Nobody can have any doubt anymore about the painful fact that the European Union is desperately lacking in any defense capability of practical use. It is becoming increasingly evident that the reason for the European community’s lack of a common army or border control force, indeed for the lack of will or any effort to set up one, is the absence of commonly held values that its members would see as worthy of protection. Consequently, this community does not and cannot even have a shared future vision, and thus it cannot forge itself into a true community. This is how things are despite the fact that the potentially devastating immigration crisis we are witnessing could offer a good opportunity for Europe to put the cohesion vacuum, resulting from the collapse of the Soviet Union, behind itself and to gear up for the 21st century by channeling all the diverging forces in the same direction.
Part I.
“Have Courage to Use Your Own Reason” Kant
Danish socialists proposed back in the 1980s that instead of having its own army Denmark should settle for an answering machine responding to any incoming calls by saying “we surrender” in Russian. I have a proposal for the European Union’s profile picture. It should feature a Juncker posing and staggering in a waiter’s uniform, surrounded by the members of the European Commission, shoving the gates of Europe wide open ushering new settlers inside. “Wherever you like! We are at your service! Just come on in, you are warmly welcome!” Angela Merkel actually produced her own new profile picture when she took selfies with the new settlers.
Nobody can have any doubt anymore about the painful fact that the European Union is desperately lacking in any defense capability of practical use. It is becoming increasingly evident that the reason for the European community’s lack of a common army or border control force, indeed for the lack of will or any effort to set up one, is the absence of commonly held values that its members would see as worthy of protection. Consequently, this community does not and cannot even have a shared future vision, and thus it cannot forge itself into a true community. This is how things are despite the fact that the potentially devastating immigration crisis we are witnessing could offer a good opportunity for Europe to put the cohesion vacuum, resulting from the collapse of the Soviet Union, behind itself and to gear up for the 21st century by channeling all the diverging forces in the same direction.
The European Union is divided. There is a particularly deep divide between the countries on the two sides of what was once the Iron Curtain. The peoples living in Europe’s western parts have looked at the peoples and nations living here with a disdainful scorn and sometimes with a forgiving contempt for hundreds of years. It was a golden opportunity for them when after World War II – with the helpful assistance of their beloved Churchill – they let the region be taken over as part of the Russian sphere of interest, giving a free hand to Moscow to carry out its experiments with communism. In response to the Soviet challenge Europe’s western part, aided by the US, bolstered by the Marshall Plan, managed to build up social market economies, letting NATO take care of defense issues and the US to direct its foreign policies. During a nearly half a century spent under such conditions the West European countries lived through a sort of a golden age while their intellectual and media elites adopted a not only permissive but too often supportive affection towards the operators of the totalitarian communist dictatorships. Their attraction was not in the least influenced by the fate of tens of millions of Central and Eastern European citizens suffering the horrors of the communist dictatorships.
This is said because progressivist cheerleaders (an expression coined by Frank Furedi) were, from the seventies, recruited almost exclusively from among leftist, Marxist opinion leaders related to the movements of 1968, whose identity was rooted in wealth and convenience, while cherishing their concern and affection for the repressed masses. They liked to accept appointments to the most lucrative supervisory board positions (Gerhard Schröder, Joschka Fischer) and jobs on Wall Street or in the City. This was one of the reasons they found no excuse for the penniless East Europeans who reappeared in their fields of vision from 1990 on again, who were anti-communists while they were Marxists and equality-fetishists; who thought in national terms while they were internationalists and globalized; who were faithful Christians in contrast to them who were atheists; and Europeans instead of having developed into cosmopolitans the way they had. They have always communicated with the Eastern part of Europe from the altitude of a podium, the way they always had with their colonies and this attitude was not in the least affected by our accession to the European Union in 2004, allegedly as equal ranking members. Václav Havel was right when he said that the West did not know what to do about the collapse of communism.
Apart from a few exceptions the collapse of the Soviet regime came like a bolt from the blue to the political and media elite of the Western political left; their first response was complete incomprehension and hardly concealed indignation. They just could not understand why we were making such a fuss when their idolized Gorbachev was only beginning to pull off the latest reform of the communist system. Just why on earth could we not patiently sit and wait until he renders real socialism into socialism with a human face? It was “real socialism”, an expression lovingly used by the western political left, that made it clear for all that they simply did not give a straw about facts, that is, about reality. (More recently, they have taken to talking about real history. We assume they are doing so in order to be objective.) They leave the latter to us and they continue to reserve the right to stick to their illusions of an imaginary socialism existing only in their dreams. They were deeply disappointed with us when without their permission we abandoned the society transformation project to which they gave such heartfelt support, the one that was to have devised a future for them through experimentations, a future that, if functional, they would be able to introduce but if it is not, then, well, so it went for us. Now, really, why did we not root for Gorbachev the way they all did? Why did we overthrow the communist system in this region? Why did thousands of East German citizens flee through Hungary to the western part of Germany? Why did we upset their relaxed and comfy world?
