The Great Arab Conquests: Why People Reverted to Islam

This is the ninth post in my series about Hugh Kennedy's book, The Great Arab Conquests. Here, Kennedy examines, at the very end of the book (pages 374-76), why people in the conquered lands chose to revert to Islam. His answer is that it was to their material benefit, that this was a way for people to become part of the new, dominant culture of the day. What's interesting is what Kennedy doesn't say, that the mass reversion of the native populations to Islam was not "by the sword," as Islamophobes mistakenly believe. Instead, the reversion to Islam was a very slow, gradual process that took centuries to complete.

Note: While this topic was originally set to be the last post in this series on Kennedy's book, I've decided to continue on, insha'allah, with a related series, focusing on some of the leaders and other people mentioned in The Great Arab Conquests, and descriptions about places, geographical and architectural, in Muslim lands. While I plan on using Kennedy's book in the future, I hope to use other research materials for these new posts.

As we have repeatedly seen, the Muslim conquerors put little or no pressure on the recently subjected populations to convert to Islam. Any attempt at compulsory conversion would probably have provoked widespread outrage and open hostility. As it was, the Muslim authorities established working relationships with the heads of the churches and other religious institutions that were now in their power. Conversion when it came was partly the result of fiscal pressures, the desire to escape the hated poll tax, but also because conversion provided an opportunity to escape from existing social constraints and to become a part of the new ruling class. Being a Muslim had always been essential for anyone who wanted a career in the military. By the tenth century, and before in some areas, it had become very difficult to have a successful career in the civil bureaucracy without becoming a Muslim. Attraction, not coercion, was the key to the appeal of the new faith.

During the first century, the Muslim Empire was a fairly open society. The elite of the new empire were the Muslims and Islam claimed to be a religion for all mankind. No would-be convert could be denied membership of this new elite. In contrast, Roman citizenship or membership of Persian aristocratic families was an exclusive, privileged position to be defended by those who enjoyed it. By converting to the new religion of Islam, conquered people could move to being conquerors, members of the new ruling class and, at least theoretically, equal to all other Muslims. Of course, problems soon arose and there were prolonged and violent clashes between old Muslims and new Arab and non-Arab Muslims, but this could not undermine the fact that Islam was open to all.

This is the other side of the collapse of the old social order and class boundaries lamented in aristocratic Persian sources of the period. There were some spectacular examples of this mobility. Nusayr was a prisoner of war, probably of humble Aramaean origin, captured in one of the early Arab campaigns in Iraq. He converted to Islam and his son Mūsā went on to become governor of North Africa and supreme commander of the Muslim forces in the conquest of Spain. At a humbler level, the peasants who refused to obey the orders of the Persian landowner in Iraq, the Copts who chose to stay in North Africa rather than being forced to return to their native Egypt, or the local men who served with the Arab armies in Transoxania may all have seen the coming of the Muslims as an opportunity to better themselves, taking advantage of the freedom and opportunities offered by the new order.

The early Muslims brought with them a great cultural self-confidence. God had spoken to them through His Prophet, in Arabic, and they were the bearers of true religion and God's own language. It is interesting to compare this with the Germanic invaders of western Europe in the fifth century. When they occupied the lands of the Roman Empire, they abandoned their old gods and converted to Christianity, the religion of the empire they had just conquered, and, as far as we know, no one claimed that God spoke German. This cultural self-confidence meant that Arabic became the language of administration and the language of the new high culture. Anyone who wished to participate fully in government or intellectual activity had to be literate in Arabic and preferably a Muslim. Again the contrast with the Germanic west is revealing. Here Latin remained the language of administration and high culture until at least the twelfth century, the new ruling class adopted Latin titles like duke (dux) and count (comes), and the Germanic languages survived only as vernaculars. The Muslim titles, caliph (khalīfa), amīr and wālī (governor) were all Arabic in origin.

Nonetheless, conquest was the prelude to conversion. It established the political and social framework within which the much slower, incremental processes of changing to Islam could take place. By the year 1000, it is likely that the majority of the population in all the different areas that had been conquered by 750 were Muslim. The conquest did not cause conversion but it was a major prerequisite: without it Islam would not have become the dominant faith in these areas.

The success of the Muslim conquests was the product of a unique set of circumstances and the preaching of a simple new monotheistic faith. There were many features of Islam that would have made it approachable to Christians and Jews. It had a Prophet, a Holy Book, established forms of prayer, dietary and family laws. Abraham and Jesus were both great prophets in the Muslim tradition. From the very beginning Islam established itself as a new faith, but it was one that claimed to perfect rather than destroy the older monotheistic ones. It had none of the strangeness of, say, Buddhism. These similarities, this common tradition, must have aided and encouraged conversion.

In many ways acceptance of Muslim rule was the result of Muslim policy toward the enemy: it was almost always preferable to surrender to the invaders and to make terms and pay the taxes rather than to resist to the last. The Islamization and Arabization that followed conquest over the next two or three centuries would not have occurred if political conquest had not already succeeded, but they were not a direct and inevitable consequence of that conquest. Instead, it was a gradual, almost entirely peaceful result of the fact that more and more people wanted to identify with and participate in the dominant culture of their time.

Photo credit: Wikipedia/Tawelsensei. La Mezquita, the former masjid of Cordoba, Spain. The architecture is notable for its giant arches, with over 1,000 columns of jasper, onyx, marble, and granite.

Straight Talk About Islam: Muslims Fear Allah (swt)...

...not men, and certainly not Islamophobes.

Sheila Musaji at The American Muslim has responded to Bobby Spencer's "test" (sorry, I won't link to him) as to whether one is a "moderate" Muslim or not. While I respect Musaji's attempt to answer Spencer, this is not a test I'll ever take, insha'allah. Personally, I don't give a shit as to what Islamophobes think, whether I'm "moderate" enough for them or not. Their minds are already made up; I won't waste my time trying to persuade them otherwise. They're not worth the bother.

The problem with Islamophobes like Bobby Spencer and his ilk is that they think Muslims can be cowed from peer pressure; they don't understand that what mere men think about Islam or Muslims is largely irrelevant. Just because Islamic beliefs and attitudes don't fall lockstep with Western (or other) culture(s) doesn't mean that Islam and Muslims are in the wrong. Like the people at Hebrew National, we answer to a higher authority. Bobby Spencer hasn't grasped that yet. They think (hope, pray) that Muslims will fear them; instead, we fear only Allah (swt).

So from whencesoever Thou startest forth, turn Thy face in the direction of the sacred Mosque; and wheresoever ye are, Turn your face thither: that there be no ground of dispute against you among the people, except those of them that are bent on wickedness; so fear them not, but fear Me; and that I may complete My favors on you, and ye May (consent to) be guided; (2:150)

It was We who revealed the law (to Moses): therein was guidance and light. By its standard have been judged the Jews, by the prophets who bowed (as in Islam) to God's will, by the rabbis and the doctors of law: for to them was entrusted the protection of God's book, and they were witnesses thereto: therefore fear not men, but fear Me, and sell not my signs for a miserable price. If any do fail to judge by (the light of) what God hath revealed, they are (no better than) Unbelievers. (5:47)

The fact of the matter is, people like Bobby have no authority whatsoever to try to sit in judgment of Muslims. I accept judgment only from Allah (swt) and other Muslims, the latter who may help me to improve myself to become a better Muslim.* If you're not a Muslim, it doesn't really matter whether you approve of our beliefs and attitudes. You should really be worrying about yourselves.

