The Siege of Vienna -1683 and Today

The space bar on my keyboard is giving me problems, which makes typing quite maddening. I will have to make this post short.


Hat tip to Gates of Vienna:

As a compulsive reader, particularly in all aspects of Western history, a certain event or date about which I had read on numerous occasions often suddenly strikes me as having real significance.

The place in time of the 1683 siege of Vienna (the 330th anniversary of the Christian victory was yesterday), envisioned and lead by by the Korprulu Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire, was one that took a long time to penetrate my thick skull. About five years ago the relevance of the Islamic invasions with our problem with Islamic aggression today hit me like a hammer.

Previously, when contemplating modern-day Islamic aggression,  I had concentrated on the seizures of American shipping, successful demands for tribute (of European states also), and enslavement of American seamen followed by the Barbary Wars of the late 18th-early 19th centuries. That made sense as the US had been targeted due to her non-Islamic nature while in her infancy, but one day the year 1683 hit home-

-It was exactly one hundred years prior to the Treaty of Paris, the document that officially recognized the independence of the American republic from the United Kingdom.

One hundred years. That means that, when the news of the Treaty broke out, there would have been people alive whose fathers had read or heard accounts of the horde of  troops of Ottomans and tributary states coming close to plundering the capital of the Holy Roman (German) Empire.

- sitting well inside the borders of Western Europe.

The taking of the rest of modern-day Austria would not have been out of the question. The Ottomans had an immense and powerful army, but their continual advances were made practical by the augmentation of troops from Ottoman-ruled or vassal states (The siege force included elements as diverse as Crimean Mongols and Christian Moldavians). In addition to the Constantinople-like rape of the city and her people, future Ottoman armies would include components of former Hapsburg soldiers. France, who was complicit in the Ottoman attack (among other things, Hapsburg-held regions bordering France were being plucked away  while Hapsburg energies were being directed at the protection of  the Eastern front) would have found herself faced with an enemy far more destructive and rapacious than anything that a 18th century European state could dish out - this now much closer and with no appreciably strong  state to act as a buffer.

This was the third time that Austria was threatened, and the second time that Vienna herself was besieged.

The answer to the call for surrender or enslavement was clear - Vienna would fight.

The siege progressed, and until the main relief army of Poles and Germans arrived and caught the overconfident attackers off-guard, the walls of Vienna had been close to being breached.

To me, the heavily-armored winged Hussars (Their uniform included wooden-framed wings) led by Polish King Jan Sobieski are the focus of the relief army. Crashing into the now-fleeing Ottomans, they - along with their German allies, made short work of those who would carry Jihad into the heart of Western Europe.

The Korprulu Grand Vizier's fate? He - in Mafia style, was "sent for" and strangled for his botched mission.

The excerpts from the following post note the tragic irony that has befallen Vienna since that momentous day (as with other Western European cities) by the policies of her Socialist leaders. Referred to here as "red", Leftists and their so-called conservative opposition have knowingly allowed Turks to invade Europe again -this time without having to risk a single life.

http://gatesofvienna.net/2013/09/330-years-after-the-victory-over-the-turks/

"What the Turks lost at that time, the red city government has been returning to them a thousandfold for decades now. Vienna has roughly 1.7 million inhabitants; of these somewhat less than half are immigrants. Those of Turkish origin rank third in number behind the Germans and the Serbs and constitute about 10% of the migrants in Vienna. Nevertheless they are the ones that demand the most and arguably spread themselves around with the most audacity.

Vienna already has 45 mosques, and the ATIB Union, Association of Turkish-Islamic Union for Social and Cultural Cooperation in Austria, still does not have enough of them. The ATIB is directly under the control of Turkish authority for religious affairs [Directorate of Religious Affairs], from which they presumably receive their instructions...........

Politically Incorrect reader Robert Hubac has now let off steam in an open incendiary letter to the red Mayor Michael Häupl:

[…] My challenge rests on statements and explanations which I am able to base on facts. I received assistance with specialised knowledge about Islam from professionals in Austria, Europe and even overseas. My self-employment in the real estate sector assisted me in making assessments pertaining to real estate law, location issues etc., as well in the appraisal of influences which a large project of this kind has on the neighbourhood, with all its negative effects. […] Large platforms of this kind will not be off limits to hate preachers. That can be shown by examining other so-called Islamic cultural centres in Europe. There is also the fear that Muslims, who are living here by virtue of so much tolerance and support on the part of the authorities, will be encouraged to seek “more”, which, as shown by events in England’s Blackpool and Sweden’s Malmö, can reach the point where Sharia is introduced for specific areas. […] If the association becomes operative, that will amount to the acceptance of political and religious views and practices which are not in any way consistent with our conception of the world, the Geneva Convention on Human Rights or such matters of immorality as the degrading treatment of women, absence of free choice in religion, dress regulations, the genital mutilation of minors under unsterile conditions, cruelty to animals through halal slaughter and so on.
Should a stop not be put to the Islamisation project soon in Austria, Germany and the whole of Europe, then we mock the action of Sobieski, Karl von Lothringen, Prince Eugene and other victorious warriors against the Turkish and Islamic claim to world domination. And not least we violate the future of our children and grandchildren."

Indeed.