Saturday, August 30, 2008

What Went Wrong With the West, and What Can We Do?

The Fjordman Report

The noted blogger Fjordman is filing this report via Gates of Vienna.
For a complete Fjordman blogography, see The Fjordman Files. There is also a multi-index listing here.



At the beginningof the 21st century, the West is the sick man of the world. We provide our enemies with the technology and medicine to multiply, give them the transportation and legal rights to move to our countries (after we first showed them through TV and movies how much better life is in our part of the world). On top of this, we pay them to colonize our countries and harass our children, while our so-called leaders ban opposition to this as intolerance, discrimination and racism.

How did we go from being the most rational and dynamic civilization in human history to being the most irrational and pathetic? When did the West stop thinking? Where did we go wrong?

Here is the answer an American friend of mine gave:

Well, there’s Marxism of course, which was extremely damaging in all its forms. There were the two world wars which killed so many of our people and caused a lack of cultural confidence. Then there was the Pax Americana and the unprecedented safety and affluence it brought to the Western World. We have now had two generations of Westerners, almost three, who have never known real poverty, hunger, war, or “the knock on the door in the middle of the night.” Without a need for survival skills, we had the time and the money to focus on ever-more insane political and cultural ideologies. People didn’t worry about gay rights or “whiteness studies” in the middle of the Great Depression or the London Blitz! I think I remember reading something about how the Indian Hindu empires became ripe for conquest by Islam — “They focused on becoming good, instead of remaining powerful.” I can’t remember the source on that though. But that’s what we are now — obsessing about how to be good, not on being powerful. And our “goodness” isn’t worth much if the rest of the world is focused on becoming powerful.

Also, you have to remember, a lot of people are making money out of these insane ideologies. The “diversity” industry in the U.S. is worth billions — people with little skills or ability are being given comfy well-paid jobs because of it. And because of anti-discrimination laws, every organization, whether for profit or not, must have a “diversity” plan to point to if they ever get sued for “discrimination.” It’s literally a recession-proof captive industry. Anyways we’re sick and the whole world knows it. They are coming here to feed off our sickness. How sick is it? In the US if you are non-white, you can immigrate here and instantly be given all kinds of special privileges, scholarships and preferences over white Americans who have lived here for generations. (Or if you’ve got a Spanish name, you can get those same privileges and preferences even if you’re as white as King Juan Carlos of Spain!)
- - - - - - - - -
All you have to do is scream “racism” and your ticket is punched for life. My first ancestor arrived in the US in 1642 and I am descended from several Revolutionary War soldiers. But my blonde, blue-eyed daughter must step aside for the progeny of a Mexican illegal immigrant who deliberately got pregnant and gave birth here so she could access the schools, welfare state, and infrastructure that my ancestors fought, bled and died for. The word is out — get yourself into the West, scream “racism” and you’ve got it made. And the “racism” industry is happy because the more non-whites come here, the more business for them. That all of this is building up to a mass genocide of our people, no one seems to care, except for the Marxists, who of course eagerly look forward to it.

So, what can ordinary citizens do about this?

Well, first of all we need to reclaim pride in our own heritage, which has been systematically robbed from us in recent generations. We need to reclaim control over our borders, and must reject any organization, either the EU, the UN, various human rights NGOs or others who prevent us from doing this. And finally, we need to develop a new mental paradigm dedicated to our own survival. We first need to survive, and then hopefully regenerate.

We cannot fix the rest of the world’s problems and have no obligation to do so even if we wanted to.

26 comments:

Anonymous said...

The best explanation I've found that speaks directly to what has changed is Allan Bloom's

The Closing of the American Mind

It's an excellent read.

Afonso Henriques said...

I think we better regenerate first and then survive. At this point, we won't survive without a "Cultural Revolution" first.

What happened to the West?

Well, one American here said that the last Scandinavian with balls, died defending Berlin in 1945; A well played commenter indirectly said on TV two weeks ago that all the Portuguese and Spaniards with balls went to Latin America;

My thesis is almost like that: Western Europe felt in 1945 and never arouse again, Latin America... is it Western? And the U.S.A. felt in the 60s with his puppy, Canada.

All we have now is Eastern Europe, well, Russia, because the rest is already in the E.U. And I think Australia and New Zeland just thought it would be nice to follow the Civilizational trend.

