Fred:
I must wrap things up… starting the day very early tomorrow. I’ll get to the subject further another time. For now, I must say that your questions are good. It is not enough to proclaim that we must win, the question is, HOW?
I think I differ with you and some other people here in a sense that you seem to think that our opponents may be amenable to reason, to being influenced by economic and other practical considerations. I think that this view may be underestimating one critical fact: They take their religion seriously.
This is the reason that I pointed you to articles like the “Fantasy Ideology” and to the presentation by Shaykh Kabbani. Why shouldn’t I believe that those people value their “street” (to quote Kabbani) interpretation of Islam more then life itself? Haven‘t they proved it many times?
To quote Kabbani again, no one can reason with them.
In the end, the truth is that anything we can do about it is limited. The only people who can and should and must proclaim Jihad against their extremists are Muslims themselves.
If they do, there is a chance. If they don’t, I have little doubt that the extremists will eventually find a way to radicalize the Muslim world and capture political power – NO MATTER WHAT WE DO.
Perhaps, the most important thing we can do is to assist them in understanding the above, for if they don’t, their moderates will eventually find themselves being “re-educated” in the GULAGs and the killing fields – which will spring up all over the place – on their side of the future Iron Curtain.
BTW, I do find it disturbing that Europeans seem to have achieved such an extreme consensus against American policies. If you trade, you know what such a consensus means. I would be very worried if we Americans had such a consensus about… anything.
(One more thing… the name SkiNowSki seemed like a good idea when I first picked it – I am a skier. Call me Ski… or whatever… at my age I’m not sure I want to be known as “skin” -bg). |
