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Old 12-17-2004, 06:49 PM   #39 (permalink)
archer2371
Sarge of Blood Gulch Red Outpost Number One
 
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Location: On the front lines against our very enemy


That's a map of Muslim Expansion up until 750. At the end of 661, they had taken the lands of Egypt, Syria, and Persia, controlling major trade routes to establish themselves as an economic power in the land. To say they weren't "interested" in the outside world is rather factually inaccurate. You can't control a major portion of the Silk Road and not be interested in the outside world. Also, the Muslims were continually obsessed with sacking Byzantium after the Crusades had ended and finally did conquer it sometime in the late Fifteenth Century (I can't remember the exact date). To say that the Muslims were just kinda sitting there when the bad ol' Christians who eat babies came along and tried to destroy their lives and the Muslims heroically made a stand and sent the Christians packing is again factually inaccurate. Yes, there were atrocities committed, but they were committed on BOTH sides, because the nature of warfare then was brutal and savage. They threw diseased cows at each other for cryin' out loud! The only thing that makes the Crusades such an anomaly is the fact that Pope Urban II usurped the power of the state when he called for the protection of the Holy Lands. The Byzantine Empire was seriously considering invading lands held by the Muslims in clode proximity to their own lands. The Merovingians were thinking the same thing (or was it the Carolingians at the time.... let's see here, Martel was in power at the Battle of Tours, so it was the Merovingians).
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