When they were having such a nice time in that something of theirs called BRD (they always used this acronym, they never actually uttered the whole term: Bundesrepublik Deutschland, or the Federal Republic of Germany), enjoying affluence, the continuously diminishing number of weekly working hours and a sweet life without responsibilities. We, Hungarian idiots, believed that we were doing something good to the West Germans because we believed whatever Adenauer and Kohl said and it is only now that we are starting to realize that it was this very gesture that triggered the West German media’s and intellectuals’ unfettered hatred of us that we have to experience day in day out. We ruined them because they had to unite with the “Ossis”, their poor relatives of whom they had been hitherto spared by the communists’ policy of locking themselves up – excusing them from having to help and support the East Germans, even relieving them of any contrition when they could say that their East German friends would only run into trouble if they started to care about them. My, how pleasant it used to be! They could compete in enthusing about the social achievements of the GDR and those of other socialist countries, about Honecker, Kádár and Ceaușescu in Italian restaurants in Frankfurt and Cologne and in the parks of West Berlin. For how much more pleasantly one could spend time in Tuscany or Saint-Tropez than in, say, Weimar or Leipzig, in the grey and unpleasant German Democratic Republic, a complete disaster in terms of culinary pleasantries or the entertainment industry. They were sickened of the mere idea of “Czech and Polish salami peddlers” appearing on the streets of Vienna – to quote the Austrian socialist ex-chancellor Vranitzky.
But the thing is that after 1990 the whole uncouth bunch was there and they had to do something about and with them. And ever since then they have been busy working on educating, or rather, re-educating them, that is: us. And the whole lot of stupid East Europeans, including millions from the former GDR, thought that western wealth and freedom went hand in hand and they were also entitled to them. They thought that nothing could be worse than the intellectual and media terror they had experienced during the 45 years of Soviet occupation. Well, it did not become worse but the much hoped-for freedom of speech was practically instantly locked up in the cage of what is called politically correct. The East Germans fared worst. Wessis coming in the third and fourth waves ousted Ossis from everywhere, taking their positions and forcing on them the German politically correct canon creating such a tight-packed coverage over German publicity that even Ulbricht or Honecker could only dream of. All the more so, because during those times everyone was watching the western television channels. The GDR’s past does not count, nobody in the West is interested in the experience accumulated during the years of communism. The room of sympathy reserved for the mandatory culture of victimhood had filled up and it could not accommodate victims of communism. (Germany does not contribute funds to the International Museum on Communism being built in Washington or to the Memorial to the Victims of Communism in Ottawa, just like they have not been able to produce 50,000 euros that would be required for the joint project aimed at identifying the victims of communism! Germany was not represented in and sent no wreath either to the ceremonial laying of wreaths at the Victims of Communism Memorial in Washington, an event attended by representatives of 28 countries! A pretty tight-fisted nation, that is for sure.)
It does not matter that Germany is now being headed by two former GDR citizens (Merkel and Gauck); in their strive for compensation they have become Wessier than Wessis themselves are: they have given up their national identity and are highly successful in camouflaging their Christian values. This reminds me of the teaching of a Zen master: a long time must pass before the impacts of an event, a tragedy or a success can be assessed. Wait and see! – the sage answered those nagging him with questions. Now 25 years after the removal of the Iron Curtain I have this question: were we, people behind the walls, not helped by tyranny and isolation in preserving our life instincts? Were we not helped by foreign oppression in solidifying our system of values and our capability of resisting external force? Is it not that experience which is now making us oppose the West European elite that had been made to get accustomed to convenience and welfare and at the same time unable to assume responsibility?
West Germans Are Citizens of the World, They Are Europeans for Whom the FRG Is a Comfortable Place to Stay, without Any Ties Whatsoever
The true gravity of the problem dawned on me in an East German city, sipping wine after dinner. With me was a married couple the same age as I was, both professors of the local university, and, confiding in me, they admitted that they went over from the western part of Germany – where they were born and raised – so as to be able to talk more freely there(!). It is there that while sipping your wine you can express opinions digressing from the canon – something impossible in the western part of Germany. So a quarter of a century after Germany’s reunification we can declare that from a certain perspective Germany is becoming more and more like the former GDR. As the large coalition appearing to be consolidating under Merkel is looking more and more like the GDR’s unified state party called SED, so is politics becoming more and more a commodity on short supply, like in the days of yore. Newly formed opposition parties are facing the threat of getting banned. They are stigmatized by the elite as being extreme right from the very beginning, no matter who they are and what they want. Anybody going against them cannot be anything but a fascist, like in the good old days. German publicity is painfully standardized to fit the mainstream as even German media leaders are obliged to admit. Facebook is being censored, the media and culture policies are applying humiliating methods in dealing with anybody thinking outside the box. This old-new Germany is lacking in both emotion and reason, moral terror and the culture of victimhood reign over everything, the result of which is the prevailing Willkommenskultur. The essence of all this is that it affords the feeling of being appreciated for the right behavior to all of those who opt for cowardice and self-surrender.
