Remember the Intrepid: America's Everlasting Enemy

America’s Everlasting Enemy

– William E. Kelly (billkelly3@gmail.com)

“We ought not to fight them at all unless we determine to fight them forever.” – John Adams

Arab dictators were pirating American merchant ships off Africa, holding their passengers and crews hostage and demanding ransom and tribute while armies of Islamic extremists were running rampage across Africa and the Middle East, killing infidels, destroying relics, graves and libraries and establishing Sharia law everywhere they conquered, beheading the men and selling women and children off as slaves.

Sound familiar? Well that was the situation at the turn of the 18^th century – over two hundred years ago, when the Barbary state tyrants of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Tripoli pirated American ships, demanded ransom and tribute, and sparked an American political debate over whether the ransom and tributes should be paid or whether a Navy should be formed and sent to fight them.

“Millions for defense but not one cent for tribute” was the battle cry, which led John Adams to say, “We ought not to fight them at all unless we determine to fight them forever.”

So Congress approved the funds for the construction of four frigates and the establishment of a Navy, which today, finds itself in ships named after the heroes of the Barbary Wars – the USS Barry, USS Bainbridge, USS Serrett have all been fighting pirates off Africa and radical Islamist armies running rampage over Afghanistan, Africa, Syria and Iraq.

John Barry, the first flag officer of the US Navy was charged by President Washington to train midshipman to be the first offices of the new navy and the first three - Richard Somers, Stephen Decatur and Charles Stew art went on to distinguish themselves in the Barbary wars and have warships named after them. Somers never returned home and is buried in Tripoli despite the efforts to have his remains repatriated.

The first American ship to engage the Islamic pirate over two hundred years ago, the schooner U.S.S. Enterprise was commanded by Lt. Sterret, who raked the pirate ship Tripoli with a number of broadsides before the Libyan pirate captain surrendered., but since the United States had yet to officially declare war, Sterret left the pirates with one sail so it could return to report what the Americans were capable of.

When the frigate U.S.S. Philadelphia, assigned to blockade Tripoli harbor, ran aground, Captain Bainbridge surrendered, and his 300 man crew became prisoners of the Basha of Tripoli, the tyrant Yousef Karamanli, who held the prisoners in the dungeons of the old castle fort, except the five sailors who agreed to convert to Islam.

As on Islamic text explained how The Prophet Mohammed treated those he conquered, “The Prophet agreed to save their lives as long as they repented their treachery and agreed to abide by the Muslim law, which they (Jews) refused to do. All of the men of the tribe were put to the sword. It was intended to underline the point the Prophet was trying to make: that the laws of Islam had superseded those from the ancient past. This incident had nothing to do with anti-Semitism and shortly afterwards, as if to prove the point, the Prophet married one of the Jewish widows.”

As an excuse for their barbarism, the Islamists quoted the bible (Deuteronomy 7:2): “When the Lord your God give them over to you and you defeat them, then you must utterly destroy them, and make no covenant with them, and show no mercy to them.” -

President John Adams said: “As the essential principle of the Islam faith is the subjugation of others by the sword, it is only by force that his false doctrines can be dispelled and his power annihilated.”

In the early 1800s, when Americans went to Tripoli to fight the Barbary Pirates, they did so for the same reasons we fight the radical Islamic terrorists today – for the things we believe in – liberty, freedom and democracy, concepts they reject.

And just as the American prisoners who were enslaved and held for ransom were given the opportunity to convert to Islam to earn their freedom, five of the 300 men of the captured frigate USS Philadelphia decided to defect.

Others who were killed in the Battles of Tripoli, including the men of the USS Intrepid, are buried today in clearly marked graves and above ground crypts in a small walled cemetery near the harbor.

Here lies an American sailor who gave his life in the explosion of the United States ship Intrepid in Tripoli Harbor September 4, 1804

The Grave of an "Amerique" at the cemetery at Tripoli Harbor now threatened by radical Islamists

The graves of the American Naval heroes in Tripoli are now in great peril as the cemetery where they are entombed is now under the control of radical Islamist militias who also control the airport (formerly Wheelus AFB) as well as the American embassy compound, and frequently engage in grave robbing as a tactic to promote their cause.

These fierce fighters are salafist jahidist who despise democracy, hate Americans and believe in an extreme orthodox form of Islam that prohibits the veneration of the dead and they don’t t allow others to do so. They impose a strict form of Shara law that governs everybody in lands where they control, and they now control the grave site of the American Naval heroes that should be repatriated home whenever the situation permits.

They follow the same brand of Islam that we know as the Taliban, the Al-Shabab, ISIS and the radical Islamists who now control Trpoli, as well as the Barbary Pirates America fought over 200 years ago.