-------------------------------

"In the US if you are non-white, you can immigrate here and instantly be given all kinds of special privileges, scholarships and preferences over white Americans who have lived here for generations. (Or if you’ve got a Spanish name, you can get those same privileges and preferences even if you’re as white as King Juan Carlos of Spain!)"

Maybe then, I'll change my surname from Reis Fernandes to Reyes Hernandez and just immigrate to the New World1

Fjordman said...

Chalons: We no longer have any real understanding of or agreement about what our civilization actually is. Globalists seem to think it's an empty vessel only to be filled with "human rights," without any real identity or culture of its own worth preserving.

I suspect much of the infighting between the so-called "conservative anti-Jihadists" over the past year has been due to the fact that not only do we not agree about the nature of the enemy (Little Green Footballs still supports the "moderate Islam" myth, and views everybody else as "extremists"), but also because we do not agree about the nature of us. There has always been a lot of infighting in Europe. Maybe it's a Christian thing. Or maybe it dates back to the individualism of the ancient Greeks. Anyway, it is extreme right now.

Anonymous said...

Indeed Afonso, all you have to do is change the "s" at the end of your last name to a "z" and your're instantly transformed into an oppressed minority entitled to all sorts of goodies financed by the taxpayers of the US. Didn't know that one little letter in the alphabet would be worth so much money and privilege, did you know?

Diamed said...

'And finally, we need to develop a new mental paradigm dedicated to our own survival. We first need to survive, and then hopefully regenerate.'

I agree. We should not be fettered by things deemed more important than survival like compassion, liberty, equality, freedom of speech, the economy, Christian ethics, etc, etc. We are our own worst enemy because we haven't even decided survival is valuable. By regenerating afterwards I infer reach the same cultural dynamism and vitality we observed in the 1700's and 1800's, not regenerating back into the twisted value system we have today once it's 'safe' to do so. I would prefer to never see the 'life at the bottom' west again.

If we survive, we can be or do anything we want afterwards, if we don't, there's nothing we can be or do and no morality you believe in will be promoted. It will lay in the grave with no advocates at all. This is why people of all stripes and goals should agree to fight for survival first, and the imposition of their pet philosophy second.

However, I believe the numbers are against us and most likely, all we can do is sit back and watch. I don't see any trends for the better, only the situation getting worse everywhere. (Just look at Italy electing that right-wing government only to be swarmed with illegals anyway, or Denmark being overruled by the EU and not allowed to restrict immigration. No one anywhere is getting away.) Instead of turning back the tide, which at this point would require such a bloody genocide we'll never be willing to do it, I suspect the best we can do is gather up disgruntled whites who are not happy being minorities and seceding, plotting out a piece of land exclusively for whites and making our stand there, perhaps 100 years from now when there's nowhere left to run and the whole world looks like south africa, such people will finally emerge from their mental cocoons.

Anonymous said...

I agree, Fjordman. I immediately thought of Bloom's book when your post posed the questions: 'When did the West stop thinking? Where did we go wrong?' It's a question I've been pondering for some time now. The Closing of the American Mind offers some good insights into the death of discernment. ( And so have many of your excellent essays)

I haven't read this book yet, but it seems relevant. Natan Sharansky strikes out against the multicultural mindset in his new book, the central premise being that a people without a sense of identity cannot defend themselves.

Defending Identity: Its Indispensable Role in Protecting Democracy

ɱØяñιηg$ʇðя ©™ said...

This is exactly how the situation is in various dgreading degresin many european countries already. What good will it do us to create a small white only country when it will be surrounded by hostile aggressive muslim states anyway? That could even turn out to be contraproductive. All they have to do to get rid of these hated white kaffirs is nuking the crap out of that country. Better to make our stand where we are now. Yes, it will be bloody but it has unfortunately gone too far to be solved anyway peacefully.

Fjordman said...

Yes. We will have reconstitute or create an identity to defend ourselves. The thing is, this new identity may look quite different from the old one(s). I was accused by the morons over at LGF of being a "white nationalist." As I asked then, I don't see why being labeled a "white nationalist" is supposed to be bad whereas nobody uses the terms "black nationalist" or "yellow nationalist."

Europeans haven't traditionally identified ourselves as "whites," we have identified ourselves as Italians, Englishmen, Serbs, Bulgarians, Russian Orthodox, Dutch Protestants, Polish Catholics etc. You can go to virtually any spot on European soil, and the people there will claim that the nation X did something bad to them in the fourteenth or seventeenth century, and that they still hate them for it. Europeans have been fighting and killing each other longer and far more than we have been killing non-whites.

