüt Cavusoglu was elected chair of the parliamentary assembly of the Council of European.
  
• Istanbul was chosen as the cultural capital of Europe for 2010. The festival city, Salzburg, has a sponsor from Turkey.
  
• Critical remarks in progress reports continue to have no consequences (e.g., Cyprus, religious freedom).

In its judgment of Turkey, the EU for instance, disregards the fact:
- - - - - - - - -

• That Turkey has great deficits in human rights and therefore does not fulfill the basic requirements for acceptance. (In contrast to these criteria, Turkey was granted “sufficient” fulfillment of basic requirements.)
  
• That special role of the army and religious authority, which is anchored in the constitution of the (national-religious) unity government is EU adverse and so Turkey is not and cannot become a democracy in the Western sense.
  
• That the public life of Turkey is determined by Islam, in other words, by ideological basics which are the exact opposite of the Western model of life.
  
• That a full membership for Turkey means an entry with fulfilling the requirements and, in consideration of the size and otherness of this land, plainly means the final abandonment of the feeling of togetherness and the end of the work of European integration.
  
• That the entry of Turkey brings with it an enormous financial burden for the EU and, aided by this financing, all the Turkish EU contradictions, including military ambitions, are bolstered.
  
• That the EU, in the absence of any foreign policy of its own, would stumble in the wake of Turkish interests into Turkey’s conflicts with its neighbors.

The foreign policy of the EU is a reflection of national interests and accordingly not in a position to counteract US hegemonic moves. It must eventually come to the realization that, despite all criticism of the USA. it is the only “player” in the Western world.

European Navel-Gazing Is No World Policy

Although EU deficits become ever more visible, and negative polls and warning voices of important personalities are not lacking, all EU governmental organs are celebrating the accomplishments of the work of integration with events and brochures.

The message of all these “events” is clothed in catchphrases and tranquilizer words. Take for example the following vocabulary of deception and clouding of the mind:

• Abrahamic religions: the patriarch Abraham connects all monotheistic religions. (Why are the obvious differences in the way the religions are lived and practiced not addressed? A common ancestral father does not help us live together. Common rules of play will do that.)
  
• Islam is a peace-loving religion; you must distinguish between Islam and Islamism; there is no unified Islam; the head scarf is an ordinary article of clothing; there are prejudices against Islam, even Islamophobia.
  
• Turkey is a functioning democracy; Turkey is a secular state; Erdogan and his party are “moderately Islamist.” This is per se a contradiction in terms.
  
• Negotiations open to results; in a plebiscite the people will have the last word. (President Fischer rightly noted that a plebiscite requires a law which can only be determined after completion of negotiations and ratification by parliament. Thus, the promise of a plebiscite proves to be a placebo, since no political force to speak of can nor will come through for such an illogical procedure ex post facto.)
  
• During the last Austrian presidency, there was even the slogan: “The EU ought to be fun”!

Like the sorcerer’s apprentice, the EU is moving rapidly toward its self-immolation. Criticism is declared to be prejudice and the concept of prejudice is deformed to be an advantage.

It does not escape the notice of the critically thinking citizen that all these statements from the media, the authorities and from the EU describe a fairy tale world, from which there will someday be a rude awakening.

The Islamization of Our Lives

The Islamization of Europe (and the whole world) is not only the result of Muslim immigration since WW II, but has been a declared goal of Islam since the time of Mohammed. Right from the beginning, war in Islam has been a part of spreading the faith, and is therefore “just.”

The Crusades were all concerned with the re-taking of Palestine and other Christian areas from the Muslims and were in no way imperialistic projects. They were reactions to Muslim attacks. Without the Crusades, Europe would have been subjugated by Islam centuries ago.

• The de-hellenization of Asia Minor began with the appearance of the Turks (Seljuks) in the Byzantine Empire (1071). The dream of Ottoman (Turkish) world empire led to the conquest of Constantinople and the Balkans came to a close over about three centuries with the sieges of Vienna in 1529 and 1683 and the succeeding “Turkish wars.”
  
