Distressing News Out of the Pentagon: Political Correctness Reigns?
January 4, 2007
They still don't get it. In a time when America is at war with Islamic jihadists bent on our destruction, the Pentagon just fired a leading analyst of...Islamic jihad.
Author Andrew Bostom (see here and here for his indispensable works) just informed me of this new Washington Times piece by Bill Gertz, who first broke the news of Stephen Coughlin's troubles at the Pentagon. Coughlin, the Pentagon's specialist on Islamic law and Islamist extremism, has been fired from his position on the military's Joint Staff over what Gertz describes as "opposition to his work for the military by pro-Muslim officials within the office of Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England."
Here are the gory details, courtesy of Gertz's column:
Mr. Coughlin was notified this week that his contract with the Joint Staff will end in March, effectively halting the career of one of the U.S. government's most important figures in analyzing the nature of extremism and ultimately preparing to wage ideological war against it.
He had run afoul of a key aide to Mr. England, Hasham Islam, who confronted Mr. Coughlin during a meeting several weeks ago when Mr. Islam sought to have Mr. Coughlin soften his views on Islamist extremism.
Mr. Coughlin was accused directly by Mr. Islam of being a Christian zealot or extremist "with a pen," according to defense officials. Mr. Coughlin appears to have become one of the first casualties in the war of ideas with Islamism.
The officials said Mr. Coughlin was let go because he had become "too hot" or controversial within the Pentagon.
Translation: He was telling the truth. It gets worse:
Misguided Pentagon officials, including Mr. Islam and Mr. England, have initiated an aggressive "outreach" program to U.S. Muslim groups that critics say is lending credibility to what has been identified as a budding support network for Islamist extremists, including front groups for the radical Muslim Brotherhood.
Mr. Coughlin wrote a memorandum several months ago based on documents made public in a federal trial in Dallas that revealed a covert plan by the Muslim Brotherhood, an Egyptian-origin Islamist extremist group, to subvert the United States using front groups. Members of one of the identified front groups, the Islamic Society of North America, has been hosted by Mr. England at the Pentagon.
Thankfully, Coughlin's story is starting to get some play in the blogosphere:
After word of the confrontation between Mr. Coughlin and Mr. Islam was made public, support for Mr. Coughlin skyrocketed among those in and out of government who feared the worst, namely that pro-Muslim officials in the Pentagon were after Mr. Coughlin's scalp, and that his departure would be a major setback for the Pentagon's struggling efforts to develop a war of ideas against extremism. Blogs lit up with hundreds of postings, some suggesting that Mr. England's office is "penetrated" by the enemy in the war on terrorism.
Stay tuned for more on this story. It's a potential bombshell. How can you defeat the enemy if you dare not breathe its name? Not only should our military be given a crash course in the jihadist ideology, but every senator, congressman and presidential candidate should be asked whether they have read the Koran and Hadith and what they know about jihad. It should be a prerequisite for the job. The current administration has already failed the test woefully.
Wouldn't it be refreshing to see an elected official truly engaged in the War of Ideas against the Islamists, much like Reagan, Truman and others did against the great threat of their time, Soviet Communism?
Given that our intelligence chairman doesn't even know the difference between a Sunni and a Shia, I won't hold my breath.
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