These "small identities" matter a lot to us, but they don't matter to our enemies. Gangs of immigrants who beat up, rob or murder a young European man in Paris don't ask whether he is a Catholic or a Protestant, they just see a "white guy." Likewise, a young woman who is gang raped in Brussels or Stockholm is not targeted for her nationality, she is targeted because she is a "white whore."

If people of European origins are attacked for being whites, how long does it take before they also start defending themselves as whites? The globalists and the Multiculturalists may partially succeed in breaking down traditional, national identities. Ironically, they may create a new transnational identity based on common loyalty as "whites." And these "whites" will want a room of their own, where they can prosper and send their children to school to learn about their heritage, not to have it abused while they suffer harassment in the streets of their own cities for having a white skin.

Anonymous said...

LGF came off as a Pavlovian mob in that fiasco. Discernment is not their strong suit. One best keep it binary over there. Thanks for exposing that for us, Fjordman. It was very revealing.

I think the double standards are slowly, very slowly starting to break down. The body count is getting increasingly hard to ignore and the stories too frequent to dismiss. Still it's a tragedy that so many must suffer for somebody else's vision of utopia.

Anonymous said...

LGF? Charles Johnson is currently venting the anger of failure, at the creationists. Ever the confused crybaby, he is forced to defend bible thumping Republicans, while attacking their core beliefs. What a phony!

Hal K said...

Here is one thing that can be done to try to reverse this process. We need to teach our children a proper appreciation of their racial and ethnic identity. My child is just now starting at a school that is listed as 50% white (we live in the U.S.), but when I look at the names of the children in her class it appears that she is the only one who is not the offspring of East or South Asian immigrants. It seems to be a fairly good private school, but one of their main stated principles is the importance of teaching an appreciation for “diversity.” It occurred to me that it would be valuable to have unapologetically pro-European educational material for my daughter in order to counteract the indoctrination she is about to receive. If anyone knows of something along these lines I would appreciate hearing about it.

Afonso Henriques said...

Fjordman,

I liked your last comment a lot. I agree completely with you.

But... you fail to see one thing. Third Worlders do not attack whites mainly because of their race, because of their white skin.

You may want to write about it but, while Europe does indeed show a strinking genetlically homogeneity and, while you can indeed speak of European Genes, you can not speak of an European race.

For instance, why are Greeks white (and if needed beaten in the streets) and Turks not?
There are indeed Turks who look white, who have white skin and they may even have light eyes and hair but they will never be beaten because they are white.

Bosniaks, the same. I don't doubt many Bosniaks and even Albanians had in fact killed and raped Serbians who were darker than them *because* the Serbs were white.

Zidane, for instance, is he all that non white? And he's a full blooded African...

The problem is not *because* they are white. Turks do not become magically black in the border with Greece, the problem is that the people who are attacked are part of the European Civilisation.

The attacks are not racial, they are almost spiritual. This war is not racial. So you will conclude that "whites" in fact do not exist. What exist is a cultural and genetic patrimony, Europe, that is being violently attacked just because it exists. Just because it apears to be somehow superior in so many ways...

"White" weakens us, by giving to a Civilisational and Cultural, but never genetic (white Bosniaks, white Albanians, white North Africans...) space a faux racial meaning. The Arabs are also Caucasians but they are not "white". What we mean with white is European, is Western, and whenever a "white whore" is raped or someone is beaten, that's nothing to due with their race but with their Civilisation and Culture. Think about it.

Rocha said...

Afonso,

You are damn wrong, and many people make that same mistake because of ignorance. There are in truth two components of being western, one is cultural and another racial. The most important is the cultural. That's why a spaniard or a portuguese can mix in latin america. But you can have only the racial. Turks mixed with the white Greek/Armenian population of Anatolia so much that many of them can be called white but they are culturally muslim, Bosniaks are white but culturally arab/muslim, the same can be said about Albanians or even North Africans, the last ones were conquered and colonied by Fenicians (not very dark) Romans and Greeks before Arabs even dreamed of setting foot in there, their own original population was not black. In the other way a latin american mestizo is not white but he is westerner (and i'm not telling that this excuses the present colonisation of the USA) because his culture is western. I don't know the thing Europeans and especially Americans have agaisnt Latin Americans (that even before the present crisis), Australia is seen as a western country Argentina or Brazil is not, Argentina is as white as Australia, Brazil have a substantian white minority (and a mestizo/black population fully integrated) in most of his territory, part of it even have a white majority of more than 80%. A strange thing is that in most latin american countries one would not be attacked for being white, but the same people in USA IS DOING THE OPPOSITE THAT THEY WOULD DO IN THEIR NATIVE COUNTRY! Why?!? Because we are weak now. And weakness create hate.

