Later this month, on June 28, the Serbian Orthodox Church will be observing the feast day of
Saint Lazar. The feast day is held on the anniversary of Lazar's martyrdom at the
Battle of Kosovo, an epic fight waged between the forces of Christian Serbia and the Muslim Ottoman Empire in 1389. It was Lazar, a Serbian prince, who led the Christian forces against the Muslims in the infamous battle. The Serbian force, outnumbered more than two-to-one, consisted of nearly every knight and prince of Serbia. Legend has it that the night before the battle, an angel came to Prince Lazar in a dream, offering him a choice between two kingdoms: one on Earth, and one in Heaven. Prince Lazar, knowing that the choice of an Earthly kingdom would result in victory over the Ottomans the next day, and that the choice of a Heavenly kingdom would spell defeat, declared:
"Perishable is the earthly kingdom, but forever and ever is the Kingdom of Heaven!" The words he offered his soldiers before joining the Ottomans in battle the next day were simply:
"We die with Christ to live forever!"And on June 28, 1389, at Kosovo Field, the Christian armies of Serbia were wiped out, along with the Serbian political elite - including Prince Lazar. But the Ottoman victory came with a heavy price. Before the battle, the Ottomans were in a position to expand even further into Europe, conquering and converting as they went. At Kosovo, however, the Serbs had inflicted such losses upon the Ottomans -- including the death of Sultan Murad I -- that they had no other choice but to retreat back to home turf. Over the next few hundred years, the Holy Ground of Kosovo -- where the Christian West was saved from the Islamic Caliphate -- would be overrun by Albanians, a conquered people who were forced to convert to Islam by their Ottoman overlords 500 years ago, and have remained a Muslim nation ever since.
On June 10, 2007, it was
reported that United States President George Bush received a "hero's welcome" in Albania.
"Sooner rather than later you've got to say 'Enough's enough - Kosovo is independent,'" Bush said, telling Albanians what they wanted to hear. He said independence was a certainty.
Independence for Kosovo is, of course, absolutely none of President Bush's business. Unfortunately the issue was thrust upon all citizens of the United States by President Bill Clinton in the late 1990's, when Yugoslavian (Serbian) forces began to crackdown on Albanian separatists in Kosovo. The dispute was an internal matter of a sovereign state, and atrocities were alleged on both sides, but when the international community -- led, of course, by the United States -- finally inserted itself into the matter, it erred on the side of the Muslim Albanian separatists. A brutal air war was waged on the people and infrastructure of Yugoslavia by the United States under the guise of NATO, and on June 11, 1999, Yugoslavian President Slobodan Milosevic backed down. The Albanians returned to Kosovo, Yugoslavian forces retreated, and the region has been ruled by the United Nations ever since.
Contrast this episode with the situation in the Middle East. As Kosovo has always been a sacred part of the Serbian Nation, Palestine is historically recognized as the fatherland of the Jews. Roughly 100 years ago, the Zionist movement began to pick up steam. An attempt to reverse the ancient Jewish diaspora was made and by 1948, the State of Israel was recognized across the world. Most Christians in the United States believe that the establishment of the modern Israel was ordained by God in some way; this is reflected by the unconditional diplomatic and military support given to Israel by the United States' government. Of course, the reclaiming of Israel could not have been achieved without an
ethnic cleansing of Muslim Arabs, and the efforts of those that we would easily label
murderers and terrorists - if they hadn't happened to have been Jews.
The circumstances between the Muslim Arab conquest of Palestine and subsequent reclamation by the Jews early last century, and the Muslim Albanian conquest of Kosovo and attempted reclamation by the Christian Serbs later last century, are virtually the same. Yet, for whatever reason, the United States backed Israel, and threw the Christian Serbs to the dogs. Imagine a few years from now when the demographics have lined up, that the Mexican populations of California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas vote for independence from the United States. Then the Russian, Chinese, and European heads-of-state fly into Mexico City to pledge their support for the Mexicans in the US Southwest. That's pretty much what just happened with President Bush in Albania (save for the fact that -- unlike the US Southwest -- Kosovo is regarded a holy ground by an ancient people that -- unlike the US -- actually
have fought a war of survival against the spread of Islam).
Despite the circumstances leading up to the 1999 NATO campaign, and the consequences it will forever hold for Christian Serbia, millions of US citizens are still wildly deluded into believing that their country is some sort of "Christian Nation". The brutal fact of reality is that the Kosovo War was just one more episode in the United States' long, rich tradition of destroying Christians. The staunchly devout Southerners were overrun and "reconstructed" when they peacefully and democratically left the US in the 1860's, with tens of thousands of civilians killed in the process. Forty years later, more than 200,000 (mostly Christian) Filipino civilians were murdered by US forces in a pointless bid to conquer the Philippines. After World War One, the Protestant and Catholic Kaisers of Germany and Austria-Hungary were forced to abdicate, and the Allies' constant demand on the Tsar to keep his nation in the war led directly to the demise of Orthodox Russia. Without these ancient, Christian monarchs in power, the US and its allies had delivered Europe and Russia to Fascism, Nazism and Communism. The idiotic Treaty of Versailles that made this possible was championed fiercely by the United States. It led directly to the Second World War -- which
wasn't allowed to end until the United States' military had finished its science project in "
the oldest and most influential Christian community in Japan" -- and subsequent struggle with international Communism in which tens of millions of innocent civilians would be murdered by their godless governments. The bloodiest century in the history of the universe was made possible by the unwarranted meddling of the United States' government, which for some reason prints "In God we trust" on its currency and forces its youngsters to pledge allegiance to its flag, which is touted as the symbol of a nation "under God". This same "nation" went on to kick off the Twenty-First century with a quixotic bid to erect a Jeffersonian democracy in the heart of Mesopotamia, an ancient region with absolutely no heritage of liberal government whatsoever. Typically, the debacle in Iraq is poised to accomplish that which no other empire ever could -
the complete and total annihilation of some of the most ancient Christian communities in the world.
As our president mingles amid throngs of happy Albanians, let us remember the historic events of June, and never forget the hypocrisy exhibited by our leaders and the atrocities perpetrated by our government on Christians all around the world.
Labels: bad ideology, International, Interventionism, Johnny Anonymus, politics, religion
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