Archive for the ‘Opinion Articles by Steve’ Category

Steve Cliffe  08/30/2010

September 11, 2001 marked a day in which our lives changed for the foreseeable future.
Gone was the insular nature that had allowed us to see from afar the acts of terror that had
been going on in the Islamic spread dating back to Mohammed’s slaughter of innocents
after being exiled in the early 600’s A.D. We stood face to face with an enemy who few
knew and who many misunderstand.
Like any common criminal thug, the Islamic fundamentalists who attacked the World
Trade Center that day had no regard for human life including their own. They continued
a tradition dating back to the executions committed by Mohammed of all who stood in
the way of his world view of tyranny under the guidelines of the theocratic world
government outlined in the Qur’an, Shari’ah and Hadith.
These three books specifically outline a strategy that falls outside our concept of human
interrelation. They advise using the Qur’an to lie to enemies as long as the greater goal
means the spread of Islam, to kill those who will not submit (yes I know the Verses of the
Pen say otherwise, but they are superseded and abrogated in moral authority by the
Verses of The Sword which were written after them since the Qur’an is a book to be read
chronologically rather than from front to back), and to recognize only two states of
existence in the world; the state of Islam or the state of war to prepare for Islam.
The use of child bombers is abhorrent to us but not to the terrorists who view this as a
holy war and the only way to true salvation lies in dying in jihad efforts. They believe, as
the jurisprudence of the Islamic system of belief dictates, that they have to conquer the
world, as Malcolm X would say “by any means necessary”. Killing kids is perfectly
acceptable targeting for these terrorists and that is what makes their list of new target
focus so scary. It applies to the next set of targets they have begun actively encouraging
their supporters to strike among us; malls, random assassination of those who dare
question or oppose them, and perhaps most heinously, our schools.
The fact is that jihadists encourage massive hostage taking for the sole purpose of
slaughtering them in a “terrifying” way as a direct homage to Mohammad as articulated
in his slaughter of the Banu Qurayza. The fact is they have outlined in a series of
manuals that provide specific information on how to attack such targets to inflict
maximum casualties. This should cause us to fear for our children as never before, and
recognize that our current model of lockdown/hide-in-place is the worst possible strategy
since it incorporates no proactive strategy and provides no tactical training for the staff in
case of a terrorist attack.
It can be safely assumed that the “terrifying” manner is consistent with what we have
seen followers of Mohammad use before, emulating Mohammad’s own techniques
outlined in the Hadith for inducing terror, beheading kneeling victims with a small sword
or knife. This means that by piling our kids into several small holding cells (classrooms)
and gathering them together we simplify their attack strategy and make it easier to kill
our kids and the staff in our schools. Much as was done at the school in Beslan, Russia.
We cannot rely on the police or the military to protect soft targets. We must look for
ways that are capable of fitting into the lockdown/shelter-in-place model of school
response planning we see already occurring. The fact is that first responders are always
there AFTER something happens. How many kids do we have to face before we drop the
bean-counters worry about litigious criminals/terrorists who might be hurt by training our
teachers to learn to protect themselves and the children they are charged with caring for.
We already have legislation that forces teachers to report suspected parental violence
towards kids, why do they not have a focused classroom defense protocol? Surely, if you
asked the victims of any school shooting be it in West Virginia, or Columbine, in the
United States, Beslan in Russia or Finland, I am sure everyone would have thought it
impossible to happen there.
While currently there is only an extremely limited number of trainings that can interface
with active shooter response by our active shooter communities, they do exist. My
company offers the TEACHSAFE™ seminar, an addendum course that dovetails with the
educational lockdown/shelter-in-place model as well as LEO/first responder interface
planning and all of this for FAR less than the cost of a monitoring system or therapy after
an incident takes many innocent lives. This course is available through the
Asymmetric Warfare Studies Group training curriculum as well as through us
directly. There are training options out there. We implore the educational professionals,
their unions and the legislators responsible in the both the federal and state levels to start
looking at this before the terrorist launch an attack. Please for the sake of our kids get
proactive and do not wait to train our teachers until after an attack occurs.

Steve Cliffe

The repeated defiance of the world’s leadership to recognize and name the current fight

against totalitarian theocracy is endangering people in every nation that has any place for

freedom in its belief structures. Training individual and small group survival is my forte

and passion. It requires me to recognize all aspects of the situational arena in which one

lives to instruct effectively. The mindset and ethos required to defend against asocial

violence must possess an understanding of the philosophical principles that form the

social context people try to maintain to prevent the chaos of an amoral society. The

reason for this need to understand the functioning reasons behind social constraints is to

recognize when the contract is being breeched and thus the constraints to asocial response

removed.