• This dream of a Turkish world empire has become reality again at this time through acceptance into the EU — without fulfilling a single condition.
  
• The technological and consequent military superiority of Christian countries beginning in the 16th century ultimately led a counterweight to the Muslim military
  
• Finally, the Islamic world fell behind and was even occupied by Christian countries. This enabled the Christian countries to function as protective powers for Christian minorities living in Muslim countries.
  
• Weakened by two world wars, Europe lost its leadership role in the world. Today, non-European countries determine what happens.
  
• Consequently, European values and culture exist merely as one variant in a worldwide offering. European culture and values are already judged negatively in many places. There is no longer any question of being a role model.

A particular milestone in this development is the first oil crisis of the 1970s. Europe’s dependence on oil led to the Europe-Arabic Dialogue (Eurabia). This is an exchange of oil for good will toward Arabic-Islamic interests and/or values. That gave rise to “the Islam prohibition.”

The fact is that Muslim countries treat Western countries with unaccustomed disrespect, of which the conflict of Switzerland with Libya is a clear example. The indifference of Somali authorities to the piracy of mercantile shipping and the attitude of Iran in the question of nuclear armament are two further examples.

Completely unperturbed by Western criticism, Iran supports Hizbullah with modern weapons. Without any objection, the West learns of the Islamization of Kosovo, Bosnia-Herzegovina and other regions by means of Saudi Arabian funds.

The January 2010 EU parliament resolution concerning incidents against Christians in Egypt and Malaysia as well as the proposed resolution of the Austrian parliament in July, 2008 on the worldwide discrimination, repression and persecution of Christians underline the precarious situation of Christians (non-Muslims) in Muslim countries. There were no repercussions. We are contemporary witnesses to the greatest persecution of Christians of all times. Persecution of Christians is not some reminiscence from the age of Rome.

The Islam Prohibition can be traced at the international as well as the national level. It consists of a ban on putting critical questions to Islam. In the dialogue, each and every discussion is ended by the discussion-stopping arguments “general suspicion” and “racism.” The order of the day is twisting the facts by Muslim authorities and compliant Western “helpers.”

An especially striking example is the portrayal of Islam as the “religion of peace,” even though Islam was conceived as an immutably battle-ready ideology. (Indeed, it should be noted that peace in Islamic terms means the state of the world after its total Islamization. To that extent, the designation “religion of peace” is no contradiction even if Islam — legitimately by its own standards — employs violence. The non-Muslim has the choice of conversion, emigration, or death.)

The UN human rights declaration is commemorated every year on Human Rights Day, the 10th of December. Thus, the allegedly universal validity of this socio-political accomplishment is recalled. Not commemorated is the fact that, for Muslims, the 1990 Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam applies — sharia, Islamic law.

The “Western” idea is that human rights coincide with the concept of individual freedom. That includes religious freedom, understood as the freedom of the individual to choose his religious perspective, or to reject it.

The Islamic idea is that religious freedom is the unrestricted right of Islam to expand as a collective (umma) and displace all other religions and lifestyles. Islam is an alliance of religion and politics!

In this sense, the following points should be seen as closely connected and as steps to the Islamization of Europe (the world).

• Since the 1970s — approximately contemporary with the first oil crisis — some Islamic states have been attempting to submit human rights to moral relativism by referencing cultural and religious traditions.
  
• In 1990, Pakistan proposed a ban on defamation of Islam to the UN Human rights Council. The proposal was expanded to “religions” and also accepted as well by the UN General Assembly.
  
• As a consequence, the “Viennese World Conference on Human Rights in 1963” struck a compromise. Since that time, “various historic, cultural and religious conditions are recognized.”
  
• In the human rights year 1998, at the proposal of Iran, the UN General Assembly declared 2001 the “UN year of dialogue between civilizations” and thereby introduced the process of recognizing multiplicity as enrichment in a globalized world (creative diversity). Austria was host of one of the meetings in 2001.
  