In fact, I say to you, Bobby, your time is running out. Only Allah (swt) may judge you, but His judgment is final. You need to submit to the will of Allah (swt) before it is too late.

He [Ibrahim (pbuh)] said: "And who despairs of the mercy of his Lord, but such as go astray?" (15:56)

HT: Islamophobia Watch

* Private note: And that includes you too, Aaminah.

Muhammad Yunus: Casino Capitalism

The German magazine Der Spiegel has a short interview with Muhammad Yunus, founder of Grameen Bank and co-winner of the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize. Mr. Muhammad is asked about his take on the current financial crisis, but these two answers below are the real money quotes. You can read the entire interview here.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Who do you think is guilty for the current financial meltdown?

Yunus: The market itself with its lack of adequate regulation. Today's capitalism has degenerated into a casino. The financial markets are propelled by greed. Speculation has reached catastrophic proportions. These are all things that have to end.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: The current financial crisis began as a credit crisis -- homeowners in the US could no longer pay down their mortgages. At Grameen Bank, which provides microloans, the repayment rate is close to 100 percent. Do you think your bank could be a model for the entire finance world?

Yunus: The fundamental difference is that our business is very connected to the real economy. When we provide a loan of $200, that money will go to buy a cow somewhere. If we lend $100, someone will maybe buy some chickens. In other words, the money goes to something with concrete value. Finance and the real economy have to be connected. In the US, the financial system has completely split off from the real economy. Castles were built in the sky, and suddenly people realized that these castles don't exist at all. That was the point at which the financial system collapsed.

The latter answer is also addressed in another recent blog post of mine; see I Hate to Say I Told You So...

HT: Economist's View

Ayat 30:1-6 and the Wars Between Byzantium and Persia (II)

Alif Lam Mim

The Roman Empire has been defeated-

In a land close by; but they, (even) after (this) defeat of theirs, will soon be victorious-

Within a few years. With God is the Decision, in the past and in the Future: on that Day shall the Believers rejoice-

With the help of God. He helps whom He will, and He is exalted in might, most merciful.

(It is) the promise of God. Never does God depart from His promise: but most men understand not.
-- The Romans (30): 1-6

For many of us Muslims, the first six verses of the surah called The Romans are familiar, but we probably don't know much about the wars between Byzantium and the Persians that described the Byzantine defeat in the mid- to late-610s and the prophecy regarding the Byzantine victory over the Sasanian Empire in 627. This is the second half of a post (the first half is located here), the eighth in my series about Hugh Kennedy's book, The Great Arab Conquests.

Previously, we looked at a basic overview of the conflict between Persia and Byzantine Rome, and the problems Byzantium faced after the war had ended. In this section, from pages 101-03, we look at the aftermath to the Sasanian Empire after their defeat by Heraclius.

The great war between the Byzantines and the Persians which had so damaged the Roman Empire in the first three decades of the seventh century had also been a disaster for the Sasanians. At first Persian arms had been almost entirely successful. In 615 the Persian army had reached the Bosporus opposite Constantinople, and in 619 Persian troops entered Alexandria and completed the conquest of Egypt. The tide began to turn in March 624 when the emperor Heraclius took his fleet to the Black Sea and began the invasion of Armenia and Azerbaijan. The Persians were now outflanked and were forced to withdraw their army from Anatolia to face the emperor, who was now attacking from the north. In 627 he swept through north-western Iran, before descending to the plains of northern Iraq and defeating the Persian army at Nineveh (12 December 627). It was the greatest military disaster that the Sasanian Empire had ever suffered. Chosroes retired to the capital at Ctesiphon, leaving his palace at Dastgard to be sacked by the Romans. Here he began the search for scapegoats to blame for the spectacular reversal of fortunes that had occurred. He seems to have decided on the execution of his most important military commander, Shahrbarāz, but before he could act there was a coup. Chosroes was assassinated early in 628 and his son, who had agreed to his father's murder, ascended the throne as Kavād II.

Kavād immediately set about negotiating a peace with Heraclius in which all prisoners were to be released and the pre-war frontiers restored. And all might yet have been well had the new king not died within the year, probably of the plague. He was succeeded by his infant son, Ardashīr III, but the general, Shāhrbarāz, refused to accept this and in June 629 siezed the throne. This was the first time in four centuries that a man who was not a member of the Sasanian family had tried to take the throne, and there was considerable resistance. After just two months, he, too, was murdered and, since Chosroes II had left no other sons, the throne passed to his daughter, Būrān, who, although apparently an effective ruler, died, of natural causes, after a year. There then followed a bewildering succession of short-lived rulers until finally Yazdgard III, a grandson of the great Chosroes, was elevated to the throne in 632.

The details of these intrigues are not in themselves important. The overall effect was decisive, however. The Sasanian Empire had been ravaged by an invading army and any idea of its invincibility had been destroyed. Archaeological evidence suggests that many settlements in the richest part of Iraq were abandoned as a result of the war. Furthermore the house of Sasan, the mainstay and raison d'être of the state, had been torn apart by feud and murder. It is more than likely that Yazdgard, if he had been given time, would have restored royal control and prestige. But the year of his accession was the year of the death of the Prophet Muhammad: Arab tribes were already taking advantage of the chaos to make inroads on the settled lands of Iraq, and Khālid b. Al-Walīd, the Muslim general, was on his way. In these circumstances, it is surprising not that the Persians were defeated by the Arabs but that they fought with such determination.

This last section, from pages 367-68, looks at the damage the Byzantine and Sasanian Empires inflicted upon each other and how neither were prepared for the oncoming Arab conquests.

Along with these long-term factors, there were the short-term effects of war and the dislocation it caused. There had been many conflicts between the Roman and Iranian empires since Crassus and his forces were defeated by the Parthians in 53 BC, but the war that broke out after the assassination of Emperor Maurice in 602 was the most far reaching and destructive. The effects of the Persian sweep through the lands of the Byzantine Empire affected society at many levels. It destroyed Byzantine imperial control over the lands of the Near East, it severed the links with Constantinople; governors were no longer appointed, armies were no longer dispatched and taxes were no longer paid. The Chalcedonian Orthodox Church lost its imperial patronage and became one Christian sect among many others. Many churchmen and other members of the elite fled to the comparative safety of North Africa or Italy. Archaeological work has suggested that, in Anatolia at least, the advance of the Persian armies did enormous damage to urban life and that people abandoned the spacious cities of the plains to take refuge in mountain-top fortresses. The restoration of Byzantine imperial control came only a year or two before the Arab armies marched from Medina, and in many areas there may have been no Byzantine military and political structures in place at all.

