What It Takes To Defeat Islamic State's Ideology

[Trader]

Defeating the ideology behind ISIS will require millions of miraculous conversions to something better. Islam is a might makes right proposition since they believe that everything that happens is the will of Allah. They make no provision for God’s permissive will, where God sometimes allows human freedom to act against His will, so if they can declare a caliphate and hold it, it must be His will. If the caliphate is destroyed, that must also be His will. Minor interruptions in their plan for a whole world under Sharia are not enough. They need to see an overwhelming movement away from them, which under their own definition, would be the the will of Allah.

 

[Darryl1958]

I have one Coptic acquaintance who muses that as the Islamic world becomes more literate, and is able to actually read what is written in the Koran and the teachings of Islam in their fullness, they will become more deluded with their religion as a result.

There is bound to be a lot of cognitive dissonance between basically good hearted and decent people, and teachings which when taken literally, will direct people into actions that go against what is written in their hearts.

 

[Trader]

I have one Coptic acquaintance who muses that as the Islamic world becomes more literate, and is able to actually read what is written in the Koran and the teachings of Islam in their fullness, they will become more deluded with their religion as a result.

There is bound to be a lot of cognitive dissonance between basically good hearted and decent people, and teachings which when taken literally, will direct people into actions that go against what is written in their hearts.

We can all hope that it is true, but it flies in the face of the facts where many of the top terrorists are very well educated in Islam. They have doctors, lawyers, and engineers running ISIS and are drawing followers from many nations with near universal literacy.

I have no explanation for how so many people have signed on to Islamic fundamentalism. They just do not think the way most of us do. It makes me recall that we had the same problem with Japanese suicide bombers in WWII who continued after there was no reasonable hope of success. Even after two atomic bombs were used and the government announced unconditional surrender, there was a coup attempt by radicals. Kamikaze attacks stopped when they ran out of pilots and airplanes.

 

[Theo520]

I’m curious why countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia don’t already meet the prophecy of being an Islamic State. To me, ISIS is just another Islamic State, nothing unique.

Anyone understand this issue?

 

[Trader]

I’m curious why countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia don’t already meet the prophecy of being an Islamic State. To me, ISIS is just another Islamic State, nothing unique.

Anyone understand this issue?

I can’t claim to understand ISIS, but I think they would say that Saudi Arabia has been independent for almost 100 years, since the fall of the Ottoman Empire, and has not even tried to expand Islamic rule. In their view, Saudi Arabia is corrupt, greedy, and lazy. There are also groups in Turkey who want to re-establish the caliphate and renew the Ottoman Empire, but they have little political support from Turks who see a higher standard of living as part of greater Europe.

 

[gilliam]

I’m curious why countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia don’t already meet the prophecy of being an Islamic State. To me, ISIS is just another Islamic State, nothing unique.

Anyone understand this issue?

Iran considers itself an Islamic State, however ISIS and all the Sunni countries do not consider it any more than a bunch of heretics. Iran though doesn’t consider itself a caliphate.

Saudi Arabia is a secular kingdom. It is ruled by a dynasty, not Islamic clerics. It does not consider itself a caliphate.

 

[Eric_Hyom]

Koehler notes that all such self-styled jihadist groups recruit new members by arguing that Islam is under attack by evil forces, that the faithful must fight back, and that, by joining the group, recruits will help build a new home for true Muslims.

America and Britain have to accept some responsibility, we had no real justification to invade Iraq. 160,000 dead civilians, over two million refugees, and over half the civilian population is now suffering from mental health problems due to war.

How are these ordinary Iraqi civilians who had nothing to do with 9 / 11, ever going to get justice for or all their losses?

They need our prayers and our support.

 

[Ridgerunner]

America and Britain have to accept some responsibility, we had no real justification to invade Iraq. 160,000 dead civilians, over two million refugees, and over half the civilian population is now suffering from mental health problems due to war.

How are these ordinary Iraqi civilians who had nothing to do with 9 / 11, ever going to get justice for or all their losses?

They need our prayers and our support.

They didn’t ask for our prayers, but they did ask for our support in the form of no fewer than 10,000 U.S. fighting troops to remain in Iraq to keep the peace while they redeveloped.