• On December 10, 2007, the speaker of the Organization of the Islamic Conference declared in the UN human rights council that the Cairo Human Rights Declaration of 1990 supplements the UN human rights declaration of 1948 since it is concerned with the cultural and religious features of Muslim countries. (Thereby, Islamic law was de facto recognized, even though it contradicts Western ideas of rights.)
  
• The speaker of the OIC declared simultaneously that discussions of sharia in the framework of the UN human rights council are an insult to Islam and therefore impermissible.
  
• Following up on this suggestion, the UN human rights council decided in June, 2008, that religious discussions could be led only by academics.

Therefore, recognition of special features, respect and tolerance is the basis for relations between civilizations. That is the opposite of integration.

• The EU agency for basic rights tracks racism and xenophobia. Combating Islamophobia is a primary concern. Christophobia is not mentioned, although the repression and persecution of Christians have grown to the point where they are impossible to miss.
  
• In 2005, Europeans made Islamophobia equal to anti-Semitism and thus made it a crime.
  
• In the Council of Europe resolution 1605 of April 15, 2008, a distinction is made between Islam and Islamic fundamentalism, whereby discussion of Islam and its ideology of war becomes taboo.
  
• The president of the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe, the Turk Mevlut Cavusoglu, said in his inaugural address in January 2010 that intercultural and inter-religious dialogue must be strengthened. All kinds of racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism and all other kinds of similar phobias which lead to discrimination and intolerance must be stamped out. Of hostility to Christians, which we experience daily, there was not a word.

This stress on Islamophobia is especially questionable since there is no legal definition and the following standards presumably invoke the Islam Prohibition:

The Council of Europe’s Framework Resolution 2008/913/JI of November 28, 2008 on legally enforced combating of particular forms and expressions of racism and xenophobia provides, in article 1 that the following intentional acts be made punishable by law (official crime)

“public incitement to violence or hate against a person or group of persons or member of that group defined according to race, skin color, religion, ancestry, national or ethnic origin”

As a direct result of the Islam Prohibition, we can explain why, at the demand of the Muslims, or in eager anticipation of obeying them, the majority society is considerate of alien lifestyles and ideas and thus fully accepts segregation. (The practice of sharia in British jurisprudence can be seen as abandonment of self, a submission to Islam):

• No pork or alcohol
  
• Gender separation in school and in public. Knowledge of psychoanalysis, e.g., of Sigmund Freud is not considered.
  
• Women may only appear in public in the company of their husbands or only with a head covering.
  
• Crosses removed from schools and hotel rooms.
  
• Refusal to salute the flag in the army and extensive special treatment of Muslim recruits.
  
• Consideration for the effects of the month of fasting.
  
• Consideration for the Islamic prohibition against interest (Islamic banking). Banking may not charge interest nor deal in businesses that are repugnant to Islam (alcohol, pork, gambling, etc.) All these are signs of a progressive Islamization of all aspects of life. In truth, a systematic and unconditional discrimination against all things not Muslim!

Almost exclusively, the non-Muslim’s answer to this threatening situation is dialogue. Since Vatican II, even the Vatican believes in dialogue.

In countless interrreligious/intercultural dialogues, Christianity and the West are equated and this prevents the interpretive power of our laws from being placed beyond all doubt. Anyone who feels connected to neither Christianity nor Islam (syncretists, agnostics, atheists) justifiably asks: “Who is representing me in all the interreligious dialogues and why is my philosophy of life and the separation of religion and state of less value than religious belief, especially Islamic?”

This applies, for instance, to the president. He describes himself as an agnostic. Also never heard from are those who are in contact with Muslims in the course of their everyday lives and must experience the difficulties of integration, in the police, emergency services, hospitals and schools.

In many places, Islamic ideas are fully accommodated, from Muslim work clothes in the municipality of Vienna to the complete prohibition on discussing Muslim moral concepts. Neither the ORF, the theater nor the churches ask critical questions. They are content with “playful” encounters like hiking or soccer.