A distinguishing feature of this "last great war of antiquity" was that it devestated both of the great empires with even-handed brutality. Heraclius's invasion of the Persian Empire was as destructive as the Persian invasions of the Byzantine Empire had been; the great fire-temple at Shiz, where the Sasanian shahs had been inaugurated, was destroyed and the royal palace at Dastgard sacked. More crucially, the great king Chosroes II (591-628) was killed by his own generals. The Sasanian Empire, unlike the Byzantine, was formally a dynastic state; Heraclius's assault undermined the prestige of the dynasty and the confidence of the Persian ruling elite. Infighting among the members of the royal family caused a period of great instability. By the time that Yazdgard III (632-51) was wide accepted as shāh, the Arab armies were already attacking the Iraqi frontier.

The success of the conquest was also aided by the succession disputes that paralyzed the Byzantine state after the death of Heraclius in February 641. The power struggle at the Byzantine court seems to have been directly responsible for the otherwise inexplicable failure to mount an effective operation to defend Egypt. If Heraclius had been succeeded by a strong and energetic new emperor, the Byzantines might well have been able to mount a counter-attack in Syria or along the Mediterranean coasts, especially during the very disturbed period that followed the assassination of the caliph Uthmān in 656. The Muslims had a generation in which to consolidate their power and their hold over the lands won from the Byzantines.

Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons. Taq-i Kisra, the Great Arch of Ctesiphon; this is the only remaining visible structure of the Sasanian palace complex at Ctesiphon, in what is now Iraq. This photo was taken in 2007.

Perhaps She's Watched "Fargo" Once Too Often?

Sarah and her disappearing "accent." Sarah, does this mean that your persona is just as fake?

You betcha!

Baby Tudungs and Other Pics

Milady had a bunch of photos that she had taken with her handphone camera (in addition to the video that we posted on the blog earlier tonight). These were taken over the past few weeks.

To be honest, I'm not sure exactly when she took these first three photos; in the first, A'ishah has a bit of a chapped upper lip. This has been quite common for her these past two months, and they come off on their own in time.







This photo was taken over at Grandma's house (you can see her toes to the right of the picture ;) ). That's me holding A'ishah's head up as I try to burp her while she sits on my thigh. Milady thinks Mibaby looks cute in a chipmunkish sort of way when I burp her like this. ;)



These last two photos are our "baby tudung" photos. We had been thinking that it might be cute for mommy and baby to wear matching tudungs (or at least color-coordinated tudungs). As we were walking through a shopping mall last night, I suggested that we buy some bandannas for A'ishah to wear. This is A'ishah wearing an American flag bandanna (with me holding her)...



...and this is A'ishah wearing a white with pink and black print bandanna after we got back home from the hospital this afternoon.



BTW, if you're a friend of mine on Facebook, there's one extra photo of yours truly holding the munchkin on my album of A'ishah pics; here's the link to my profile.

Happy Baby

The video below was taken by Milady two days ago, on October 7th, using her handphone camera (which is the reason for the poor resolution). Still, we're pleased to show our happy baby as she lie upon the bed the other day. I'm about to download a bunch more photos (insha'allah) that we've taken over the past month, so we should have a few more posts about A'ishah fairly soon.

In the meantime, the kid is growing like a weed (this is not an exaggeration). When we went to the hospital this morning for some vaccinations, A'ishah weighed in at 6.33 kg (13 lbs, 15 oz.), which might seem like a lot for a 2.5-month old baby. But that weight is mostly bone; she's got very little baby fat on her so far as she's now 62.5 cm (24.6") long. Remember, she was 52 cm (20.5") at birth, so she's already picked up 10.5 cm (4.1"). Considering that both sides of the family are tall, I wouldn't be at all surprised if A'ishah grows up to rival both Milady and one of my sisters (TRtx) for tallest woman in the family, insha'allah. :)



Update: Milady and I had some of her extended family over for Eid yesterday (Oct. 12th). (Eid family visits among Milady's family often last the entire month of Shawwal.) Anyway, our guests brought their kids with them, and Milady and I were shocked to hear that one of the boys, eight-months-old, is a mere 7 kg, whereas A'ishah is almost as heavy when she's just five days shy of three months. So I downloaded some infant girls' height/weight charts last night. A'ishah is currently around the 90th percentile for both height and weight, although for height vs. weight, she's only at the 50th percentile. This is going to be a tall girl, insha'allah! Guess I'm gonna have to teach her basketball and volleyball when she gets older. ;)

An Engineer's Guide to Cats

An amusing video if you like cats. For the record, I was adopted by a cat in the mid-90s. (I was "just a guy who had a cat." :) ) Never did try the "cat yodeling," though. ;)

MESSENGER's Second Flyby of Mercury

Photo credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

Yesterday [6 October 2008], at 4:40 am EDT, MESSENGER successfully completed its second flyby of Mercury. ... The spectacular image shown here is one of the first to be returned and shows a WAC [Wide Angle Camera] image of the departing planet taken about 90 minutes after the spacecraft’s closest approach to Mercury. The bright crater just south of the center of the image is Kuiper, identified on images from the Mariner 10 mission in the 1970s. For most of the terrain east of Kuiper, toward the limb (edge) of the planet, the departing images are the first spacecraft views of that portion of Mercury’s surface. A striking characteristic of this newly imaged area is the large pattern of rays that extend from the northern region of Mercury to regions south of Kuiper. This extensive ray system appears to emanate from a relatively young crater newly imaged by MESSENGER, providing a view of the planet distinctly unique from that obtained during MESSENGER’s first flyby. This young, extensively rayed crater, along with the prominent rayed crater to the southeast of Kuiper, near the limb of the planet, were both seen in Earth-based radar images of Mercury but not previously imaged by spacecraft. ...

But, Wait! There's More!

With the huge amount of satirical pictures and videos about Failin' Palin out on the Intertubes, I may have to make this into a daily feature.

Let the good times roll! >:)


HT: WTF Is It Now?!?

Want a Strong Economy? Vote for a Democrat!

Yesterday, I highlighted a post over at Angry Bear that showed that every Democratic president since World War II has left office with a lower unemployment rate than the one he inherited from his predecessor, whereas only one Republican president, Ronald Reagan, could make the same claim. The moral of that story: if you want a job, you should vote for a Democrat.

Today, the folks at Angry Bear have ranked the last fourteen presidents (since Herbert Hoover) as to how the American economy did in real terms (i.e., adjusted for inflation) during each administration. Interestingly enough, five of the top seven presidents were Democrats, and only one Democratic president (Truman) was in the bottom seven. Below is the listing of presidents and the last two paragraphs of the essay; you can read the entire post here.

