By James Zumwalt
Two West Virginia National Guardsmen were shot just before Thanksgiving Day (allegedly) by an Afghan terrorist immigrant. While one has died and the other remains in critical condition, the question remains why they were shot. The answer may well have been given to us 126 years earlier by a young Winston Churchill.
Before 3:00 pm on November 26th, three Guard members were on foot patrol, blocks away from the White House. Suddenly, without warning, the suspect, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, 29, jumped from behind a corner. Armed with a revolver, he first began shooting at Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, 20.
Beckman had no chance to react. Shot in the head, she immediately fell to the ground. Even as she lay helpless, Lakanwal continued pumping rounds into her, before he then shot at the second Guardsman, Staff Sergeant Andrew Wolfe, 24. Wolfe had tried to take cover but was shot in the head as well before he could do so. Bystanders scattered as the third Guardsman fired at Lakanwal, wounding the suspect. Hearing the gun shots, other Guardsmen rushed to the scene to hold Lakanwal down.
There should be no doubt Lakanwal’s intent was to kill as many Guardsmen as he could. That is why he fired head shots at both. This was clearly a planned ambush.
Lakanwal had come to the U.S. in 2021 under Operation Allies Welcome. Having previously worked with a CIA-supported paramilitary unit in Afghanistan known as “Zero Units”, he was allowed to immigrate to the U.S. after the Taliban rose to power (again). He was vetted by the previous administration, through a non-government organization known as “World Relief’ which seemingly, received most of its funding through USAID. However, such vetting may have been greatly limited in a rush to get our “allies” out of the country. Over 76,000 Afghans were brought into the U.S. in this manner.
According to a “childhood friend” of Lakanwal, he was “disturbed” and jaded after working with the CIA; then there’s this, from Jeff Childers at Coffee and Covid:
A long, dramatic 2022 Propublica article about the Zero Units cited its fighters saying they saw Americans as infidels, never trusted us, but worked with us as a lesser evil or a useful path to a ‘new Afghanistan.’
Like the Quran states about non-Muslims, Zero Unit members unequivocally agreed that Americans were infidels. This alone should have given us major concerns about them coming to our country.
We are told by Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, “it’s too soon to say” what the suspect’s motives were. However, a quote from “The River War” (1881-1899)—a book written 126 years ago by Winston Churchill who had fought against Muslims in the Sudan in 1899—gives us a good indication as to what may have triggered Lakanwal’s murderous act.
Churchill was most critical of Islam—which he called “Muhammedanism”—noting:
How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries (followers)! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy…A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity…Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the faith: all know how to die but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilisation of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilisation of ancient Rome.
In the years after Churchill published his book, he could have been called “Islamophobic.” However, what he wrote back then remains just as telling today about Lakanwal as it was about Muslims back then. Churchill had an amazing talent in judging people, especially those who hated democracy. It was like a sixth sense that vectored him in on enemies of democracy such as German Chancellor Adolf Hitler before World War II. Yet even today, Churchill’s late 19th century forewarning about Islam goes unheeded.
Current demographic studies project that Islam is growing at a much faster pace than Christianity. Contributing to this increased growth rate is a much higher birth rate that generates a larger and younger population. This is occurring as Christian populations decrease in many Western nations—a product of apathy or atheism. It is estimated by the middle of the 21st century the two religions will be of near equal size globally.
We must come to recognize that we don’t need an in-depth investigation to determine that the Islamist mentality no doubt triggered Lakanwal’s dark side from home, despite his being welcomed to a new land; it is one that has been embedded into the Muslims for over 1,400 years, especially those coming from the third world. It has become part of their DNA, and they routinely claim “infidel” lives.
It is a sad commentary that for those Muslim immigrants truly in search of the freedoms a Western nation can provide for them, as we cannot make a rush to optimistic judgement to vet them. Doing so comes at tremendous risk to our own citizens, as demonstrated by Lakanwal. Unless we take more cautious action, Christian civilization will indeed go the way of Rome.