I found your comment in the spam file, and made it appear in the thread.

Sometimes for no discernible reason a comment gets tagged as spam.

Yes, I do it in an armchair. I am not paid to do it otherwise. For that we have an entire defense/military complex of which Defense and the Pentagon are costly parts. If those at those posts cannot come up with strategy, tactics, logistics then we’ve been overpaying.

Yes, two dots you ingenuous GOPer. Diversionary Democratic wars! The Republicans would never, ever, ever-ever do such a thing. After all, whatever had they to distract us from in the Bush years – trillion dollar deficit spending; continuing centralization of Federal political power; a still metastasizing welfare State; the burgeoning surveillance State; Mexican immigration, legal and illegal; the welcoming of Muslims and their inhered enmity to all things Western/American; no borders but on paper borders?

Fantasies made from incompetent dream making indeed – and wishful thinking. Click twice the heels of your ruby red shoes and you’ll be in Kansas again.

Can’t even connect two dots between Democrat wars to distract people and Republican wars based on sound strategy. Is it strategy you are incapable of understanding or is it connecting two dots in a line you are incapable of understanding, that is the question.

It’s likely in the spam filters on automatic stash. Neo might be able to find it manually.

That’s usually what the armchairs think after Iraq and Afghanistan, however they are incapable of presenting a feasible logistics plan to do so, while having no real Middle East allies or population base from which to strike at them.

Fantasies made from incompetent dream making. They live in the make believe land that they can orchestrate military logistics and strategy. They have no clue and still don’t.

Any mild perusal of history will show that humans have a strong proclivity to use force to attain the things they value. In some cases it has been land and resources. In others, it has been influence or control over resources. A major cause of war down through the ages has been to convert other people to your religious or cultural beliefs. The purveyors of Communism wanted to control land, resources, and people’s beliefs. They had a vision of utopia on Earth. The Commies who have learned nothing from past failures still do. Other wars in the past have been fought for the same reasons. Thus, anyone with just a passing knowledge of history would know that human nature invariably leans toward using force to get what we want. Weakness is always tempting – whether to a street thug or a nation looking to improve its situation by conquest. Religion and systems of government are main bones of contention among humans. Always have been, probably always will be.

The end of history was proclaimed after the USSR fell apart. A world where democracy and free market capitalism were ascendant was believed to be at hand. Peace and prosperity was expected. But something happened on the way to that bright new future. Some old (1400 years and counting) religious grudges had been festering in the Middle East. And oil wealth made it possible for those who held the grudge to buy weapons and influence. The Muslims tried three times to push the Jews into the sea with military force. Having failed at that, they have developed a new grand strategy — Fourth Generation Warfare (FGW) coupled with infiltration.

The Muslim world is not a near term existential threat because they have no industrial base and no economic base except for oil production. All they have are fearsome jihadis and terrorism coupled with open immigration into the West. FGW is based on the belief that the West, even with a mighty, modern military, cannot defeat FGW and terrorism as long as the West abides by the just war concept and the Geneva Conventions. Jihadis are will-o-the wisp targets who can set up operations in failed states and move among the civilian populations. Their leaders may be killed, their training camps may be destroyed, but they can move on and rebuild their forces. There is a large population of young Muslim men who see the life of a jihadi as a chance to amount to something — to be a somebody, not a nobody as they are in many Muslim lands. There always seems to be a supply of money from oil sheikdoms and mosques for arms and operations.

Additionally, the radical Muslims have a longer term, non-violent strategy — infiltration and using the same techniques as the left to subvert Western society. We have seen it in operation in Europe. They immigrate, but they don’t integrate. Once they are numerous enough, they begin to demand concessions to their religious practices. They become active in politics. They produce far more children than the natives of the countries they inhabit. Eventually they will be the majority. It’s a long range plan that Mark Steyn wrote about in “America Alone.”

We cannot defeat FGW and radical Islam with conventional war alone. We need to use all the tools, both military and non-military to defeat this threat.

When necessary and appropriate, we need to use overwhelming military force. In the case of ISIS, they are giving us a fat target for our technological military superiority. We know where their training camps are, where their storage facilities are, and where their command and control facilities are. In the desert airpower is supreme. They have no defense against air power. It should be applied in massive amounts against their infrastructure. I’m talking B-52s and obliteration of targets.

In the meantime we can supply Jordan and Iraq (especially the Kurds) with the military supplies and guidance (advisors) that their armies need to mop up the remnants of ISIS. With proper planning and coordination the campaign should last no more than 6 months. After that we can tailor our response to what follows. Staying ready to respond militarily in the present situation (Islamic terrorism, an aggressive Russia, and China becoming more aggressive.) is just good sense. My favorite saying — “Peace through superior firepower.”

I’ve listed the non-military (War by other means) avenues we must use before:
1. Interdiction of money networks.
2. Openly challenging Islam to reform.
3. Stop immigration from Muslim lands except under certain conditions. (Have a job, swear to integrate, denounce terrorism and violent jihad, etc.)
4. Go after imams in Western mosques that are preaching violent jihad. Pass laws against preaching sedition and put them in prison or deport them.
5. Stop all aid to Muslim countries that have radical Islamic terrorist organizations that are operating openly.
6. Begin an all-out effort in the West to produce enough energy to make the Muslim oil fields much less important in the world energy equation.

There are other things, but those are the major ones off the top of my head.

The long term goal should be to keep the radical Islamists in a box until their oil runs out and/or they reform their religion. It will be a long slog, but with a plan in place and some decent leadership, it can be achieved with a reasonable cost in blood and treasure. We are the only country with the economic and industrial base to lead the effort.

However, Obama and company will not do this. Things are going to get worse. If we are hit again before 2016, the election will be a repudiation of the “Walk stickly and carry a big soft” foreign policy.

Where you lose me is in your belief our foreign adventures were distractions from our internal Democratic corruption.

So what you gonna do? Who you gonna call?

We profoundly disagree George and I haven’t the energy to craft a new reply.