Although Mohmar Gadhafi and the dictators of Tunisia and Egypt suppressed and imprisoned many of these religious warriors, the early successes of the Arab Spring revolutions freed them to try to take advantage of t he post revolutionary power vacuum to violently take control and impose a caphalate and sharah law.

One of the first things they did after Gadhafi was deposed was to desecrate the graves of Sufi Muslim saints, some centuries old, dig up their remains from below the floors of ancient Mosques, and run off with their bones and relics into the desert like they did with Gadhafi, never to be seen again.

They also desecrated the graves of American and British soldiers in a military cemetery in Tabrok, and will certainly destroy the graves of the American Naval heroes in Tripoli if they knew and recognized their significance.

We don’t need to get large numbers of people to petition or convince Congress, but only have to convince one person – Secretary of Defense Charles Hegel that the repatriation of the remains of these men can and should be done as soon as the security situation in Tripoli allows.

Fortunately Hegel is the first enlisted man who has seen combat in Vietnam to serve as Secretary of Defense, and he listened to the MOMs wives and widows of the POWMIAs from the Vietnam era, recognized the incompetence and inefficiency of the military POW/MP office/x and cleaned house, fired those who refused to utilize DNA testing, revamped their procedures and combined both agencies.

http://www.stripes.com/news/us/after-unflattering-reports-hagel-orders-shake-up-of-mia-accounting-agencies-1.268988

That same office refused to repatriate the remains of the Naval heroes in Tripoli and were the primary contributors to the 2012 study authorized by Congress that concluded the remains should not be repatriated and remain where they are, without even a mention of the threat imposed by the radical Islamic extremists.

Since those military offices and that report have now been totally discredited, it is imperative that their policy regarding the Tripoli remains be reversed, and can be by order of the Secretary, who has the authority to order the exhumation and repatriation of American military personal from abroad. -

It will be easier for us to convince on man who is already familiar with these issues, and can recognize the positive benefits of repatriation besides preventing the desecration and destruction of the graves of American heroes.

Graves of Centuries old Sufi Saints Robbed from Mosques in Tripoli

Chuck Hagel Secretary of Defense
1000 Defense Pentagon
Washington, DC 20301-1000

May 22, 2014

Dear Secretary Hagel,

Thank you for listening to the families of the MIA and POWs and reorganizing the POW-MP-JPAC offices, as their most glaring failure was the refusal to repatriate the remains of the men of the Intrepid from Tripoli, a mission that must still be completed.

The last official report (2012) fails to mention the serious threat to the remains by the grave robbing Salfists - the same radical extremists believed to be responsible for the murder of Ambassador Chris Stevens and the recent wave of political assassinations, diplomatic kidnappings and grave desecrations.

The Benghazi headquarters of the Salfist Ansar Shariah militia, designated a terrorist organization by the US government, was recently attacked by a general who inflamed their passions and hatred for Americans, making the situation more critical now than ever before.

These orthodox Islamists don’t believe in the education of women, singing and dancing or the reverence of the dead, and try to impose their beliefs on everyone. They are of the same sect as the Taliban, who kill schoolgirls in Afghanistan, and those who desecrated the tombs of Islamic holy men in Derna. They are of the same religious beliefs as the Boco Horan, who kidnapped schoolgirls in Nigeria and they espouse the same fanatical beliefs as the Tripoli pirates we fought in the Barbary Wars.

One of the first things Chris Stevens did as ambassador was to visit the graves of the men of the Intrepid. When the US Navy conducted a ceremony at the graves in 1945, the Mayor of Tripoli was Yousef Karamanli, a namesake and descendent of the despot we fought two centuries ago. So it’s not difficult to understand why Chris Stevens sympathized with the Libyan people, supported their revolution, and was helping them establish a democratic nation when he was killed by the same radical extremists who now threaten the graves of the American military heroes who were left behind.

The Libyan Revolution ended at Tripoli’s Martyr’s Square where the only real martyrs are the Americans who perished on one of the first special op missions, a mission that continues today and won’t be completed until they are brought safely home.

A few years ago the State Department arranged for the emergency repatriation of nearly a hundred Americans from Wheelus Air Force base cemetery near Tripoli, but they left behind the remains of the men of the Intrepid, and the eminent danger posed by the grave robbing Salafists presents an emergency that requires the repatriation of their remains as soon as the situation their permits.

As the Secretary of Defense you have the power to order a Joint Service mission to recover the remains of these men so the POW/MP office can reclaim its honor, a real historic repatriation ceremony can be held and these men can be honored and buried safely at home with their shipmates.

Unlike at the Grave of the Unknowns, there are no armed guards protecting these men, and it will be to our everlasting shame if their graves are found to be empty and desecrated.

Thank you for your time and attention to this matter,

William E. Kelly, Jr.