The exchange of thoughts is without intellectual depth and corresponds to a wine-tasting or the exchange of recipes. Some representatives of the church even see Islam as an ally against secularization.

With respect to the proclamation “demand and encouragement,” the measures taken by the administration to further integration are content with the encouragement. By this means, the parallel society is anchored still more firmly. Even the requirement to learn German is weakened by a multitude of foreign language translations and translation services. So learning German is actually no longer necessary in many places in Austria.

The result of this attitude is the Muslim parallel society which is not integrated nor willing to integrate and frequently has no respect for the indigenous population. There is hatred for the West. The law of the state has no effect in the parallel society. The police have no reach. Justice is determined by local — mostly Muslim — patterns.

Consider too, that a society is acting “positively” in terms of racism, when it does not insist upon its own standards from immigrants and closes one eye instead of helping.

What Does All This Mean for Coexistence With the Muslims?

Can western lifestyle (secular individualism with free will, voluntary religious practice and individual identity) even persist against Islamic and oriental-patriarchal lifestyles (group identity and nationalism)?

The basic elements of this Western lifestyle are being seriously challenged by Islam, even though these elements are the result of a long, at times painful, hard fought process of consciousness raising and are regarded by Western civilization as an achievement. These are, above all

• Separation of religion and state
  
• Religious freedom, freedom of expression even to its extreme
  
• Religion and sexuality are private affairs
  
• Art is allowed anything
  
• Gender equality

Islam was recognized as a religion in Austria with the Islam Law of 1912. The requirement for recognition was “compatibility with the laws of the state.” Despite all warnings, this has not been checked for a long time. Persecution of Christians in non-Western countries, of secular immigrants, and Islamic writings (fatwas) inimical to the West could not bring an end to this turning of a blind eye.

The government is required to make clear its interpretive authority vs. Islam and to do away with Islam’s deviations from the laws on religious freedom. Put simply, the authorities must actualize the “explanatory remarks” and the “report of the special commission” concerning the law of 1912. This task has been waiting for nearly 100 years!

It is unacceptable that Islamic values have not been dealt with in the ordinary course of parliamentary discussions but has been demanded “from outside.”

The authorities must also clarify whether the concept “infidel,” by which Islam designates all non-Muslims as second-class people, is, in the sense of the above-mentioned framework resolution “public incitement to violence or hate against a group or member of a group of persons defined as a religion according to the criteria.”

The Structure of Turkey

Turkey is a regional power with a targeted domestic and foreign policy, by means of which it confronts a split EU foreign policy with great pertinacity. It pursues its own interest exclusively, often blatantly in contradiction to EU interests. Completely in tune with this foreign policy opportunism is the direction of its foreign policy with regard to the EU/Europe, but also the Islamic and central Asian area.

There is also no shortage of military interventions to effect its foreign policy goals. There have been ca. 3,000 Turkish soldiers stationed on Cyprus since 1974, although the grounds for intervention (overthrow of the Greek military regime) have been gone for years. Turkey also intervenes everywhere where it wants to assert its interests, not militarily, but with substantial political and economic pressure.

That includes diplomatic actions in the USA and the EU in regard to the Armenian genocide and the Kurdish separatist movement PKK. Still fresh in memory is the Turkish intervention against the installation of the Danish president as NATO general secretary. Freedom is not important to Turkey; Muslim sensibilities are. Nonetheless, it was rewarded for this extortion by a strengthening of US good will.

Turkey’s anti-Western positions are, of themselves, no surprise. In the OIC, Turkey appoints the general secretary and therefore functions as the important spokesman in the controversy between Islam and the West. That was true in the clash over the Mohammed cartoons and applies presently to the OIC’s efforts to subordinate the UN human rights declaration to sharia. By this means, criticism of the Islamic perception of human rights is to be stopped. Turkey has long since visibly returned to the Islamic camp. There is no question of a bridge between cultures. Atatürk and his secular orientation are nothing any more than lip service,

Turkey has a constitution adverse to the EU: political life and religious practice are under the purview of the military, even though the Islamic regime is working to reduce this influence. Religious practice and religious adherence are not a private matter as they are in the Western world.

