In the late 19th century, a charismatic ji hadist named Muhammad Ahmad ibn as-Sayyid Abd Allah — who called him self “the Mahdi” — swept across the Sudan, routing the “infidel” forces of the Egyptian rulers and arriving in 1884 at the gates of Khartoum. There, an equally charismatic British general named Charles Gordon led the city’s defense by native troops. The city held out for nine months before falling.
Gordon was speared, his head cut off and put on a tree, where people could throw rocks at it.
The Mahdi instituted a sharia state before dying of natural causes and was succeeded by a disciple.
It took 13 years, but the outraged British population got vengeance. A punitive force under Gen. Horatio Kitchener defeated the Mahdist forces at Omdurman, killing more than 10,000 warriors against a loss of 48 men. The jihadists’ faith and primitive weapons were no match for Kitchener’s machine guns and artillery.
In retaliation for Gordon’s death — and to break the Mahdi’s spell — Kitchener destroyed the Mahdi’s ornate tomb, exhumed the body, cut off the head, threw the bones into the Nile and (much to Queen Victoria’s horror) for a time kept the skull as a souvenir.
That was the end of violent jihadism in North Africa for a century.
The death of Osama bin Laden — another charismatic who preached death to the infidels — may have a similar disheartening effect — especially if followed by the relentless and, if necessary, brutal use of targeted force against Islamic terrorism.
From Charles Martel at Tours in 732 to Sobieski at Vienna in 1683 to Kitchener at Omdurman, nothing has had a greater calming effect on the Muslim world than decisive defeat. Yes, bin Laden was still exercised about the 15th-century Spanish reconquest of el-Andalus, but his animus died with him. Now the Muslim world must decide whether the war shall continue.
A raid like Sunday’s (a tip of the hat, by the way, to the peerless helicopter pilots of the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, formed in the wake of the Carter-era Iran-hostage-rescue disaster) will go a long way to pacifying non-jihadis, who understand that they are no match for American power and will only suffer should the radicals succeed in making this a conflict of Islam vs. the West.
That is, it doesn’t have to come down to a Kitchenerian slaughter. All that “the Islamic world” needs to accept and understand is that its Mahdi is not coming.
It may be true that millions of Muslims viewed bin Laden (at least initially) as the great sheik who struck a blow against the Great Satan, but many millions more did not. If their voices have been stilled by fear or indolence, the death of bin Laden may free them to speak out.
Millenarian sects tend to falter when their confidently apocalyptic predictions fail to materialize. Now that bin Laden sleeps with the fishes — the perfect end to a jumped-up gangster — it is highly likely that his version of jihad will die with him.
Unlike the British, we’ve never had the slightest desire to occupy Muslim countries. If Muslims want to come here and accept the American way of life (which means, obviously, no jihad and no sharia), fine.
From her earliest days, America — the vision of freedom — has threatened kings and emperors and popes and potentates and pashas and Mahdis. But every one that tried to crush us failed.
The cheers that accompanied President Obama’s announcement of bin Laden’s death Sunday night were right on the money. Another arrogant thug had joined King George, the Nazis, the Soviet communists and all the rest on the ash heap of history.
This wasn’t jingoism; this was justice.