Of course our proclivity to either lay down our lives or have them taken unwillingly from us in the name of either Catholicism or Protestantism has gone, even in those parts of Ulster where faith is now just a proxy for power. The Thirty Years War left Europe devastated, with populations decimated, diseased and starving, infrastructure laid waste and the lands plundered by brigands while law and justice were ridden under the hooves of warhorses. Out of the mess came, after time, the second enlightenment and the changes that would make Europe dominant in the world. In the year 1600 the Christian and Islamic worlds were just about neck-and-neck in medicine, science, art, literature and technology. By 1700 we had left them as far behind as savages poking in the dirt with sticks.
The Islamic world is packed full of young men of prime fighting age who have no jobs, no land and no futures. Median age in Europe is well over 40; in the Islamic world it's about 27. The Sunni - Shia civil wars have already started, and like the European battles of the 1600s the war will roll back and forth across the middle east, this year in Syria, next in Yemen, then the Gulf, then Lebanon again until even Turkey is engulfed in war and the battles reach Europe's borders. Millions are going to die. Whether it's better to be shot, blown up by a missile, gassed, decapitated by bread-knife or dismembered by rusty Panga I don't know but that's the fate of millions of Muslims in the coming years, until they reach an endogenous realisation that the nuances in dogma that separate the sects aren't worth the life of a single Muslim.
Already the refugees are seeking Europe's peace and shelter. De Spiegel leads with the German reaction against the Afghanis, Iraqis, Egyptians, Libyans, Malinese. And now no doubt the Syrians are already on their way. The defence and foreign policy issues that face this government are far far greater than either Cameron or Miliband give any hint of understanding.