The religious authority, Diyanet, regulates religious life for Sunni Islam, the majority faith. Other sects are disadvantaged. The once flourishing Christian community has shrunk to numerical insignificance. Even 20 million (Islamic?) Alewites are hampered in their religious practice by the Sunni majority.

Diyanet names the imams and sends them into countries with Turkish or Turkish-descended populations, for example, Germany and Austria. In both countries, Diyanet maintains branch offices like a colonial administration, to encourage the religious and national connections to Turkey — but not integration. From this grows a state within a state with the purpose of land acquisition. In Austria, this branch is called ATIB = Ayrupa-Türk Islam Birligi = Turkish Islamic Union for Cultural Cooperation (literally, European-Turkish Islamic Unification with no reference to cultural cooperation).

The Turkish laicité was decreed from above. It did not grow from the bottom up as in the West. The comparison with France is misleading. The Turkish state is not religion-neutral like France. On the contrary, it advantages Sunni Islam and discriminates against all other religions and beliefs.

The founder of the Turkish republic, Kemal Atatürk, introduced separation of religion ad state ca. 80 years ago. The military was established as the guardian of this lay establishment, which led to the more recent past and then to the ban on parties.

Despite all efforts at control, “Kemalism,” with its attempt to implant laicism in the population, has failed. To this day, there are two antagonistic groups in the population: the rural, religious people, including those who migrated to the cities and the secularly oriented city dwellers, whose numbers are dwindling.

Practically speaking, Turkey is in a culture war. Head-covering remains an ideologically highly explosive question. The ban on action for the ruling party the president and many other politicians because of misinterpretation of laicism found no majority with the constitutional judges.

Misunderstanding the facts, the EU took the side of an Islamic state and applauded the process. One resource for this cultural conflict is the influx of capital from Muslim sources. Anyone who practices Islam can count on financial support. This applies not only to residence, work, school and groceries, but also to entrepreneurs in finance and contracting.

The “moderate Islamist” government is taking Turkey step-by-step to an Islamic theocracy and in managing this is completing the necessary ideological re-orientation.

The Turkish constitution foresees not only the special role of the military and religious authorities but also the ethnic-religious centralized state. Accordingly, Turkey’s constitution recognizes no ethnic minorities, including, for instance, 12 million Kurds.

A striking nationalism is quickening in Turkey and protected by criminal laws (no insulting of Turkey, no criticism of official positions on Armenians, Cyprus). Testifying to this nationalism are the ubiquitous Atatürk posters and statues together with the country-wide motto, seen everywhere: “Everyone who is a Turk is fortunate.” This nationalism plus Islam explains the unwillingness and incapacity of Turks to integrate in Europe (Turkish organizations declared during the “Islam conference” of former interior minister Schäuble that they did not adhere to German values).

A horrifying demonstration of this religio-nationalistic attitude is the murder of three fellow employees in a bible print shop in Malatya in 2007. The perpetrators justified themselves with their battle against enemies of the faith and of the Turkish nation. SPD EU representative, Turkish-born Vural Öger, poured oil on the fire by placing the blame on the EU because of its push for reform in Turkish law.

An accommodation of the Turkish constitution to the EU would mean relinquishing these two pillars and thus the end of Atatürk’s Turkey. On the other hand, it is obvious that a similar process in the “negotiations,” would lead the EU to accept a military dictatorship or a theocracy into its ranks. In either case, it will become a plaything of Turkish politics. Reconciliation policy, which aims at an improvement in relations with neighbors, is contained within tight boundaries. The Armenian-Turkish thaw was followed quickly by a cold front.

Unperturbed by all these contradictions, Turkey steps forth with absolutely incomprehensible declarations and demands and talks about an entry date of 2013-15 in the following ways:

• We have fulfilled all entry requirements and have a right to full membership.
  