1. FDR
2. LBJ
3. JFK
4. Clinton
5. Reagan
6. Carter
7. Nixon
8. Ike
10. GW (that's 10 so far – don't be surprised if he sinks further into the mire)
11. Ford
12. Bush Sr.
13. Truman
14. Hoover

What the list shows us, is that, the top half of the spots are dominated by Democrats. Two Republicans, Reagan and Nixon, make it in (5th and 7th, respectively). It also shows us that the bottom half of the list is populated almost exclusively with Republicans. The one Democrat in the bottom half of the list, not incidentally, is the Democrat most beloved of Republicans today: Harry Truman. George Bush has compared himself to Truman, and a few weeks, Sarah Palin told us how she too was comparable to Truman. What are the odds that prominent Republicans would compare themselves with FDR or LBJ? (Snarky answer – probably about the same as the odds a Republican administration would produce a growth rate comparable to FDR or LBJ.)

Now, after 70 years of data, after observing what we've observed over all sorts of conditions, it is hard to conclude anything but this: one party advocates policies that produce rapid economic growth, and one part dismisses those policies with epithets like "socialism" and advocates instead policies that produce dismal economic growth. And dismal economic growth has consequences. Poor economic growth makes people worse off, and hits them in their pocketbook. And when people are hurting financially, their health suffers, the rate of divorce goes up, suicides increase, and the abortion rate increases. So those who advocate the policies that bring us lower incomes, poorer health, break up families, increase suicides, and increase the rate of abortions are doing us all a lot of harm. More, in fact, than Osama or Saddam could possibly have done. And yet, the folks who advocates those policies question the patriotism of the rest of us. It's very, very strange.

James Galbraith: Goodbye, Conservatives. Hello, Predators.

A very interesting article in Slate's The Big Money about the so-called "conservative" wing of the Republican party. Galbraith's thesis, in fact, is that the Republican party is beholden to a predatory class of politicians (who, IMO, aren't necessarily neocons) that practice crony capitalism. Galbraith's conclusion is that the presidential election really hinges on a single issue: Do Americans want a continuation of the predator state, or is it time to clean the government out?

Below is the meat of the article:

Real conservatives know that neither Bush nor McCain is one of them. Bush is a bread-and-circuses reactionary with a clientele of lobbies. McCain gets his economic ideas from Phil Gramm, the ultimate architect of the Enron culture, of libertine speculation and financial disaster. As for Sarah Palin, back in Alaska she took every dime of pork she could lay her hands on. This crowd deregulates and privatizes not because they think it might work out for the public but because they know it won't. What they care about is putting their friends in charge.

Under Bush, oil and gas, drug companies and defense contractors, insurers and usurers, banks and big media control the government of the United States. John McCain was a key member of the Keating Five and a lynchpin of the savings-and-loan debacle; then, as chair of the Senate commerce committee, he presided over Lobby Central; notoriously, his campaign is run by lobbyists to this day and until last week his policy could be summed up in slogans: he was a "free market" man, a "deregulator." Sarah Palin is an interesting case. What was she known for in Wasilla and Juneau? For trying to fire any public servant, from the town librarian to the state commissioner of public safety, who didn't toe her line. Bush and McCain are the predator state writ large, and she is the predator state writ small.

The predator state has no public purpose. Apart from a few empty slogans-smaller government, balance the budget, feel your pain-the connection between actual problems and actual policies has disappeared. It has become clear that, if the Republicans had their way, this election would not be about issues. It would be about anything else: personalities, associations, the politics of fear, and the life history of a long-ago prisoner of war.

But fate blew McCain's cover. On the morning that Lehman Bros. and Merrill Lynch fell, John McCain spoke the immortal words of Herbert Hoover: "The fundamentals of our economy are strong." He said it twice. It's a phrase with deep resonance in American politics. People understand it. No politician says "the fundamentals are strong" unless they know that they are not.

The Dow Jones average fell 504 points that day. As stocks crashed, suddenly people remembered that modern markets cannot exist without a cop on the beat. Every important market out there, from fresh food and safe drugs to autos and air travel to housing and health care, depends on government to maintain trust, and without it, none of them would survive. Without regulation, predators take over, and when they do, trust eventually collapses. Every important market is in peril now, precisely because of the predators in power these past eight years. And none more immediately than finance.

The Bush-Paulson bailout exposed the predator state in detail. Deregulation and desupervision were the origin of this crisis: the 1999 Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act repealing Glass-Steagall, and the Gramm-authored loophole legitimating credit default swaps in 2000. Bush's financial regulators brought chainsaws to press conferences, a clear signal to sub-prime hustlers that "anything goes." "Liar's loans," "neutron loans" and "toxic waste" became financial terms of art. When the crash came, Paulson and Bernanke were plainly not up to the job. The original three-page Treasury bill was less a power grab than a punt; it said to Congress: "there's nobody home over here."

The crisis forces McCain back to issues and exposed the emptiness of his campaign. He resorted to theatrics, "suspending" his campaign to fly to Washington to "work" on a bailout bill, only to demonstrate that his leadership charms were lost on Republican members of the House. At the White House summit he had nothing to say. Later he attacked the morals and ethics of Wall Street, but backed a bill that was aimed to protect the stock prices of the Wall Street firms, while imposing no new discipline and doing nothing to stop the foreclosures. And when it came time to actually cast his vote, he couldn't be bothered even to speak from the Senate floor.

It seems unlikely that John McCain, the regulation-wrecker, will become, overnight, the man who would turn vice to virtue on Wall Street. But even suppose he were serious. Who would trust him? No one with money on the line.

This is McCain's deeper problem. If he is elected, under his leadership, trust cannot be restored. No one with his philosophy or record can do that. Restoring trust requires a government of trustworthy people. Team McCain doesn't have any, and some, especially Gramm, inspire the opposite. It wouldn't matter what their policies were or pretended to be. Nothing they attempted would work.

The Democrats did not do well in the crisis; they were conflicted, divided, unsure of their ground, and they got rolled on many details. Yet they nevertheless broke through politically; Nancy Pelosi's stinging speech last Monday was a rare statement of plain truth. And so the choice in this election is well-defined. One party believes that the government serves no public purpose. The other believes that it must. One party has turned the government over to lobbies, to cronies and to big donors. The other is beginning to realize that a real government must be rebuilt. One party would keep the same crowd in office; the other would have to begin by clearing them out. No one can say there is no difference between the parties this year, and the basic issue in this election is really just as simple as that.

The Economic Version of "Final Destination 3"

There is someone, walking behind you
Turn around, look at me
There is someone, watching your footsteps
Turn around, look at me
One more post on economics (for now), this time an unusual look at housing prices. The New York Times produced a graph of Robert Shiller's American housing price index, which shows what prices have been like from 1890 through 2006. For example, if a standard house cost $100,000 in 1890 (in 2006 dollars), a similar home would have sold for $199,000 in 2006. What's interesting, though, is that someone has taken Shiller's data and transformed it into a roller-coaster ride using Atari's RollerCoaster Tycoon (R)3 software. (Be sure to look at the bottom right corner to view the year.)



