Ottoman Algeria in Western Diplomatic History with ... - Bibliothèque

Adams went as far as to consider that “the policy of Christendom has made
cowards of all their sailors before the standard of Mahomet” and that it “would
be heroical and glorious” of America to suppress those barbarians. 90
In American perceptions, therefore, the enemy was identified: he was a
pirate, he was Muslim, and he was weak. Here perhaps lay the roots of the
uneasy encounter of the United States with the Muslim countries: America had
already formulated a certain animosity towards the Muslims and by extension
towards Islam. The forthcoming direct contacts would merely crystallize those
early distorted perceptions of Islam and Muslims in the American mind. 91 In
the ultimate conflict between Algiers and the United States, even if it was not
like the classical sort of conflict between Christianity and Islam, religion
nevertheless was an underlying issue. The two sides clashed, not over
theological differences, but rather as a result of the divergent views that were
generated by two different faiths. 92
American perceptions of Algiers were formulated long before the two
countries entered into formal contact and they were indisputably biased and
distorted. George Washington, for example, called the North African states
“little piratical states;” 93 Jefferson referred to them as “nests of banditti” and to
90 John Adams, The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States with a Life of the
Author, Notes and Illustrations, edited by Charles Francis Adams, 10 vol. (Boston: Little, Brown, &
Company, 1865), 8:407, To T. Jefferson, 3 July, 1786. (Hereafter cited as WJA). Also Appendix 5A.
91 Melvin E. Lee, “The Fallacy of Grievance-based Terrorism,” Middle East Quarterly (Winter 2008),
p. 72.
92 Frank Lambert, The Barbary Wars: American Independence in the Atlantic World (New York: Hill
and Wang, 2005), pp. 112-14.
93 George Washington, The Writings of George Washington, edited by Worthington C. Ford, 14 vol.
(New York/London: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1891-1892.), 11:59, To the Marquis De Lafayette, 15
August, 1786 (Hereafter cited as WGW)
189