But Obama wouldn’t do it, so in that sense, and in that sense alone, we do have some responsibility for turning the place into a battleground between Sunni radicals and Iran. The Joint Chiefs predicted it. The CIA predicted it. Obama’s own Secretary of Defense predicted it. But Obama ignored them all, along with their recommendations.

So here we are.

Saddam Hussein killed approximately a million people. Would you have required that he double that number, triple it, before you would think removing him to be justified? Would you put him back in power if you could turn the clock back?

It wasn’t his removal, but our self-removal that caused this. Even Al Quaeda admitted they were beaten. But we ran away.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Iran considers itself an Islamic State, however ISIS and all the Sunni countries do not consider it any more than a bunch of heretics. Iran though doesn’t consider itself a caliphate.

Saudi Arabia is a secular kingdom. It is ruled by a dynasty, not Islamic clerics. It does not consider itself a caliphate.

I don’t think the Shiite radicals have the same apocalyptic vision the Sunni radicals have. I don’t think the Shia require a caliphate. They do, as I understand it, require a world war, whereupon the twelfth imam will return, all will become Muslims, and the world will end.

 

[Elizium23]

I have one Coptic acquaintance who muses that as the Islamic world becomes more literate, and is able to actually read what is written in the Koran and the teachings of Islam in their fullness, they will become more deluded with their religion as a result.

There is bound to be a lot of cognitive dissonance between basically good hearted and decent people, and teachings which when taken literally, will direct people into actions that go against what is written in their hearts.

I think we can take by example the situation in the Catholic Church and project it onto Islam, giving us a better understanding of their situation. What I mean to say is, there are millions of lukewarm and liberal Catholics. Catholics who don’t care about their identity, Catholics who maybe attend Mass when it’s convenient for them, Catholics who don’t really practice but are cultural Catholics, Catholics who know what the Church teaches but dissent from it nonetheless.

Likewise there are millions of “moderate peaceful Muslims”. They don’t really care what Islam actually teaches. They practice it in a lukewarm fashion, out of convenience or cultural conditioning. They are the “fat, dumb and happy” members of a huge family who are just happy as long as the family is large and comfortable and they’re not asked to actually do anything.

ISIS, on the other hand, are strictly adhering to the tenets of their religion. I should clarify, the tenets of their particular sect, because belief in Islam is a spectrum just like any other large disorganized religion. More so, because there is no central authority. But ISIS and other Salafi Muslims are clearly interpreting the Quran thoroughly and in a valid way. They sincerely believe that they are upholding the faith as they see it.

This is what I think. When you extend belief in Islam to its logical end, you get jihadi terrorists. When you do the same thing to Christianity, you get people like Billy Graham and Mother Teresa and Saint John Paul the Great. Islam is a revolutionary political movement moving under the cloak of religious faith. That is why it must be staunchly opposed and eradicated from the face of the earth.

 

[Darryl1958]

We can all hope that it is true, but it flies in the face of the facts where many of the top terrorists are very well educated in Islam. They have doctors, lawyers, and engineers running ISIS and are drawing followers from many nations with near universal literacy.

I have no explanation for how so many people have signed on to Islamic fundamentalism. They just do not think the way most of us do. It makes me recall that we had the same problem with Japanese suicide bombers in WWII who continued after there was no reasonable hope of success. Even after two atomic bombs were used and the government announced unconditional surrender, there was a coup attempt by radicals. Kamikaze attacks stopped when they ran out of pilots and airplanes.

While I personally do not see any evidence of disillusioned Muslims turning to Christianity-statistics do not support that at any rate-I do think there is evidence of a turning away from Islam by many. Hirsi Ali is not an outlier, I don’t think.
I have heard some said that the people of Iran are some of the more thoroughly secularized in the Islamic world. Such is their disgust with experiencing an Islamic theocracy first hand
I think you are quite correct in noting that the most extremist and fundamentalist leaders in Islam today are among the most educated. I would also take note of the fact that the kind of education that these leaders have received is a thoroughly Western education. As such, while political Islam has been an essential part of that worldview from the very beginning, there is a nihilism and a willingness to end the world that has never been a trait of the religion like it is today. Underneath the fundamentalism, the vacuity of belief reaches almost hysterical levels. This is a throroughly modern response that has very little in common with the cool, calculated, measured, patient responses of strategic Islamic caliphs of the past.