The problem with this video, though, is that it stops short of what's happened in the past two years. Back in late May, The Economist, which I do read (apparently this is a political joke now), produced a graph that shows this past year's plunge. To give an idea of what the end of the roller-coaster ride should look like, one wit at Angry Bear suggested the following video:



HT: Angry Bear

State Coincident Indices through August 2008

The State Coincident Indices, published by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, have been released through the month of August. The top graph is from the month of May, which I've republished to provide some continuity from the previous set of graphs; the latter three graphs are for June, July and August.

As you can see, there has been some strengthening in the Gulf states of Texas and Louisiana (one wonders how the graphs will look after taking into account Hurricanes Gustav and Ike), the western half of the upper Midwest, and West Virginia, which went from deep red to dark blue in a matter of two months. Trouble spots include the Pacific Southwest and the Midwest, although the latter region may be improving; we'll have to wait and see.

From the August 2008 press release [pdf]:

The Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia has released the coincident indexes for all 50 states for August 2008. The indexes increased in 12 states for the month, decreased in 31, and were unchanged in the remaining seven (a one-month diffusion index of -38). For the past three months, the indexes have increased in 12 states, decreased in 35, and were unchanged in the other three (a three-month diffusion index of -46). For comparison purposes, the Philadelphia Fed developed a similar coincident index for the entire United States. The Philadelphia Fed’s U.S. index was flat in August and has remained unchanged over the past three months.

Want a Job? Vote for a Democrat!

A couple of interesting posts on unemployment today, the first being from Spencer at Angry Bear:

So much for Sarah Palin's claim that Republican tax cuts create jobs. In the post WW II era every Democratic President has left office with a lower unemployment rate than they inherited from their predecessor while only one Republican president left office with a lower unemployment rate than they inherited. That was Ronald Reagan, but his first term still holds the record for the highest average unemployment rate of any post - WW II four year Presidential term.

George Bush inherited a 3.9% unemployment rate and the results of all his tax cuts has been a rise in the unemployment rate to 6.1%, so far. By contrast Bill Clinton inherited a 7.4% unemployment rate and with his prudent fiscal policy left Bush a 3.9% unemployment rate.

Leave it to Team Bush to be the only American President to throw a war that failed to stimulate the economy.

Another scary graph comes from Economist's View:

A grim morning: Double plus ungood news on multiple fronts this morning. The credit crunch is getting worse: LIBOR jumped again, the TED spread is at a new record. Bad news on employment: payrolls down 159,000, average work week down, official unemployment rate flat at 6.1 percent but broad measure (U6) up from 10.7 to 11.

We are going over the edge.

The track record: This chart shows U6, the broadest measure of unemployment and underemployment from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. (No data available before 1994.)

Hey Sarah Palin

Cute.

Hey Sarah Palin, do you tell them in Wasilla
That 4,000 years ago we roamed the planet with Godzilla?
Is it true?
I am so fucking scared of you
As number 2

Hey Sarah Palin, I think Alaska's very pretty
But just 100,000 people more than Oklahoma City
Yes it's true
Go look it up, I'm telling you
Oh man, were through

Chorus
Oh, if you become VP, oh, it's Canada for me (2x)
It's Canada for me

Hey Sarah Palin, did you really once inquire
Whether you could throw library books into a big bonfire?
God, my eyes
This really might be our demise
This pack of lies

Hey Sarah Palin, just because you're good at shootin'
Doesn't mean you have the ammo to negotiate with Putin
Are you on coke?
This fucking country's up in smoke
Oh what a joke

Chorus
Oh, if you become VP, oh what will it mean for me (2x)

Bridge
Just because I can see the moon
Doesn't make me an astronaut, you loon
Your foreign policy expertise is pooh
Do you really think a woman commits
To a candidate just because she has tits
Please tell me that this ticket is not true
I thought that there could be no worse
Than Cheney, but here you are, I curse
The madman who would cast a vote for you
And McCain too

Hey Sarah Palin, is it media distortion
Or would you tell a girl who's raped that she could not have an abortion?
It's a new low
Who knows just how far you would go
I'd rather vote for Ross Perot
Hey Sarah Palin I don't know
Where can we go

Chorus

HT: TBogg

Don't Think So!

Is Failin' Palin smarter than a fifth grader? I think we can safely assume what the answer would be. ;)

Original photo credit: WTF Is It Now?!? Modified by yours truly.

John Gray: A Shattering Moment in America's Fall From Power

I thought I'd take a few minutes to write up some commentary about John Gray's essay that I posted a few days ago.

In fact, if there is any period of history that recent American history reminds me of, it is that of Louis XIV:

Louis' numerous wars effectively bankrupted the State (though it must also be said that France was able to recover in a matter of years), forcing him to incur large State debts from various financiers and to levy higher taxes on the peasants as the nobility and clergy had exemption from paying these taxes and contributing to public funds. Yet, it must be emphasized that it was the State and not the country which was impoverished.

When John McCain said on September 14th that "The fundamentals of our economy are strong," there is some small truth to that. The ability of the American economy to rebound, pay off its debts, repair its infrastructure, and put its people back to work is strong. But as John Gray points out in his essay, the United States' ability to influence other governments has weakened dramatically. A creditor nation holding the debt of a debtor nation is like a leash on a dog: the creditor nation limits the ability of the debtor nation to do what it wants. The U.S. has long practiced this tactic to its own benefits over the decades (I wrote about this in a term paper when I was working on my MBA), but now a number of nations either have the potential to use the leash on the U.S. (e.g., China and Russia) or feel emboldened to thumb their noses at America (e.g., Venezuela).

The only way out of this situation is for America to pay their debts through lower government spending and (much) higher taxes, and to reverse its current accounts balance from a negative into a positive. "Declaring bankruptcy" by defaulting on its debt is not an option. That, in fact, would be a death sentence for the Republic. America must humble itself by reforming the government and financial sectors away from its predator state greed. This "humbling" is going to be extremely painful economically and politically, but it must be done; the alternative - other nations leading the U.S. where they want America to go - will be even more painful.

From The Guardian:

Our gaze might be on the markets melting down, but the upheaval we are experiencing is more than a financial crisis, however large. Here is a historic geopolitical shift, in which the balance of power in the world is being altered irrevocably. The era of American global leadership, reaching back to the Second World War, is over.

You can see it in the way America's dominion has slipped away in its own backyard, with Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez taunting and ridiculing the superpower with impunity. Yet the setback of America's standing at the global level is even more striking. With the nationalization of crucial parts of the financial system, the American free-market creed has self-destructed while countries that retained overall control of markets have been vindicated. In a change as far-reaching in its implications as the fall of the Soviet Union, an entire model of government and the economy has collapsed.

Ever since the end of the Cold War, successive American administrations have lectured other countries on the necessity of sound finance. Indonesia, Thailand, Argentina and several African states endured severe cuts in spending and deep recessions as the price of aid from the International Monetary Fund, which enforced the American orthodoxy. China in particular was hectored relentlessly on the weakness of its banking system. But China's success has been based on its consistent contempt for Western advice and it is not Chinese banks that are currently going bust. How symbolic yesterday that Chinese astronauts take a spacewalk while the US Treasury Secretary is on his knees.

