Invitations For Invasions: Why They Are Bad
In light of both the BBC news story recently mentioned by dracko and the documentary on the Umayyad Caliphate I saw on the History Channel yesterday, let me give you all a little piece of advice that can be learnt from surveying the arse end of the European Dark Ages:
If you or your ethnic group are ever in a tight spot with an opposing ethnic group in your place of residence, then for the love of Marduk, do NOT pay a band of foreign warriors to invade your country to take care of said opposing ethnic group for you, because as soon as they've finished the job they bring over their entire family and you can never get the blighters to leave. Two classic examples of this phenomenon:
1. After the sacking of Rome in 410, Emperor Honorius removed all remaining Roman forces from British soil to sort out the Visigoth threat back home, leaving the Britons at the mercy of Pictish invaders from the North. To deal with the problem, King Vortigern invited Germanic mercenaries from Angeln, Saxony, Jutland and Frisia to settle in Britain and fight the Picts. The mercenaries like the place a bit too much and decide to stay after taking over most of what would become England. As of today, the descendants of the Britons who stood their ground against their new Pagan overlords (mainly those residing Cornwall, Cumbria, Devon and parts of Yorkshire) still can't get the bastards to leave. It's not all bad though; life for a Briton under the Angles is certainly preferable to life for an Angle under the Normans. Serfdom's not all it's cracked up to be.
2. In 711, in a bid to topple Roderic the Visigoth king of Spain and his Catholic forces, Count Julian gave the Moors the green light to invade the Iberian peninsula. They send over several thousand soldiers from North Africa under the command of the mighty Tariq ibn Ziyad to take out the Visigoths. Having succeeded, they take over the whole of Spain and then proceed to invade the rest of Europe, before Charles Martel, leader of the Merovingian Franks, halted the Islamic conquest in France at the Battle of Tours.
You may not have heard of Charles "The Hammer" but the fact that this kraut knew how to swing a sword is largely the reason Christian Europe didn't become Muslim Europe and the reason you're not reading this entry from a prayer mat. The Moors retreated to the Iberian peninsula after the battle; it had taken them between seven and eight years to invade and take over the area, and it took the forces of Christendom between seven and eight centuries to kick them out again. Tenacious fellows, those Mohammedians.
And there you have it.
If you need any help to remember this simple piece of advice, then just think of the Snark from the first Half-Life. You employ the creature to terminate a foe and once it's finished the job, it comes back to terminate you. The bounder.
If you or your ethnic group are ever in a tight spot with an opposing ethnic group in your place of residence, then for the love of Marduk, do NOT pay a band of foreign warriors to invade your country to take care of said opposing ethnic group for you, because as soon as they've finished the job they bring over their entire family and you can never get the blighters to leave. Two classic examples of this phenomenon:
1. After the sacking of Rome in 410, Emperor Honorius removed all remaining Roman forces from British soil to sort out the Visigoth threat back home, leaving the Britons at the mercy of Pictish invaders from the North. To deal with the problem, King Vortigern invited Germanic mercenaries from Angeln, Saxony, Jutland and Frisia to settle in Britain and fight the Picts. The mercenaries like the place a bit too much and decide to stay after taking over most of what would become England. As of today, the descendants of the Britons who stood their ground against their new Pagan overlords (mainly those residing Cornwall, Cumbria, Devon and parts of Yorkshire) still can't get the bastards to leave. It's not all bad though; life for a Briton under the Angles is certainly preferable to life for an Angle under the Normans. Serfdom's not all it's cracked up to be.
2. In 711, in a bid to topple Roderic the Visigoth king of Spain and his Catholic forces, Count Julian gave the Moors the green light to invade the Iberian peninsula. They send over several thousand soldiers from North Africa under the command of the mighty Tariq ibn Ziyad to take out the Visigoths. Having succeeded, they take over the whole of Spain and then proceed to invade the rest of Europe, before Charles Martel, leader of the Merovingian Franks, halted the Islamic conquest in France at the Battle of Tours.
You may not have heard of Charles "The Hammer" but the fact that this kraut knew how to swing a sword is largely the reason Christian Europe didn't become Muslim Europe and the reason you're not reading this entry from a prayer mat. The Moors retreated to the Iberian peninsula after the battle; it had taken them between seven and eight years to invade and take over the area, and it took the forces of Christendom between seven and eight centuries to kick them out again. Tenacious fellows, those Mohammedians.
And there you have it.
If you need any help to remember this simple piece of advice, then just think of the Snark from the first Half-Life. You employ the creature to terminate a foe and once it's finished the job, it comes back to terminate you. The bounder.