Hal K said...

Alfonso,

I think you may be missing the forest for the trees. Is it the few cases where Muslims are racially European and white that are significant, or is it the many cases where non-whites are moving into countries with current white majorities and changing the demographic balance that are significant? Of course, each person has to decide for him or herself what is more important, but Muslims play a small role in the demographic transformation taking place in the U.S. This may not be the best case, since this blog focuses on Europe, so consider the case of Britain. The racial balance would be changing there even without the Muslims. Islam intensifies the problem of demographic change because of the relatively aggressive cultural attitudes of Muslims, but the problem would still be there without Muslims.

Hesperado said...

Afonso asked:

"For instance, why are Greeks white (and if needed beaten in the streets) and Turks not?"

The answer to this lies in a phenomenon that is gaining traction: Muslims who may have light pigmentation (Bosnians, some Turks, some central Asiatics) become "honorary browns", just as whites who convert to Islam become "honorary browns". Meanwhile, less-than-white Europeans (swarthy Mediterraneans) who are non-Muslims remain "honorary whites".

The "brown" aspect of Islam stems from the facts that

1) the vast majority of Muslims are non-white

2) the vast majority of whites in the world are non-Muslims.

Notwithstanding the perfectly rational mantra of the Anti-Islam Movement that "Islam is not a race" -- nevertheless, because of the two facts above, the perception is overwhelming that Islam is an "ethnic" culture. And since it is the most globally militant, it has also acquired a "Che-Guevarization" -- a romanticization as "freedom fighter" guerillas fighting against "oppression" and white Western "interference", etc.

See my 3-part essay on this topic:

White Muslims: Honorary Browns

Ricky Martin said...

Wow. Those are wise words. He said exactly what I had been thinking, but I was not intelligent enough to put it into words. In particular, I appreciate the point about these ideologies having become billion dollar industries. Anyone familiar with the legal field will know exactly what he is talking about.

p.s. the 'genocide' comment is hyperbole, he must know that politically correct ideology is much too "nice" to ever promote the direct, intentional harm of masses of people.

Mark Richardson said...

My own preference would be for the European nations/ethnies to continue to respect their own distinct traditions, whilst also recognising a larger Western tradition as well.

I expect that for a lot of Europeans the traditional national identity is still the living one they identify most closely with. The "white" identity will be more abstract and less likely to inspire positive action.

pasta said...

I have been having this idea spooking around in my head for some time, quite possibly a crackpot idea, but I would like to share it. If you want, judge for yourself:

What went wrong with the West and what can we do?

One of the symptoms of our decline is the failing of our families. Many people don't marry at all, don't select their partner(s) carefully for their marital quality or obtain divorce on a whim. Too few children get born and those who do get born, often get raised by single parents or in dysfunctional households. People give having fun top priority in their lives, and reproduction seems to happen more or less randomly.

It has been opined before by some that the decline of organized religion caused this mess and a return to it could cure it. This was countered by the observation that nations with deeply rooted Catholicism, like Poland or Hungary, have a particularly appallingly low fertility rate. However, it can't be denied that religion does have an influence on how people live, Islam is an example.

I am a lifelong atheist myself and couldn't believe in God if I tried. But organized religion is more than just the faith in a supernatural entity, it consists of other beliefs and practices, too. Islam is notorious for setting strict rules for every aspect of life for its adherents to live according to. It is because of these rules that muslims choose their partners among themselves and that they don't practice contraception. (At least they shouldn't, according to the stricter interpretations of Islam) These rules "work" insofar that even in the absence of government enforcing them Islam thrives and its adherents multiply in numbers. Judging by its spread, the rules of Islam are quite successful.

Christianity used to have such rules, too. Pre- and extra-marital sex and contraception used to be forbidden according to the rules set by religion. I read once, that some centuries ago in a part of Germany even marrying a partner of a different religious persuasion was condemned of by the Church. Even if these were not enforced by government, the mere fact that the Church condemned it, had an affect on the moral behavior of the people.

