The coming of the Caliphate?

John Derbyshire thinks it will come to that. His argument is depressing, tragic and utterly compelling.

And yet, in all probability, Britain will yield to “these people.” This can be said with fair certainty because Britain did yield to the previous concerted series of terrorist attacks on her soil, the one carried out by the so-called Irish Republican Army...The terrorists who carried out those attacks were in many cases arrested, convicted, and imprisoned; they have now all been released, even those serving life sentences...The terrorist leaders who organized and directed the attacks have been given well-paid jobs in the British civil service, with secretaries, chauffeur-driven cars, and handsome pensions. The arm of British law enforcement that bore the brunt of the attacks, the Royal Ulster Constabulary, has been disbanded at the terrorists’ request, and its decades of brave and honorable service to the Crown are being flushed down the memory hole as fast as it can be done.

Yes, Britain will “do a Spain.” I am sure of it. Britain’s Spain will not be as dramatic or obvious as Spain’s Spain; [the British] have far, far more experience of appeasement than the Spaniards. They know how to do it slowly, imperceptibly, so that nobody much notices. You could ask a Turkish Cypriot, or a white Rhodesian, or of course an Ulsterman.

Why will they do it? Well, why did they do it in the case of the IRA? Because of a simple calculus of self-interest. In the first place, the integrity of their homeland was not threatened, and is not now...Even at the height of the IRA terror, nobody though that Britain’s existence was at stake, as they thought in 1940 or 1588. Similarly today: Islamic terrorists can make a terrific nuisance of themselves, but nobody imagines that a petty rabble of third-world anarchists is going to sweep away the structures of the British state — massacre the Royal Family, seat themselves in parliament, take over the Royal Navy, loot the Bank of England. Absurd!

Since the existence of the nation does not appear to be at stake, citizens, and their alert representatives, are free to ponder, with a clear and patriotic conscience, where their self-interest lies. In a whole-hearted cooperation with America in the war on terror? Or in accommodation with the terrorists?...

...Back in the 1930s, many English people thought that appeasing the kaiser in 1914 would have been a wiser policy that rushing to the aid of Belgium, and would have saved the nation from a ghastly catastrophe and millions dead and maimed. Some respectable historians agree. When Hitler showed up, appeasement was therefore the natural response. It might have worked, if Hitler had not been Hitler. However, no English person of today thinks that Osama bin Laden is Hitler. Appeasement of the jihadists is a rational course of action.

Is it the correct course of action? I don’t myself believe it is. I believe that weapons of mass destruction alter the old logic, in ways that not many people outside America — and not a very satisfactory number inside, come to think of it — have thought through.

Here, though, you come to another equation in the calculus of appeasement. Is the United States willing to fight this war the way it needs fighting, with grim ferocity and cold unconcern for legalistic niceties? To lay waste great territories and their peoples, innocent and guilty alike, to level cities, to burn forests and divert rivers, to smite our enemies hip and thigh, to carry out summary execution of captured leaders? Of course not — how barbaric! And yet (whispers the ancestral, tribal voice in our heads, and in British heads too) if not, then what’s the point? War is a tribal affair, one tribe exterminating another, or reducing it to utter impotence and ignominious surrender. That’s what war is, and it isn’t anything else. We know this in our bones, from a million years of tribal living and fighting. If we are not willing to fight a war like that — which apparently we are not, being much too civilized — then we should not be too surprised if our allies turn and cut deals with our enemies. At least they’ll have a quiet life, for a while. [emphasis added]