I absolutely agree with that statement. By the same token, I watched Muslims be very much part of the solution. A number of them kept my ass safe time after time. It's complex.
An effective strategy in many aspects of life is to give people the rope that they're asking for and then watch them hang themselves with the rope. This works with kids. Take the little ones out to dinner and they sulk about eating off the kid menu. They want an adult meal. Let them have the adult meal and then force them to eat it all. Next time they'll stay with the kid's menu.
The majority of Muslims want to live in Islamic States. The longer we deny them the opportunity to do so the longer they're going to think that their alternative vision of how a society can be created is still viable. Who is around today who advocates that the USSR needs to be reconstituted because it was a better way to structure a society? Only bitter-enders. Communism has been discredited because it was given a chance and it failed. The same needs to happen with the Caliphate. They need to try it and then your friends, the dissenters, can work from within to help bring about the end. The mass of people need to realize that the Islamic way keeps them trapped in a social/religious system which is barbaric and they need to have internal reforms and revolts.
They needs to change, we can't change them. Best for us to wall them off and let them develop their own civilization without any interference from us.
Rik, I agree with some of what you're saying and disagree with some as well. I agree Obama's approach of bending sooooooooo far over backward to moderate Muslims here in the US and elsewhere hasn't worked. It's a long discussion. On the military front, it's a global war and the right leader (not Obama) would know how to mobilize the world.
Again, to what end?
The end would be to eradicate Muslim terrorists.
I thought we did that back in Lebanon, and then when Reagan bombed Quadaffi and then when Bush order the invasion of Afghanistan. That strategy doesn't seem to work very well.
Now, I may be a little overboard, but I was all for taking out Afghanistan. That is, Heavy bombing at each training site. None of this surgical strike crap. If a country is going to open themselves to terrorists, then suffer the consequences. I don't know if there is such a thing as a "baby nuke" but that is what I was looking for when we started on Afghanistan. It may have obliterated a fourth of the country, but the world would know where we stood, the terrorist training camps would be gone and we would not have lost the thousands of men we did over the years we did. And it was a helluva lot cheaper. As for rebuilding.. look somewhere else.
If you are going to mess with us...be sure you know what you are doing.