When Jefferson became President he said enough is enough. He is the actual father of our Navy and Marines. Jeferson sent a fleet to the mediterainian first to blockade those states.
Jefferson was also the first president to form a colition of other governments to fight the Muslim states. ( The Barbary Pirates were not pirates but agents of those states) there was peace in the area for a while until after the war of 1812, when the second war with Algiers began in 1815, naval victories by Commodores William Bainbridge and Stephen Decatur led to treaties ending all tribute payments by the United States. European nations continued annual payments until the 1830s.
Jefferson also warned that we have not heard the end of Muslim terrorist actions. So right he was.
If you want to view what the first war with Islam was about, here is a link.http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/ collections/jefferson_papers/mtjprece. html.
It does seem as though he and Bush were on the same page, doesn't it?
It's also very interesting that when Jefferson sent the Navy and the Marines, he waited until they were at sea, beyond being called back, before telling Congress.
Our Navy wasn't attacked before that. He started out using a blackade, not an invassion so an act of war wasn't necessary.
Yep that part of history is right. However it was NOT the “first coalition of other governments” to fight Islam. It was however the FIRST time a leader of another country used their bible to understand what he was up against.
Rocklakeguy, here is how Congress was informed, by Jefferson.
"When Jefferson became president in 1801 he refused to accede to Tripoli's demands for an immediate payment of $225,000 and an annual payment of $25,000. The pasha of Tripoli then declared war on the United States. Although as secretary of state and vice president he had opposed developing an American navy capable of anything more than coastal defense, President Jefferson dispatched a squadron of naval vessels to the Mediterranean. As he declared in his first annual message to Congress: "To this state of general peace with which we have been blessed, one only exception exists. Tripoli, the least considerable of the Barbary States, had come forward with demands unfounded either in right or in compact, and had permitted itself to denounce war, on our failure to comply before a given day. The style of the demand admitted but one answer. I sent a small squadron of frigates into the Mediterranean. . . ."
The Library of Congress has a good timeline on Jefferson.
NHRalph-- are you copying the link or typing it in. You can't have spaces. I went and eliminated your spaces and am able to get to your link now.
view link
How can you get that conclusion from what you read? Muslim extremist states? This was nation against nation, Do we say the was with Britain was against rogue christian extremists.
This was Jefferson’s first State of the Union address.
As he declared in his first annual message to Congress:
"To this state of general peace with which we have been blessed, one only exception exists. Tripoli, the least considerable of the Barbary States, had come forward with demands unfounded either in right or in compact, and had permitted itself to denounce war, on our failure to comply before a given day. The style of the demand admitted but one answer. I sent a small squadron of frigates into the Mediterranean. . . ."
Now what does that mean?
That means he sent ships (Navy) with Marines (To" the shores of Tripoli') to stop the raiding of the American merchant ships for slaves and booty.
Do you agree that he told Congress after he sent the warships?
He said “I sent a small squadron of frigates into the Mediterranean.”
An after the fact statement, is it not?