The German chancellor is ignorant of history: she does not know the history of her country, of the region or of Europe. She knows precious little about the world. Similarly to that of the German elite, nothing other than the mandatory repentance over the Holocaust fits in her horizon. Germany has become a large and hopeless warning, indeed, threatening, index finger under her leadership. “If we start having to beg pardon because we show our friendly face in an emergency, then that is not my country” – she scolded her voters on September 14, 2015, at the beginning of the crisis brought about by the immigration of Muslims. The chancellor is not very good at employing high-quality speech writers or spin doctors. Every speech she delivers is hopelessly spiritless and mediocre. She is eerily similar to Free German Youth (FDJ, the youth organization of the one-time East German party state) activists who came to spend a week or two in summer camps at Lake Balaton in the seventies, who were hilariously funny when they kept repeating party slogans whatever we happened to be talking about.
Here is Angela Merkel: “Islamism, Islamic terrorism is very strong in Libya, Syria and Northern Iraq. The European Union has contributed a lot of fighters to Islamic terrorism. So we cannot say that this is something we have nothing to do with. Because some of them are young men brought up in our countries. Even here, in Germany. Also, fear is not a good advisor. Neither for individuals, nor for a whole society. Cultures, societies in fear cannot take control of the future. Moreover, there is this dispute in Germany over whether there are too many Muslims here and whether Islam is part of Germany. But then, where there are as many as four million Muslims, there should be no dispute of whether Muslims belong to Germany but Islam does not. There are concerns but we are free and able to practice our religion and believe in it if we want to, so we should not reproach them for their Muslim faith; instead, and this is exactly what I find to be missing, we should also have the courage to be Christians. We should have the courage to keep up a dialogue with them. It should be possible, Ladies and Gentlemen, to go to masses again, study the Bible and we should be able to explain church murals to them. So that it should not be necessary in Germany to explain what Pentecost means, in newspaper articles. And it is not how well immigrants know the Quran that we should be complaining about. I find this funny. It would be good to see this dispute prompting us all to deal more with our roots. I find this dispute to be very defensive. Of course, terrorism is something that we should deal with. And anyway, Europe’s history is fraught with dramatic and merciless clashes, so we have to be very cautious when something bad is happening somewhere else. But we have no reason to be conceited and I am saying this as Chancellor of Germany” – this is what she answered at a residents’ forum to the question of whether there was any reason for being afraid of the uncontrolled influx of masses of Muslims. Now is this not miserable?
Germany is being ruled by a vanguard of the leftist media and intellectual elite. Political leadership with Merkel at the helm exercise politics to please them, editors-in-chief and editors, speaking their language and conforming to their values. Rather than actually making policies, they adapt to this irresponsible and arrogant bunch of people utterly lacking in imagination and capability of actually doing things. The financiers, the sponsors – that is, the directors and owners – of these “responsible editors” were the ones brought to light by Udo Ulfkotte in his book recently published and of course deliberately not discussed in the media, entitled Bought Journalists. It is him – who worked for 17 years as an editor for the “reputable and benchmark” newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) – from whom we know how profound a role oil-related funds play in the reports of “independent journalists”. He claims to have also been bribed by representatives of the Sultan of Oman Qaboos bin Said Al Said and the Saudi ruling house. He was given gold watches and other luxury gifts, he could take any pleasure journey in exchange for positive coverage of a variety of Middle Eastern countries and their rulers. Ulfkotte has so far been charged some 150,000 euros in fines for various errors and mistakes he made in his book and this is still far from the end. His main assertions, however, have not been refuted.
