Dale K. Robinson
The two American ambassadors asked their Muslim counterpart why Muslims were hostile to the United States.
Ambassador Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja told the American ambassadors that Islam “was founded on the Laws of their Prophet.” He went on to tell the Americans that it was written in the Quran “that all nations who should not have acknowledged their authority were sinners” and that it was Muslims' “right and duty to make war upon them wherever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as prisoners.” He added that every Muslim “slain in battle was sure to go to Paradise.”
The ambassadors were meeting to discuss the seizure of American ships, cargoes and crews by state-sponsored terrorists. The American ambassadors had been ordered to negotiate a treaty with the Islamic nation.
And for the next 15 years, the United States gave the Islamic nation millions of dollars in exchange for safe passage for American commerce in the area. The monies paid to the Islamic nation amounted to 20 percent of the US government's annual revenues. Yet American ships and cargoes were still seized by state-sponsored terrorists and the American crews captured to be held for ransom or used as slave labor.
Both of those ambassadors would one day become presidents of the United States. And shortly after his inauguration, one deployed a US Navy task force to the Mediterranean. It was the first battle in the War on Terror and the turn of a new century.
Two hundred years ago. The ambassador become president was Thomas Jefferson; the state-sponsored terrorists were the so-called Barbary Pirates. The states that sponsored them were the forerunners of today's Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya.
For centuries, these forerunners of today's terrorists preyed upon merchant vessels in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic and raided the coasts of Europe and Africa. They plundered villages, seizing the inhabitants. While some were sent to man the oars on their galleys, most of the men were killed. The women and children were taken as booty for the slave markets. Boys aged 9-10 were often castrated.
The pirates ranged as far north as Ireland and even Iceland and south along the African coast, terrorizing coastal villages with pre-dawn raids. They preferred capturing young Christian European women because they fetched better prices in the slave markets.
Jefferson and John Adams had been sent to London in 1786 to negotiate a treaty with the Dey of Algiers. Jefferson opposed the treaty, which agreed to pay the Barbary States for safe passage of American vessels. Jefferson argued that paying a tribute or ransom would lead to further demands.
Jefferson was right. In 1795, the US government paid nearly a million dollars to ransom 115 sailors from Algeria. When Jefferson took over the presidency in 1801, the Pasha of Tripoli was demanding an immediate payment of $225,000 and an annual payment of $25,000. Jefferson refused. Tripoli declared war on the US.
Jefferson responded by deploying the US Navy and a contingent of Marines to the Mediterranean. It was not an easy fight. The USS Philadelphia was lost and its crew captured. It took more than four years to achieve a decisive victory and US Marines marched across the desert from Egypt to Tripoli to achieve it. But in 1806, Jefferson was able to report that the Islamic states on the Barbary Coast seemed “generally disposed at present to respect our peace and friendship.”
For the next few years, the Barbary pirates left US shipping alone, but attacks resumed when the US became distracted by the War of 1812. But in 1815, a US Navy force returned to confront the Barbary States and a series of naval victories led to treaties ending threats to US flagged ships and the end of tribute or ransom payments to the Islamic governments.
Congressman Keith Ellison of Minnesota recently took his oath of office on a Quran that belonged to Thomas Jefferson. Ellison cited the fact that Jefferson owned a Quran as proof that a “visionary like Jefferson” believed wisdom could be gained from many sources.
No doubt. Jefferson purchased George Sale's English translation of the Quran from the printing office of The Virginia Gazette in 1765. He likely used it in his studies of the law and religion and perhaps it helped forge the beliefs that led to the Declaration of Independence a decade later. Perhaps he turned to it again to help him understand the threat Islam posed to the fledgling United States in 1786 and again when a Muslim nation declared war on America in 1801.
The rulers and citizenry of the Barbary States were not radical Islamists, but mainstream Muslims practicing their faith and following the Laws of the Prophet, as related by the Algerian ambassador. The Quran not only permits, but encourages the murder and enslavement of non-Muslims. Verse 2.191 of the Quran tells Muslims to “Kill them [unbelievers] wherever you find them.” Verse 47.4 exhorts Muslims “Therefore, when you meet the unbelievers smite their necks, then, when you have killed many of them, tie the bonds.”
That is the wisdom Jefferson gained from the Quran Mr. Ellison took his oath of office upon. Jefferson, recognizing the threat, acted decisively to end the threat Islam posed to the United States for more than a century and a half. America had tried appeasement and it didn't work; it cost American lives and treasure.
This column appeared in the Jan 17, 2007 edition of The Destin Log in Destin, Florida.