Despite incessantly urging other countries to adopt its way of doing business, America has always had one economic policy for itself and another for the rest of the world. Throughout the years in which the US was punishing countries that departed from fiscal prudence, it was borrowing on a colossal scale to finance tax cuts and fund its over-stretched military commitments. Now, with federal finances critically dependent on continuing large inflows of foreign capital, it will be the countries that spurned the American model of capitalism that will shape America's economic future.

Which version of the bail out of American financial institutions cobbled up by Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke is finally adopted is less important than what the bail out means for America's position in the world. The populist rant about greedy banks that is being loudly ventilated in Congress is a distraction from the true causes of the crisis. The dire condition of America's financial markets is the result of American banks operating in a free-for-all environment that these same American legislators created. It is America's political class that, by embracing the dangerously simplistic ideology of deregulation, has responsibility for the present mess.

In present circumstances, an unprecedented expansion of government is the only means of averting a market catastrophe. The consequence, however, will be that America will be even more starkly dependent on the world's new rising powers. The federal government is racking up even larger borrowings, which its creditors may rightly fear will never be repaid. It may well be tempted to inflate these debts away in a surge of inflation that would leave foreign investors with hefty losses. In these circumstances, will the governments of countries that buy large quantities of American bonds, China, the Gulf States and Russia, for example, be ready to continue supporting the dollar's role as the world's reserve currency? Or will these countries see this as an opportunity to tilt the balance of economic power further in their favor? Either way, the control of events is no longer in American hands.

The fate of empires is very often sealed by the interaction of war and debt. That was true of the British Empire, whose finances deteriorated from the First World War onwards, and of the Soviet Union. Defeat in Afghanistan and the economic burden of trying to respond to Reagan's technically flawed but politically extremely effective Star Wars program were vital factors in triggering the Soviet collapse. Despite its insistent exceptionalism, America is no different. The Iraq War and the credit bubble have fatally undermined America's economic primacy. The US will continue to be the world's largest economy for a while longer, but it will be the new rising powers that, once the crisis is over, buy up what remains intact in the wreckage of America's financial system.

There has been a good deal of talk in recent weeks about imminent economic armageddon. In fact, this is far from being the end of capitalism. The frantic scrambling that is going on in Washington marks the passing of only one type of capitalism - the peculiar and highly unstable variety that has existed in America over the last 20 years. This experiment in financial laissez-faire has imploded.While the impact of the collapse will be felt everywhere, the market economies that resisted American-style deregulation will best weather the storm. Britain, which has turned itself into a gigantic hedge fund, but of a kind that lacks the ability to profit from a downturn, is likely to be especially badly hit.

The irony of the post-Cold War period is that the fall of communism was followed by the rise of another utopian ideology. In American and Britain, and to a lesser extent other Western countries, a type of market fundamentalism became the guiding philosophy. The collapse of American power that is underway is the predictable upshot. Like the Soviet collapse, it will have large geopolitical repercussions. An enfeebled economy cannot support America's over-extended military commitments for much longer. Retrenchment is inevitable and it is unlikely to be gradual or well planned.

Meltdowns on the scale we are seeing are not slow-motion events. They are swift and chaotic, with rapidly spreading side-effects. Consider Iraq. The success of the surge, which has been achieved by bribing the Sunnis, while acquiescing in ongoing ethnic cleansing, has produced a condition of relative peace in parts of the country. How long will this last, given that America's current level of expenditure on the war can no longer be sustained?

An American retreat from Iraq will leave Iran the regional victor. How will Saudi Arabia respond? Will military action to forestall Iran acquiring nuclear weapons be less or more likely? China's rulers have so far been silent during the unfolding crisis. Will America's weakness embolden them to assert China's power or will China continue its cautious policy of 'peaceful rise'? At present, none of these questions can be answered with any confidence. What is evident is that power is leaking from the US at an accelerating rate. Georgia showed Russia redrawing the geopolitical map, with America an impotent spectator.

Outside the US, most people have long accepted that the development of new economies that goes with globalization will undermine America's central position in the world. They imagined that this would be a change in America's comparative standing, taking place incrementally over several decades or generations. Today, that looks an increasingly unrealistic assumption.

Having created the conditions that produced history's biggest bubble, America's political leaders appear unable to grasp the magnitude of the dangers the country now faces. Mired in their rancorous culture wars and squabbling among themselves, they seem oblivious to the fact that American global leadership is fast ebbing away. A new world is coming into being almost unnoticed, where America is only one of several great powers, facing an uncertain future it can no longer shape.

HT: Juan Cole

FAIL!

Funny! And Eid Mubarak to all my Muslim visitors; may all your fasts and good deeds be accepted by Allah (swt). Ameen!


HT: Yet Another Web Site

I Hate To Say I Told You So...

Metaphorically speaking, of course. One of the things I love about Islam is that it's a very practical religion. Non-Muslims may not like the various rules within the religion, but I have found, by and large, that Allah (swt) put them there for very good reasons. For example, "don't drink alcohol." How many benefits would there be to the individual, to society, if people didn't drink? How many lives would be saved, for example, if there were no drunk drivers? I used to read "Dear Abby." How many letter writers' lives would be changed for the better if they lived an Islamic lifestyle? "Dear Abby" would probably go out of business.

Likewise, the world is now in the midst of an economic crisis the likes of which no one has seen since my parents were toddlers. How much better would the economy be if it followed Islamic business principles? The following passage comes from one of the economics blogs I read, Angry Bear:

It was about an interview by Bill Moyers of John Bogle. He noted:

JOHN BOGLE: Well, it's gotten misshapen because the financial side of the economy is dominating the productive side of the economy...We've become a financial economy which has overwhelmed the productive economy to the detriment of investors and the detriment ultimately of our society.

I want to come back to the difference between the financial system and the productive system. The productive system adds to the value of our economy. And, by and large, the financial system subtracts. And, yet, it's growing and growing and growing. And this short term thing where short term orientation in which trading pieces of paper is regarded as a social value. It is not a social value.

Go listen to it. Then listen to Mr. Moyers latest interview with Kevin Philips.

But what's here that doesn't get the attention is the United States in the last 20 years undertook an enormous transformation of itself with no attention paid. And what it means is and what makes all this so frightening is the country is at risk because of the size of the financial sector that has never been graded on its competence and behavior in any serious way. They are the economy at this point. And we are now seeing what happens when a 20 to 21 percent of GDP financial sector starts to come unglued.

You had essentially a financial sector that, let's say, was sort of neck and neck with manufacturing back in the late 1980s. But they got control in a lot of ways in the agenda. Finance has been bailed out. I mean, everybody thinks this is horrible now what we're seeing in terms of bailouts. Even a lot of the people who do it think it's bad.

This has been going on since the beginning of the 1980s. Finance has been preferred as the sector that got government support. Manufacturing slides, nobody helps. Finance has a problem, Federal Reserve to the rescue. Treasury to the rescue. Subsidies this, that, and other.