I am not an insider, but from the outside it looks to me as if nowadays Christianity is almost completely reduced to the faith in God. Moral rules concerning reproductive behavior are not taken seriously anymore and community members are not ostracized for violating them. Therefore, to those of us, who don't believe in God, religion seems to serve no useful purpose. But maybe organized religion could serve a purpose, if it devised rules which fit into our time and address the problems we have, and if it took these rules seriously and tried its best to enforce them within the community?

I was born to atheist parents who did not try to impose any moral rules concerning reproduction on me or influence me in any other way. It was completely up to me to decide on how to live and what to do with my life. I am under the impression that, at least in my country, most people grow up in that way. No wonder that they rarely have children - nobody told them to, nor to submit to any rules at all interfering with what is generally taken for granted as to be the primary purpose of life: To have fun. Children are an inconvenience and even though the government helps in coping with the financial burden, people often don't want any in the first place.

What can we do? We seek political power, we strive to influence the governments of our countries in order to change the law and enforce different rules. But as we don't have any such political power now and, quite possibly, not get any in near future, maybe we should at least try to live and enforce rules, which we deem necessary for our survival, among ourselves? Maybe it sounds cranky, but I, being an atheist, want to suggest us creating an organized religion, a new one, not centered around or insisting in any belief in supernatural entities, but as a community developing and implementing a strategy for our survival as a group, consisting of rules which we try to adhere to and enforce among ourselves as far as this is possible without the power of a government. Other ethnic or religious groups have survived over centuries as separate minorities without becoming extinct, and as we now face the prospect of quickly becoming a minority in our own countries, too, shouldn't we at least try to adjust our habits and possibly get ourselves organized into a religious community?

Such a community could not only reinforce our shared commitment to survive as a group, but also teach people on what we believe is important, on how to go about life and assist them in it. Naturally, the creation and upbringing of the next generation must be our ultimate concern. Whenever financial difficulties are a problem, wealthy community members could volunteer to help out poor ones, for the common purpose. I have no experience of organized religion myself, and maybe I am silly for thinking that such a community could be held together, even without a common faith in God. But it seems to me that it would help greatly, if we overcame our relative individualism compared to other people and acted together in a communal way. If it is possible to make people pray in a mosque five times a day, even without a government enforcing it, why shouldn't it be possible to make people have enough children, too?

Armor said...

a few thoughts in reply to Pasta,

Moral rules concerning reproductive behavior are not taken seriously anymore and community members are not ostracized for violating them.

Those moral rules had been adopted by Christianism but were probably not part of it at the origin. It is not clear if they were imposed to society by the Church or whether society asked the Church to enforce them. Today, the European clergy has been contaminated by leftism and has become less conservative than church-goers. Some of us no longer really believe in God, but would like to do as if we did. And we count on the priests to remain pillars of society and help us keep up appearances. After all, Pope Benedict 16 says that non-believers should live as if God exists. But many priests no longer believe in God, and they no longer believe in maintaining firm structures to society. Instead, they believe in mass immigration. So, we should probably dissociate religion from any defense of European society. If we can recreate a smaller 'traditional' white society on the margins of today's battered society, maybe we'll get conservative priests again. But today's church will not help us recreate a traditional society.

Maybe it sounds cranky, but I, being an atheist, want to suggest us creating an organized religion, a new one, not centered around or insisting in any belief in supernatural entities, but as a community developing and implementing a strategy for our survival as a group, consisting of rules which we try to adhere to and enforce among ourselves as far as this is possible without the power of a government.

What you describe does not sound like religion. It sounds more like a philosophy, an idealist project.

Other ethnic or religious groups have survived over centuries as separate minorities without becoming extinct, and as we now face the prospect of quickly becoming a minority in our own countries

We should try to do the same, but every group of white people who try to organize something among themselves must expect to be attacked by government and left-wing activists. Western governments will not let us have white schools, white firms, white housing districts. If you organize night-club evenings open only to young white people to help them find romantic and sexual partners, you will get into trouble with the law. Laws are now being made to prevent homeschooling, and a large percentage of white parents are not wealthy enough to get their children into private schools.

Such a community could not only reinforce our shared commitment to survive as a group, but also teach people on what we believe is important, on how to go about life and assist them in it. Naturally, the creation and upbringing of the next generation must be our ultimate concern.

The first step: we need to find the moral courage to teach the young that they must avoid any sexual racial mixing. We must say so clearly and publically. Propaganda for racial mixing aims to destroy us.

why shouldn't it be possible to make people have enough children, too?