The very first principle to be successful in defending oneself in any kind of asocial attack

is to recognize that there is an attack underway. This is the quintessential act which

precedes all others. If you don’t know you are being attacked you are going to be the

unwitting victim. In many instances, this would be like the barrister in England who

refused to recognize the asocial nature of the attack when, giving the two criminals his

watch, wallet and everything else of value was repeatedly stabbed and died asking why

they were doing this since he had complied with their demands. He did not recognize the

attack as something to ACT against, rather he still thought of the exchange as a social

event to be dealt with on a social level, through discourse. As Ayn Rand would advise,

recognize that A is A. You cannot change fact or truth by wishing or rhetorical device.

The second is to realize that it was a course chosen actively by the person who is acting,

with complete disregard for the value structure, moral and ethical code you have chosen

to live your life by. They seek only to impose their will by use of force without moral

consideration. Criminals, terrorists, theocrats, union goons, politicians who see

bureaucracy as a self-fulfilling and self-vindicating institution which may use overt force

to compel their citizenry; all are examples of groups who chose at some level to function

amorally. And because they have chosen to step outside the bounds of the social doctrine

and use violence to inflict trauma and their will upon others, they have given up the right

to insist on being treated with the rights and privileges of citizenry and can be acted upon

by their intended victim without that victim having to worry about guilt or social

condemnation for their actions. Only active, intent response can counter an intent

initiative of action. A is A.

This is the crux of self-defense on a personal level.

I submit that it is no different on a national level or cultural level. We are in a conflict of

cultures that has been actively pursued for roughly 1400 years. Many of our ancestors

faced this very threat and have twice repelled the massive military onslaughts against the

religious and social constructs of any nation who did not submit to their demands. The

reason for their success was simple, they recognized the attacks as attacks and responded

in order to defeat them using all such measures as was necessary in a force on force

setting. They did not talk nor concern themselves with anything other than the reality of

the moment; this culture seeks to kill us, our culture must kill them. Just like street

violence, one wins and asserts their will, one loses and submits to the trauma, either

dying or surviving in dhimmitude.

We are not fighting a branch of Islam, we are fighting the cultural reality of what Islam

and its jurisprudence are; a system of world government that compels through force the

compliance of its membership, the systemic destruction of any other competing social

hierarchy and killing of all who would actively oppose it through whatever means

necessary. It consists of the theocratic guidance of the Qu’ran, the social interaction

dictates of the Shari’ah, and the indoctrinal expectations of the Hadiths.

It is not a religion in the sense that the western hemisphere recognizes a religion. There

can be no separation of church and state under Islam, to do so would directly counter the

jurisprudence of the Islamic tenets of behavior. The state is for all intents and purposes

Allah and his expression on earth of Islam is compliance to and of the state to the

principles laid out by the warlord Mohammed when he began constructing his doctrinal

writings after achieving military victory over contended trade routes.

Until we recognize and name this fact as something that this is EXACTLY what our

leaders say it is not, a cultural battle that can have only one survivor where Islam and

another belief system/culture intersect, we will continue to enable those who see us as

less than.

We cannot co-exist with those who are doctrinally correct in their Islamic faith. The

“moderate Muslims” we are told are around us may not support the drive of expansion

and destruction of all non-Islamic cultures, but they are moderates only insofar as they

choose to disregard the instruction of the Islamic tenets. The Qu’ran specifically

admonishes Muslims to never regard any non-Muslim as friend and to use the Qu’ran to

lie to enemy’s if the goal is in fact to spread Islam and further the goals of establishing

hegemony throughout the world as one Islamic nation. Times where violence has not

been ongoing are dictated by the Qur’an itself; when the Islamic forces are weak and in

disarray they may seek peace to regroup, of a period not more than 10 years in length, but

they may never seek peace in a time of military superiority. Since each act of jihad is

considered an act of war for the expansion of Islam, regardless of the location of the

violence, it does not take too much effort to trace the doctrinal adherence to this policy.

The naming of the “Western Mecca” as some are calling the new mosque to be built on

the site of the 9/11 attacks is a statement of staggering proportions on multiple levels.

First the date of attack being the anniversary of the breaking of the Siege of Vienna and

the dedication of the mosque scheduled for this date are brazen statements to the Islamic

faithful. It tells them that Islam is again on the expansion to claim all of the earth for

Allah after the terrible defeat and retraction suffered post 1638. Secondly, and most

disturbing from the perspective of societal survival, is the compliance and ignorance of

the western world population and its leadership in this current trend. The Islamic world

will see this as a willingness to be subjugated, and with subjugation, acceptance of the

reality that either a state of dhimmitude will exist until our culture is completely erased,

or the purging through slaughter as was and is seen in the majority of the caliphate

expansionism of Islam.

We need to name this cultural nemesis. We need to recognize the big picture in this and

how its 1400 years drive to become the world dominant force can and is being harnessed

by another country which sees itself as doctrinally committed to actively pursuing an

asymmetrical war against the United States; China. We need to fight it with the

understanding it will show us no quarter if given the chance to gain military and

numerical superiority in the west. We need to see this for what it is; a direct and intended

threat to our very survival. To do otherwise is to actively commit societal and cultural

suicide. A is A.