I am certain we have to do something to help the money flow such that it does not take down the entire system. It would be cutting off our noses to spite our faces not to protect ourselves from what a few have done. We have to be adults, suck it up and clean up the alcohol aroma vomit all over our bathroom.

But, we do not have to let it happen again. There is only one solution to this and no one, not anyone is pointing it out: Put the financial sector of the economy back in alignment with the productive sector. What got us in this mess is our (well not all of us) belief that the financial sector can stand on it's own as a primary wealth/money creator. It can not. Never could. But, believing it put the impetus to the creation of “vehicles” for creating trades. You know all those securitized whatevers, and alphabet monikers, and insurance for insurance for insurance based on alphabet monikers of securitized whatevers. What did people expect would happen when you turn the part of your system that is dependent on activity in an other part for it's existence into a stand alone money creator. If you are going to keep generating money from money, then you are going to have to keep coming up with new “product.” New designs, new marketing to create an need and want, new packaging, BRANDING.

Again, Mr. Philip put's it this way:

But we've seen the central component of the rise of the financial sector is the rise of the debt industry. Mortgage, credit cards, all these gimmicks that Wall Street sells-- just all kinds of products. And, of course, the products are laying an egg all over the world right now.

Get it? We take an industry subservient to the needs of production and turn it into a competitor of production. I can polish and sell rocks without a bank to borrow from. I can accumulate wealth over time. My business may grow slowly and so may my wealth, but I can do it. But, remove all non-financial activities and what does financial do to survive? What does it do to survive with no one needing a loan, backing, no desire to produce in a way that increases our productivity such that we have more time to purse happiness (that constitution purpose)? We treat finance as if it is the chicken/egg question. It is not. Finance came second and is dependent.

This particular author, "Divorced one like Bush," isn't a Muslim as far as I know, but he actually advocates a principle of Islamic finance: Making money from money is not Islamically acceptable.

Money is only a medium of exchange, a way of defining the value of a thing; it has no value in itself, and therefore should not be allowed to give rise to more money, via fixed interest payments, simply by being put in a bank or lent to someone else. The human effort, initiative, and risk involved in a productive venture are more important than the money used to finance it. Muslim jurists consider money as potential capital rather than capital, meaning that money becomes capital only when it is invested in business. Accordingly, money advanced to a business as a loan is regarded as a debt of the business and not capital and, as such, it is not entitled to any return (i.e. interest). Muslims are encouraged to purchase and are discouraged from keeping money idle so that, for instance, hoarding money is regarded as being unacceptable. In Islam, money represents purchasing power which is considered to be the only proper use of money. This purchasing power (money) cannot be used to make more purchasing power (money) without undergoing the intermediate step of it being used for the purchase of goods and services.

Principles Of Islamic Banking

In Islam, we use money for productive purposes that are for the benefit of the community as a whole. Money is not to be used to make more money directly, such as through interest. We use money to make more money indirectly, by investing money into productive assets, such as businesses, that will (insha'allah) make profits. It's a slower process, but it's a much more stable and safer system than the highly leveraged economy that's now melting down.

Update: For some similar posts, read Islamic Finance Shows Banks the Way Forward and Islamic Banking Restrains Bankruptcy.

Your Urgent Help Needed

Classic; this would be funny if it weren't true. From Angry Bear:

Dear American:

I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a transfer of funds of great magnitude.
I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you.
I am working with Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s. This transactin is 100% safe.
This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.
Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.
Yours Faithfully Minister of Treasury Paulson

Naomi Wolf: Veiled Sexuality

Naomi Wolf gets it. It's a shame most Westerners don't. Read the full article here.

But are we in the West radically misinterpreting Muslim sexual mores, particularly the meaning to many Muslim women of being veiled or wearing the chador? And are we blind to our own markers of the oppression and control of women?

The West interprets veiling as repression of women and suppression of their sexuality. But when I traveled in Muslim countries and was invited to join a discussion in women-only settings within Muslim homes, I learned that Muslim attitudes toward women’s appearance and sexuality are not rooted in repression, but in a strong sense of public versus private, of what is due to God and what is due to one’s husband. It is not that Islam suppresses sexuality, but that it embodies a strongly developed sense of its appropriate channeling – toward marriage, the bonds that sustain family life, and the attachment that secures a home.

Outside the walls of the typical Muslim households that I visited in Morocco, Jordan, and Egypt, all was demureness and propriety. But inside, women were as interested in allure, seduction, and pleasure as women anywhere in the world.

At home, in the context of marital intimacy, Victoria’s Secret, elegant fashion, and skin care lotions abounded. The bridal videos that I was shown, with the sensuous dancing that the bride learns as part of what makes her a wonderful wife, and which she proudly displays for her bridegroom, suggested that sensuality was not alien to Muslim women. Rather, pleasure and sexuality, both male and female, should not be displayed promiscuously – and possibly destructively – for all to see.

Indeed, many Muslim women I spoke with did not feel at all subjugated by the chador or the headscarf. On the contrary, they felt liberated from what they experienced as the intrusive, commodifying, basely sexualizing Western gaze. Many women said something like this: “When I wear Western clothes, men stare at me, objectify me, or I am always measuring myself against the standards of models in magazines, which are hard to live up to – and even harder as you get older, not to mention how tiring it can be to be on display all the time. When I wear my headscarf or chador, people relate to me as an individual, not an object; I feel respected.” This may not be expressed in a traditional Western feminist set of images, but it is a recognizably Western feminist set of feelings.

...

Nor are Muslim women alone. The Western Christian tradition portrays all sexuality, even married sexuality, as sinful. Islam and Judaism never had that same kind of mind-body split. So, in both cultures, sexuality channeled into marriage and family life is seen as a source of great blessing, sanctioned by God.

This may explain why both Muslim and orthodox Jewish women not only describe a sense of being liberated by their modest clothing and covered hair, but also express much higher levels of sensual joy in their married lives than is common in the West. When sexuality is kept private and directed in ways seen as sacred – and when one’s husband isn’t seeing his wife (or other women) half-naked all day long – one can feel great power and intensity when the headscarf or the chador comes off in the sanctity of the home.

...

I do not mean to dismiss the many women leaders in the Muslim world who regard veiling as a means of controlling women. Choice is everything. But Westerners should recognize that when a woman in France or Britain chooses a veil, it is not necessarily a sign of her repression. And, more importantly, when you choose your own miniskirt and halter top – in a Western culture in which women are not so free to age, to be respected as mothers, workers or spiritual beings, and to disregard Madison Avenue – it’s worth thinking in a more nuanced way about what female freedom really means.

HT: Rozas

The Elitist John McCain

HT: FrostFireZoo


HT: WTF Is It Now?!?

Ayat 30:1-6 and the Wars Between Byzantium and Persia (I)

Alif Lam Mim

The Roman Empire has been defeated-

In a land close by; but they, (even) after (this) defeat of theirs, will soon be victorious-

Within a few years. With God is the Decision, in the past and in the Future: on that Day shall the Believers rejoice-

With the help of God. He helps whom He will, and He is exalted in might, most merciful.

