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#1071314
Old Viking
It was the same way the Poles provoked the Germans in 1941.
12/13/2009 7:13:28 PM
#1071317
Doctor Whom
What's wrong in this post? Better yet, what's right in it?
12/13/2009 7:14:34 PM
#1071326
Percy Q. Shunn
Slowest scimitar-waving conquerors ever!
12/13/2009 7:20:04 PM
#1071335
WMDKitty
History FAIL.
The Christ-stains INVADED the Middle East for the express purpose of "reclaiming" a city (Jerusalem) that was never theirs to begin with. LRN 2 HISTORY!
12/13/2009 7:24:56 PM
#1071338
louislois
"They completely obliterated the Eastern Christian Empire of Constantinople."
O rly? Try researching the Fourth Crusade, and get back to us.
12/13/2009 7:26:40 PM
#1071341
breakerslion
Um... pop quiz: Who was there first?
12/13/2009 7:28:20 PM
#1071373
12/13/2009 8:00:51 PM
#1071374
/They completely obliterated the Eastern Christian Empire of Constantinople./
Ahem, excuse me. The reason why the Turks were able to conquer Constantinople so easily is because the Catholic EUROPEANS had already done the hard work for them. Your precious Crusaders had attacked, looted, and pillaged Constantinople beforehand, and by doing so, left it wide open and defenseless to another attack, this time by the Muslim Turks. FAIL.
12/13/2009 8:02:26 PM
#1071385
Vince
and then they went over and began raping their women and slaughtering whole cities.
not mutually exclusive stories here.
12/13/2009 8:13:33 PM
#1071402
Taz
This guy doesn't know shit from shinola. The Crusades were not a response to any military action. However, the Muslims did invade Europe hundreds of years before the Crusades began. They were turned back in southern France by Charlemagne's grandfather Charles Martel at the Battle of Tours in 732. Tours is considered one of the most important battles in history, because if the Franks had lost Islam might very well have become the dominant religion in Europe. The Muslims occupied parts of Spain until 1492. Later, of course, Turkish Muslims invaded Eastern Europe and were stopped at Vienna. Not trying to excuse the Crusades, but when it comes to military incursions the Muslims were not so innocent themselves.
Also, in response to an earlier comment, while the Byzantine Empire did go into decline after Constantinople was sacked by the Crusaders, it regained its strength and wasn't conquered by the Turks until a couple hundred years later.
12/13/2009 8:31:22 PM
#1071405
EllwyenDarwin
This gave me idiot chills.Junior here needs to learn some History.
12/13/2009 8:33:53 PM
#1071408
dpareja
@Old Viking: I belive Poland fell in 1939.
And it doesn't matter what excuse there is, an atrocity is still an atrocity.
12/13/2009 8:37:56 PM
#1071410
Caustic Gnostic
The Fourth Crusade, yes, it obliterated Constantinople, in a manner that the Huns, Goths, Vandals and Mongol Hordes would have found excessive.
12/13/2009 8:42:59 PM
#1071416
Berny
I bet you believe Saddam was behind the attacks at the World Trade Center as well.
Revisionist history for the loss.
12/13/2009 9:04:33 PM
#1071418
campbunny
A lot of strong opinions here in the FSTDT comments section. I wonder how many could tell me the dates of either the first crusade or the fall of Constantinople without looking it up.
12/13/2009 9:06:32 PM
#1071421
Taz
The First Crusade started around 1100 I think. Constantinople fell to the Turks in the 1400s. That's as accurate as I can be without looking it up.
12/13/2009 9:11:21 PM
#1071443
campbunny
Anyway, this post is technically correct. Muslim military conquest, starting from Arabia - not Palestine, they really did conquer that - was a very real threat to Christendom up until the seventeenth century. There really was a letter from the Byzantine emperor pleading succour against invaders. The Turks really did obliterate the Eastern Empire.
12/13/2009 10:42:12 PM
#1071457
aaa
History doesn't work that way.
12/13/2009 11:25:24 PM
#1071469
GodotIsWaiting4U
No, they DIDN'T. The crusades were a Christian invasion of Muslim lands.
12/13/2009 11:52:38 PM
#1071478
Eden
I agree with what campbunny said...
it was de facto the case that those lands (including the "holy land") formerly belonged to the byzantine empire (or "kingdom of the romans" as they correctly called themselves (with the term "byzantine empire" being invented by historians centuries later)), till they were conquered by the arabs in the 7th century.
And the crusades also where initially a response to pleas from the byzantine emperor.
What RHJunior fails to mention is, of course, that in contrast to the wishes of the byzantine emperor who just wanted military aid against the turks, the crusaders did a disservice to the byzantine empire, by attacking muslim allies to the byzantine empire as well (not to mention the disastrous 4th crusade where constantinople itself was conquered by the crusaders).
Of course RHJunior also fails to mention, that an atrocity remains an atrocity, no matter whether a war is fought for good reasons or not (although one has to admit that these atrocities were common practice in warfare in this time and that even Saladin wasn´t free from doing things which we todaywould call atrocities)
12/14/2009 12:36:22 AM
#1071484
ozznova
During the First Crusade, Jerusalem was knee-high in non-Christian blood when the Crusaders conquered it.
When the Muslims conquered it three hundred years before, the Caliph entered the city alone, unarmed, and prayed with the Christian Patriarch.
12/14/2009 1:11:00 AM
#1071486
Pheds
There's no denying the anti-Muslim bloodlust (and anti-semitism and killing of Eastern Orthodox Christians) that accompanied the crusades. Even though the middle ages were known for their brutal warfare (heck, when is war NOT brutal) this atrocities are shameful this is not a very fundi quote.
Technically the poster is correct however....North Africa and the Middle East were Christian lands (or rather their people were by large Christian). Christians and other were the victims of systematic persecution throughout much of the Ummah: forced conversion, desecration of holy places, rape, enslavement and stifling taxation. At best Christians ended up second class citizens in their own lands, at worst they ended up dead.
12/14/2009 1:26:52 AM
#1071487
Pheds
There's no denying the anti-Muslim bloodlust (and anti-semitism and killing of Eastern Orthodox Christians) that accompanied the crusades. Even though the middle ages were known for their brutal warfare (heck, when is war NOT brutal) this atrocities are shameful this is not a very fundi quote.
Technically the poster is correct however....North Africa and the Middle East were Christian lands (or rather their people were by large Christian). Christians and other were the victims of systematic persecution throughout much of the Ummah: forced conversion, desecration of holy places, rape, enslavement and stifling taxation. At best Christians ended up second class citizens in their own lands, at worst they ended up dead.
12/14/2009 1:26:52 AM
#1071489
Pheds
"During the First Crusade, Jerusalem was knee-high in non-Christian blood when the Crusaders conquered it."
Sure....it was bloody, but 'knee high'. Come one...even if you killed every person in a city twice you wouldn't be able to flood it knee-high with their blood.
It baffles me to see people laugh at creationists and other Biblical literalists and than come up with nonsense like this.
12/14/2009 1:30:27 AM
#1071490
ozznova
@Pheds
That's what the medieval chroniclers said happened . . . and they were saying it in a good way. It bears repeating.
Besides, it could have happened in some sections of the city. Ancient and medieval cities were cramped with tiny streets.
12/14/2009 1:32:37 AM
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