His new book bears the title of Asylum Industry: How Politicians, Journalists and Social Organizations Profit from the Wave of Refugees. That various services themselves often write articles befitting their goals, appearing under the names of leading journalists? That aid organizations and certain politicians have financial interests in providing accommodation and supplies for refugees? That the public is treated to made-up stories and whatever is not in line with their interests is simply hushed up? Well, it is not easy to surprise us, people living in the Eastern flanks of Europe. We have always known how these things are being done. Another thing that we have not forgotten, as we have ample experience, is that whatever propagandists and the media are feeding us with is worth filtering through the sieve of sound reason and personal experience. West Europeans, however, insist on the illusion that these things are not true but if they are, then they are immaterial. We also realized it by ourselves, confirmed by Die Welt correspondent in Hungary Boris Kálnoky in a live coverage, that they had been told to focus preferably on children and women among the migrants, to convey a positive picture of the crowds. But this is only the icing on the cake. What counts is the incessant and unflagging war waged on racism, anti-Semitism and primarily Hitler. Since what else could the leftist generation of 1968 and their accessories use in proof of their claim to being the only ones to act as moral judges and consequently having an exclusive right to adjudicate all matters of relevance. That their genesis roots in their collaboration with Stasi? Oh, that is just a forgivable aside. The past shared with the Red Army Fraction (RAF), the Baader-Meinhof group and the communist party is obviously part of their proudly held heritage! This is then the shared origin of the West German progressive leftist intelligentsia and the political representatives collaborating with them. Their morality, their stupid and blindfolded policies are best characterized by none other but the pro-immigration demonstration in Vienna on October 3, 2015 where the socialist president of the Republic of Austria took to the stage together with the bearded transvestite Conchita Wurst. Now, who do they want to mislead by doing so? Themselves, perhaps? Or could this be addressed to us? Or is this a message to the new invaders? What would happen to Conchita once he/she ventured among the Muslims in the Salzburg transit camp? Would he/she be able to come out alive? What is this all about? Do they not know that Islam does not tolerate homosexuals? And transvestites? Do they not know what Islamists think about women?
Strip a Nation of Its Self-Esteem, Disgrace It and Then You Can Do with It What You Please
Does Chancellor Merkel know, when she talks, as usual, about the sins of Europe and those of the Germans, that in the 17th and the 18th centuries Saracens (Muslims) took masses of Christians into slavery from Italy? Does she know that they were sold, in chains, on slave markets in Algiers, Tunis, Tangier and Constantinople? Perhaps she has not heard of the Afghan custom – reported by many since the 19th century – of severing all four limbs of their prisoners of war, including English, Russian and American ones alike. Does she not know that fundamentalist Muslims have even forbidden women to laugh? Does she really believe that no massacres have taken place on other continents? Does she think that others have nothing to be ashamed of? Has she not seen Islamic State fighters beheading Christians and using them as illustration to their video messages? Does she not know about the persecution and massacre of Christians in the Middle East? When is the West European elite going to cut this self-mutilation, a ritual that has long become meaningless? We are about to have had enough of the politics of this left-liberal elite of no use sissies, the only goal of which is to survive no matter the costs!
Here behind the Iron Curtain, we have had enough training to be professors of the communist, Trotskyist, later post-communist and leftist method the essence of which is slandering the innocent and the one on the defensive and at the same time acquitting the villain and currying favor with the invader. We instantly recognize the method, just like now. Anyone protecting their own culture, religion or home country against the influx of demanding migrants invading our continent are expected by the Western elites to feel ashamed because they are not sufficiently admissive and helpful, indeed, some Germans are not even willing to move out of their homes so that authorities can help the newly arrived move in. Of course those evicted belong to the most disadvantaged groups – not even by accident will one see any of the opinion leaders of Die Welt, ARD or Bild Zeitung having to leave their homes, despite the fact that their homes could certainly accommodate pretty large families. It would be worth having a try to see where their generosity ends. Would they continue to preach about pacifism and integration? Do they think Osama bin Laden was just being funny when he talked about the launching of a reverse crusade against us? In other words, a religious war, which, he said, all Arabs and Muslims should join in and fight. Anyone who remains neutral defies Allah is what radicals think. Such radicals included, for instance, Mohamed Atta of Hamburg, who participated in the destruction of the Twin Towers and who stipulated in his will that no impure beings – animals and women – may attend his funeral! I do not think that it will be enough just to show the Bible to such people – the way the German Chancellor proposed – hoping that seeing our sacred book the Islamic missionaries launching an onslaught against the West and Christianity will be so deeply touched that they will turn their backs to the belief of their ancestors, in their thousands. Do Merkel and her supporters really believe that by hiding behind a moral barricade they can hide their cowardice? Do they think that we may decide who we want to be friends with, cooperate with or participate in joint projects with, but not whether we want to wage a war? As a matter of fact, one party’s attack is enough for such a decision to be made. This applies to culture, to interpretation and to our borders as well.
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To be continued soon.
The original essay was published in Hungarian on 12th of November 2015 on latoszogblog.hu.