One way to help achieve that: we create an organization of like-minded white people and we discuss together what are the best career choices to help our children get jobs and marry as soon as possible. I think in Europe, university is too often a waste of students' time.

Afonso Henriques said...

Pasta, I understand you.

But, Catholicism has abandoned us as Europeans. We're now very little to the Pope.

I think that parents must raise their children properly and the difficult thing will be to create such a climate.

----------------


For the others, I meant that the attacks on whites are not attacks on the white race but direct attacks on the European Civilisation;

Like the 9/11 was not an atack against American architecture but an atack against America, against the American Nation.

It was more of an atack against Californians than an attack against the non-Americans who died in 9/11.

Of course I recognise that there is a "genetic patrimony" exclusive of Europe that is worth preserving. You may call it a race but those attacks are directed against Civilisation first, and race second.

Hal K said...

Earlier I offered a practical suggestion in response to the question “what can we do.” It was to create educational material for children that would present a pro-white (i.e. pro-European) point of view and help encourage a greater sense of racial and ethnic consciousness.

There is another question, raised by Limpet, which is how can whites organize and preserve white community cohesion without running into trouble with the law. The thing is, if other groups can maintain cohesion and group loyalty without breaking the law there is no reason why whites shouldn’t be able to do this too. If an organization is created with an explicitly pro-white agenda and purpose then it is unlikely that many non-whites would want to join, for instance.

Armor said...

Earlier I offered a practical suggestion in response to the question “what can we do.” It was to create educational material for children that would present a pro-white (i.e. pro-European) point of view and help encourage a greater sense of racial and ethnic consciousness.

A number of people have probably worked on that already. For example, European Americans United has prepared an elementary (home) school curriculum. I read about it here.

And also, a recent BNP link:
"BNP Launches ‘White History’ Project to Counter State’s Forced ‘Black History’

The British National Party is to launch a ‘white history’ project as a counter to the announcement that the state is to make the learning of ‘black history’ compulsory at all UK schools."

Unknown said...

Alot of criticism has been leveled against the current "regime" in Russian Federation. Given the topic of these thread I would like to comment that the current regime managed to:
1. Bring Orthodox Christianity into public discourse (by making it official religion of the state) after decades of militant atheism,
2. Restore pride in russian people (importance of ethnical pride factor is constantly discussed on this forum),
3. Increase birth rates by promoting so called conception days and sponsoring families with many children,
4. Atempts are made to reduce alcoholism problem that shortens life expectancy of many men,
5. its preparedness to act decisevely against "restive" minorities, however allows sufficient multiculturalism to various ethinicities in Russia, as long as they dont try to push anything unsavoury from their culture into mainstream.

As a conclusion I would like to say that I still have hope for my country, if economic growth continous, right political institutions will develop, some corruption will exist, but so it does in countries like France and Italy, where people are more social then germanic/anglosaxon people, and more susceptible to corruption.

Hal K said...

Limpet:

Thanks for the links.

Conservative Swede said...

Russkiy,

Good points. And yes, according to the CIA ranking, Russia's total fertility rate has gone up from 1.25 to 1.40 in the last eight years.

I hope you stick around because we have a number of Western jingoists in this forum, spouting about Stalinmania and the kind, that need to get some reality check on Russia of today.

We should remember that the West is waging war against its own people (deeply immoral does not quite cover it) While Russia is not. It's nice to see at least Russia going in the right direction. It's an example to all of us.

Unknown said...

Russian role in the current "clash of civilizations" is not clear yet. What is definite is that russians have deeply seated dislike bordering hate towards Islam. This feeling arises from Russia being colonized and subjugated by the mongols who in later times became muslim Tatars. After Moscow expanded and Tatars were subjegated, every russian has in his mind that territories like Kazan is now Russian. Do you know that there are two types of Orthodox Crosses? one is a cross with a second diagonal line underneath the large horizontal line, and the other with crecent under the main cross, which symbolises the win of christianity over islam.

As you know there were some major political problems between Moscow and other european countries when Russia was in a crusader mood against the Turks to recapture the balcans, and other christian lands however France and England were afraid of Russias ambitions and aligned with Otoman Empire, I think that was the cause of the Crimean war.

Russians still see the same thing going on, whether it was in Afganistan with America asisting Mujahedin or in Cosovo and Bosnia.

I know Russia is asisting Iran, I really hate that, but to be honest Russians know well enough what they are playing with,the dont really want strong iran. They wouldnt mind america going at it, but it is a usefull aly when Russias own interests are threatened by western powers.