(It is) the promise of God. Never does God depart from His promise: but most men understand not.
-- The Romans (30): 1-6

For many of us Muslims, the first six verses of the surah called The Romans are familiar, but we probably don't know much about the wars between Byzantium and the Persians that described the Byzantine defeat in the mid- to late-610s and the prophecy regarding the Byzantine victory over the Sasanian Empire in 627. This post, the eighth in my series about Hugh Kennedy's book, The Great Arab Conquests, looks at three passages that describe what happened between these two empires.

This first passage, taken from pages 68-70, gives a basic overview of the conflict between Persia and Byzantine Rome, and briefly discusses the problems Byzantium had after the warfare had ended.

Relations between the Byzantine and Sasanian Persian empires were largely peaceful during the fifth and early sixth centuries. Both powers respected each other's borders and their zones of influence in the Syrian desert to the south and the mountains of Armenia to the north. In the mid sixth century, however, large-scale and very damaging warfare erupted between the two great powers. The Sasanian monarchs invaded Byzantine territory on a number of occasions. In 540 they sacked the great capital of the east at Antioch and in 573 they conquered the important provincial capital at Apamea. On both occasions they returned with a large amount of booty and transported large numbers of the population to new cities in the Persian Empire.

If relations had deteriorated in the sixth century, they became much worse in the seventh. In the year 602, the emperor Maurice and his entire family were assassinated by mutinous soldiers. Some years before, the emperor had given refuge to the young and energetic Sasanian monarch Chosroes II when he had been temporarily driven from his throne. Chosroes now used the death of his benefactor as an excuse for launching a devastating attack on the Byzantine Empire. His armies won a series of spectacular victories. In 611 Persian armies invaded Syria, Jerusalem fell to them in 614 and in 615 the Persians reached the shores of the Bosporus opposite Constantinople itself. In 619 they took Alexandria and all of Egypt was in their hands.

The Byzantine recovery was the achievement of the emperor Heraclius (610-41). He had been governor of Byzantine North Africa but in 610 sailed to Constantinople with his provincial army to seize the throne from the brutal usurper Phocas. His reign had been dominated by the struggle with the Persians. After many years, when Persian armies had seemed unstoppable, Heraclius had turned the tables dramatically when he launched an attack behind the enemy lines in 624. In a move of great daring and brilliant strategic vision, he had led an army from the Black Sea coast of Turkey, through western Iran and northern Iraq, sacking the famous fire temple at Shiz and the palace of Chosroes at Dastgard. With the death of his arch-rival Chosroes II in 628 and the subsequent divisions among the Persians as they struggled to find a new ruler, Heraclius was able to make a peace that re-established the old frontier between the two empires along the Khābūr river. In 629 he negotiated the withdrawal of Persian soldiers from Syria and Egypt and set about restoring Byzantine rule in the newly recovered provinces. On 21 March 630 he enjoyed his greatest moment of triumph when he returned the relics of the True Cross, taken by the Persians, to Jerusalem.

Although the Persians had been decisively defeated, the conquest of Syria and Palestine had a very damaging effect on Byzantine power in the Levant. Apart from the bloodshed caused by the warfare, it seems that many of the Greek-speaking elite emigrated to the security of North Africa or Rome. The fighting had been very destructive, especially in the towns, but perhaps more important was the loss of the tradition of imperial rule and administration. For most of the period of Muhammad's mission, Syria and Palestine were ruled by the Persians, not the Byzantines, and it was not until 630, a couple of years before the Prophet's death, that Byzantine control was re-established. Nonetheless, this control must have been very patchy, and there were probably many areas where Byzantine government hardly existed. Most younger-generation Syrians would have had no experience or memory of imperial rule, and no cause to be loyal to Constantinople. Even as Byzantine government was being slowly re-established, the religious differences that had divided Syria in the sixth century came to the fore again. The emperor Heraclius was determined to enforce religious conformity on a Christian population that in large measure rejected his doctrinal position.

Byzantine control over Syria had been established for more than half a millennium. If Islam had been born fifty years earlier, and the early Muslims had attempted to raid Syria and Palestine in the 580s not the 630s, there can be little doubt that they would have been seen off very quickly, as the provinces were firmly controlled by the government and the defenses well organized. The coincidence that the first Muslim armies appeared in the area immediately after the traumatic events of the great war between Byzantium and Iran was the essential prerequisite for the success of Muslim arms.

To be continued, insha'allah...

Photo Credit: Cardo Maximus, a street in the ruins of Apamea (Syria), sacked in 573 CE by Chosroes I, from Wikipedia/Bo-Deh

The More Things Change... Sarah Palin and Petroleum Export Bans

The McCain/Palin strategy on economic talking points appears to be one of turning molehills into mountains: focusing on rather small issues and blowing them up dramatically in the hope that most people will take the Republicans' word for it. However, as Economist's View pointed out the other day, issues like the amount of budgetary earmarks may sound like a lot of money, but they constitute less than one percent of the federal budget. Likewise, the idea that we can start offshore drilling for oil now and that it will help us in any way today is completely bogus. Americans are being sold a bill of goods by the Republicans, but many people don't care. P.T. Barnum knew the American attitude all too well. The more things change...

Now there's a new issue where Sarah Palin shows her "expertise," that of petroleum export bans:

Of course, it's a fungible commodity and they don't flag, you know, the molecules, where it's going and where it's not. But in the sense of the Congress today, they know that there are very, very hungry domestic markets that need that oil first. So, I believe that what Congress is going to do, also, is not to allow the export bans to such a degree that it's Americans who get stuck holding the bag without the energy source that is produced here, pumped here. It's got to flow into our domestic markets first.

Oh, dear! We Americans are exporting our own oil to other countries when we need it first. Surprisingly enough, that's true. Considering the ferocious appetite Americans have for petroleum, one would think that all domestically-produced petroleum would never be exported outside of the country, but it does. OK, so how much is exported?


If you look at the EIA's Energy Flow chart [pdf] above, you'll see that, in 2007, the US produced 10.80 quadrillion BTUs (QBTU) of its own crude oil, imported 28.70 QBTUs of petroleum and exported 2.93 QBTUs of petroleum. So, 2.93/39.50 = 7.4%. That's how much oil is being exported out of the country. Seven percent.

Let's get into the nitty-gritty even further. The seven percent above includes both crude oil and other petroleum products. However, if you look at the US imports and exports of crude oil and other petroleum products, you'll see that only 26,000 barrels per day were exported (as of this writing) compared with the 12,498,000 barrels per day that were both produced domestically and imported into the U.S. That's a grand total of 0.2% of the daily supply.

In principle, I don't have a problem with the U.S. setting up an export ban on domestically-produced petroleum, although there may be some very good reasons why that oil is being exported to begin with that are not being addressed by the Republicans. But what I do want to point out, yet again, is that this is a very small issue. Crude oil exports make up a tiny, tiny, tiny fraction of the total amount of crude oil that America uses on a daily basis. But Republicans would rather focus on the inconsequential than deal with the more serious economic matters at hand.