Date: 3/23/2005
Immediately after 9/11, Tony Blair, the British Prime Minister said that Britain is ready to pay "Blood Price" to the Americans in the fight against terrorism. Now, coming from a Western head of state, this phrase is particularly blood-curdling. We rarely speak that way. But then 9/11 was a particularly nerve-shaking event. And especially for Brits, who have not reconciled to 1776 and regard the USA to be their own, metaphorically speaking. An attack on Americans would seem to many Britons, to be an attack on the British. And this special relationship is reciprocated by our President George Bush too, when he said during a visit to Britain last year, "There is a bit of an Englishman in every American." This seals the special relationship between the two trans-Atlantic English speaking nations.
Britian is still waiting with teeth gritted and bated breath for its own 9/11, which hopefully will never happen. But then we know the Muslim enemy better to write-off any future dramatic attack on Britain, as the war on Terror progresses. The closest shave that the British have had is the bombing of the consulate in Constantinople (Istanbul) in Turkey. The British underground is a predictable target of attack with the use of Sarin like nerve agent as had happened in the Tokyo subway. The British position vis-à-vis its Muslim population is even more vulnerable as against that of the USA. Since in Britain the Muslim community is much more numerous. While in the USA, it accounts for about 1 percent, in Britain it is about 7 percent. Again, in Britain it has been around since the last two centuries, albeit it began with a trickle in the 1800s, which grew exponentially after 1947. Most British Muslims come from Pakistan, India and Bangladesh. There are also a few from Uganda, Kenya and South Africa, who originally migrated there from South Asia and from there to Britian. It is a saving grace that a significant number of British Muslims are educated, relatively to their counterparts in France and Germany. Traditionally British Muslims come from Punjab and Gujarat, and they are economically better off. But then the link between poverty and Islamic terrorism is at best an incidental one. Mohammed Atta and his goons came from the upper crust of Middle Eastern society.
Waves of Muslim immigrations as Labourers, Refugees, Spouses and Students
The first wave of Muslims into Britian were as laborers from British colonial India. These were on the margins of society and were in Britian during its heyday in the 19th century. So these Muslims were docile, and were overawed by the grandeur of the British Empire. They called it the Saltanat-e-Bartania. But the departure of the British from India, and the formation of Pakistan gave the Muslims in Britian their first lessons in arrogance against the British. The Muslims are arrogant by nature, but they had been subdued in front of the British, since their empires the Mughal, Ottoman, Mameluk, etc had been defeated and destroyed by Europeans. But after the departure of colonialism, things began to change, and the Muslim began to return to their original disposition. He Muslim community in Britian was enhanced numerically by the waves of migration of laborers from Pakistan and later Bangladesh through the 1950s to the 1970s. The laborers after working in Britian for some years became naturalized British citizens and then they could legally get in their wife (or wives, since the Muslims could have up to four at a time) and their children. When under pressure from politicians like Enoch Powell, and the roughnecks like the Skinheads, Britian tried to curb the inflow of migrant labourers, the pattern of Muslim migration changed, rather the alibi to get into Britian changed from that of laborers to those seeking political asylum and asking for refugee status. These came from Pakistan, Uganda and Bangladesh. Thus by the early 1990s the Muslim population ion Britian had burgeoned to more than seven percent of the population. Added to these were students coming to Britian from all over the Muslim world. These students were the most volatile of the Muslim. They were young and many of them (the Shias) were under the influence of Khomeini and the Sunnis under that of Al Qaeda. This trend was more prominent from the 1990s. There were frequent soap box orators at the Hyde Park in Central London, asking passers by to understand Islam and embrace it. So far so good. But the British had their first brush with Muslim violence when race riots (this was a misnomer, since they were Muslim riots not racists ones) broke out in Leeds, Burnley, Bradford and other English cities.
From a howling Jihad, we now had a stealthily creeping Jihad
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