• The EU has no right to reject Turkey. Turkey reproaches the EU in the coarsest terms as being a Christian club, but is not above participating significantly in the OIC, an organization of exclusively Muslim countries. There is no Christian equivalent of the OIC.
  
• As far as the Turkish president is concerned, the Balkans extends into Turkey, when it is a question of integrating the Balkans. He interprets the continuing visa requirement for Bosnia as an example of the disadvantaging of a Muslim country, compared to Serbia, for which the requirement was lifted recently.
  
  Even in the European council, The (proposal of a) European flag with the cross — modeled on the pan-European movement — failed because of Turkey’s resistance.
  
• Turkey accuses the EU of discrimination and complains about admonitions. In truth, it is getting special treatment like no member country has gotten until now. Even Croatia was treated more harshly. Turkey is oblivious and, like an invading army, ignores the sensitivities of the population of the EU.

Turkey is blazing its trail into the EU. It extorts agreement and shows no willingness to fulfill the entry requirements. It is following its usual extortionist negotiating tactics: flatter, be insulted, threaten. It wants a Turkish Europe, as expressed clearly in February, 2008 by the Turkish president, when he appeared in Cologne. Serbia was invited to apply on the basis of a Brussels decision. Turkey made its application at the time against the recommendation of the EU.

As a result of this unfair and tenacious negotiating tactic, Turkey is well represented in the committees and PR apparatus of the EU and is shaping its “own entry requirements.” Together with Spain, it is setting the tone in the UN initiative, “Alliance of Civilizations.” A tactically feeble EU confronts this Turkish determination, backed by the hegemonic interests of the USA. This explains why

• All warning voices — no matter how high-ranking or competent — echo unheard.
  
• The organs of the EU do not recognize that a full membership for Turkey does not bring a single advantage for most of the European population. Rather, exclusively substantial disadvantages.
  
• The official organs of the EU consider their own population their greatest enemy and avoid polls and plebiscites.

All “pro” arguments are distortions of fact as, for example,

• Turkey is the realization of the union of Islam and democracy and is a bridge to the Islamic world.
  
  Based on its constitution, it is not a democracy in the Western sense of the word. It is a daily showplace of conflict between Islam and secularity. The Islamic world sees Turkey either as a lever and a part of its Islamization program or, because of its military pact with Israel, as an enemy.
  
• The geopolitical position of Turkey and its military power would enhance the role of the EU in the Western world.
  
  Quite the contrary: since the EU has no intervention policy of its own, Turkey would use the EU for its own purposes. In any case, the EU would be drawn into Turkey’s conflicts with its neighbors and destabilized along with it.
  
• With the NABUCO gas pipeline, Turkey has a key role in providing for Europe’s energy needs.
  
  Actually, it is not clear what gas will be fed into it.
  
• The EU promised entry and Turkey has been waiting 40 years.
  
  There is no democratically legitimized promise. During this time, Turkey has developed in a direction away from Europe. Indeed, in the 1970s, it expressly turned its back on the EU and/or Europe.
  
• Without entry, the reforms in Turkey will collapse.
  
  For European council charter member Turkey, the reforms are an obligation overdue for 10 years and were supposed to demonstrate Turkish self-interest. The EU has no obligation to grant a reward.
  
• The EU needs Turkey’s economic potential for further development.
  
  Entry is not based on economic special interests, especially if market potential can only be appreciated by means of financing by the investor and considerable risk and corruption exist. Turkey is one of the IMF’s biggest debtors, a developing country with typical characteristics, like greater participation in agriculture (about 30%), high unemployment (also among youth) and illegal employment, low per capita income, child labor, insufficient patent protection and unreliable law enforcement. On the basis of the existing customs union, there is already close economic linkage between the EU and Turkey. A full entry offers no additional economic possibilities.

EU — pardon me? What is that? The EU does not exist! A sacrifice of the intellect?

Hegemonic Claims Within the Community of Nations

Who determines the direction of things?

