SWJED
06-11-2006, 09:04 PM
11 June London Times via The Australian - Modern-day Goths and Vandals Threaten the West Via Cheap Flights and the Net (http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,19441287-601,00.html) by Peter Almond.
One of Britain's most senior military strategists has warned that Western civilisation faces a threat on a par with the barbarian invasions that destroyed the Roman empire.
In an apocalyptic vision of security dangers, Rear Admiral Chris Parry said future migrations would be comparable to the Goths and Vandals, while North African pirates could be attacking yachts and beaches in the Mediterranean within 10 years. Europe could be undermined by growing immigrant communities with little allegiance to host countries -- a "reverse colonisation" as Parry described it.
These groups would remain closely connected to their homelands via the internet and cheap flights. The idea of assimilation was becoming redundant, he said.
The bleak warnings by Parry were delivered to senior officers and industry experts at a conference last week. Parry, head of the development, concepts and doctrine centre at Britain's Ministry of Defence, is charged with identifying challenges that will frame future national security policy.
If a security breakdown occurred, he said, it was likely to be brought on by environmental destruction and a population explosion, coupled with modern technology and radical Islam. The result for Britain and Europe, Parry warned, could be "like the 5th-century Roman empire facing the Goths and the Vandals".
He pointed to the wave of mass migration that disaster in the Third World could unleash. "The diaspora issue is one of my biggest current concerns," he said.
"Globalisation makes assimilation seem redundant and old-fashioned ... (the process) acts as a sort of reverse colonisation, where groups of people are self-contained, going back and forth between their countries, exploiting sophisticated networks and using instant communication on phones and the internet."...
One of Britain's most senior military strategists has warned that Western civilisation faces a threat on a par with the barbarian invasions that destroyed the Roman empire.
In an apocalyptic vision of security dangers, Rear Admiral Chris Parry said future migrations would be comparable to the Goths and Vandals, while North African pirates could be attacking yachts and beaches in the Mediterranean within 10 years. Europe could be undermined by growing immigrant communities with little allegiance to host countries -- a "reverse colonisation" as Parry described it.
These groups would remain closely connected to their homelands via the internet and cheap flights. The idea of assimilation was becoming redundant, he said.
The bleak warnings by Parry were delivered to senior officers and industry experts at a conference last week. Parry, head of the development, concepts and doctrine centre at Britain's Ministry of Defence, is charged with identifying challenges that will frame future national security policy.
If a security breakdown occurred, he said, it was likely to be brought on by environmental destruction and a population explosion, coupled with modern technology and radical Islam. The result for Britain and Europe, Parry warned, could be "like the 5th-century Roman empire facing the Goths and the Vandals".
He pointed to the wave of mass migration that disaster in the Third World could unleash. "The diaspora issue is one of my biggest current concerns," he said.
"Globalisation makes assimilation seem redundant and old-fashioned ... (the process) acts as a sort of reverse colonisation, where groups of people are self-contained, going back and forth between their countries, exploiting sophisticated networks and using instant communication on phones and the internet."...