With no claim to thoroughness, and conscious of the remarks above, let the following picture apply: whoever separates from European navel-gazing and sees the world from outside, recognizes that, besides several countries active in world politics, Islam and international capital flow combined with providing energy and raw material are the hand on the tiller.

The USA as leading world power is presumably at the head. Its foreign policy is energy. China is noticeable by its securing of raw materials in Africa and elsewhere. In this race of world powers for oil and raw materials it is often unnoticed that the Islamic world is pursuing not only economic, but ideological interests — namely the Islamization of the world.

How much this Islamization has been strengthened is seen in the positive signals President Obama is sending the Muslim world. In his speech at Cairo University, he extended his hand to the Muslim world. Even the unconditional support of Israel is no longer his policy.

An international net of capital streams beyond the control of national governments, and also international organizations spans the entire world and makes its own decisions. Wall Street plays a prominent role. The motto: the financial position must remain attractive and that determines all other policies! That also applies to President Obama’s financial package.

The question arises: what the individual must and can do in this situation, especially those who feel a loyalty to European values.

The burden of our history compels us not only to reflect on what is past and vow “Never again,” but also to vigilance about the spirit of the times, the “mainstream.” In art, in many media, in the churches, in scholarship and in many political parties it is in style to turn a blind eye to the subjects Islam and Turkey. Restricted freedom of expression and fear of speaking out are dominant.

Making middle class society and Christianity — especially the Catholic Church — objects of contempt, the attack on the family, the demand for “gender mainstreaming” and equal standing for homosexual relationships are no substitute. Individual boundaries need to be set. Our civilization must not be the “show and tell” of a directionless good time society.

As in the past, so also today, looking at the truth and speaking out publicly is necessary. Especially because the past burdens our life to the present day. Whoever wants to learn the truth, will learn it. Excuses after the fact will mean nothing. Even if many people say; “My mind is made up. Don’t confuse me with facts.”

Perhaps this time, with sufficient perseverance and courage, it will be possible to create a counterweight to the spirit of the times and to explain that 2 plus 2 equals 4 and not something else.

Or mankind may follow the path of greed, betrayal and indifference to apocalyptic conditions. The worldwide economic difficulties should be a warning that it is high time for a reversal. The Rhine maidens are demanding the return of the Rhine gold.

Requests to speak, letters to the editor, commentaries in newspapers, speeches and the like can, in sufficient number, can cause change. Perhaps the above comments will be able to help with that. Whoever fights can win; whoever does not fight has already lost. If future generations are to have any respect for us, we must intervene for truth and against looking the other way — to the point of civil disobedience.

Out future will be decided not only by the achievements of the past, but by a conscious intervention of European society on behalf of it own values — especially family values and economic solidarity.

Isolation of the individual and increase of the precarious economic conditions could give impetus to a slogan like “Islam is the answer.” Unalloyed individualism will bring a swift dissolution to any society.

Famous names tell us:

• Indifference is the mildest form of intolerance. (Karl Jaspers)
  
• What you inherited from your ancestors — work to earn and possess it. (Goethe)
  
• In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. (Orwell)
  
• When tolerance becomes a one-way street, it leads to cultural suicide. (Lieutenant Colonel Allen West)
  
• Freedom is never more than one generation from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same. (Ronald Reagan)
  
• My greatest disappointment is the recognition that humanity does not learn from experience. (Doris Lessing)
  
• Difficulties are not overcome by not talking about them. (Berthold Brecht)
  
• Reason becomes nonsense, blessing becomes plague. (Goethe)
  
• Truth is the most precious thing we have. Let us deal with it frugally. (Mark Twain)

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Notes:

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Pascal Bruckner, 2008, “The Guilt Complex”: “All modern thinking can be reduced to the schematic denunciation of the West, with emphasis on hypocrisy, violence and heinousness.” ”The European bad conscience, based on imperialism, fascism and racism has gripped the continent, and is destroying its creativity, its feeling of self-worth, and is decimating its optimism.”