I know I crafted my previous response trying to find an answer as to whether the mass conversion to Christianity contemplated in previous posts was a realistic possibility (short of a miracle, or course).

In the end, I was unable to come to the conclusion that this might be a probable outcome. This is because the nihilism inherent in the political Islamism of today betrays a nihilism that belongs very much to our modern world, and not the world of profound belief and a faith unencumbered by doubt.

I cannot help but think that today’s ISIS warrior has a closer kinship to Columbine punks than they do to the ancient faith of that medieval Arab marauder. They share the same spiritual father in nihilism Like the the high school losers who chose to go out in a blaze of unholy glory, this is the kind of future that ISIS chooses for itself as well.

 

[Darryl1958]

I think we can take by example the situation in the Catholic Church and project it onto Islam, giving us a better understanding of their situation. What I mean to say is, there are millions of lukewarm and liberal Catholics. Catholics who don’t care about their identity, Catholics who maybe attend Mass when it’s convenient for them, Catholics who don’t really practice but are cultural Catholics, Catholics who know what the Church teaches but dissent from it nonetheless.

Likewise there are millions of “moderate peaceful Muslims”. They don’t really care what Islam actually teaches. They practice it in a lukewarm fashion, out of convenience or cultural conditioning. They are the “fat, dumb and happy” members of a huge family who are just happy as long as the family is large and comfortable and they’re not asked to actually do anything.

ISIS, on the other hand, are strictly adhering to the tenets of their religion. I should clarify, the tenets of their particular sect, because belief in Islam is a spectrum just like any other large disorganized religion. More so, because there is no central authority. But ISIS and other Salafi Muslims are clearly interpreting the Quran thoroughly and in a valid way. They sincerely believe that they are upholding the faith as they see it.

This is what I think. When you extend belief in Islam to its logical end, you get jihadi terrorists. When you do the same thing to Christianity, you get people like Billy Graham and Mother Teresa and Saint John Paul the Great. Islam is a revolutionary political movement moving under the cloak of religious faith. That is why it must be staunchly opposed and eradicated from the face of the earth.

I keep getting drawn back to an explanation of Islam that I heard just after 911.
That is that the relationship between being a good person and a good Muslim is an inverse relationship. Submitting to Islam is submitting to a whole host of unholy behaviors that the typical cafeteria Muslim or Muslima would find to be completely inedible.

 

[Eric_Hyom]

They didn’t ask for our prayers, but they did ask for our support in the form of no fewer than 10,000 U.S. fighting troops to remain in Iraq to keep the peace while they redeveloped.

Iraq did not ask for the invasion in the first place, and we had no justifiable cause to go to war. How many innocent civilians have suffered because of what we have done?

Saddam Hussein killed approximately a million people. Would you have required that he double that number, triple it, before you would think removing him to be justified? Would you put him back in power if you could turn the clock back?

What makes us any different to Saddam, we have destabilised Iraq and left it in chaos. Now we act in surprise when Iraqi people want justice.

How have we made Iraq better by our invasion?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Iraq did not ask for the invasion in the first place, and we had no justifiable cause to go to war. How many innocent civilians have suffered because of what we have done?

What makes us any different to Saddam, we have destabilised Iraq and left it in chaos. Now we act in surprise when Iraqi people want justice.

How have we made Iraq better by our invasion?

Lots of Iraqis did want Saddam deposed, almost certainly most of them. After all, between the two phases of the war, he gassed Kurds and strafed Shiites with helicopter gunships. They hated him.

“Justifiable” is a complex thing. He started two wars, one being practically a world war if one counts the participants. He killed about a million people. His intention to conquer the Middle East could not have been more obvious. Between the phases, he didn’t have the power to do it, but only because of Phase I. Did that mean he could never regain the strength to give it another try?

Just because he intended to be the “Hitler of the Middle East” instead of Europe, it made him no less a vicious aggressor. He paid parents to induce their children to suicide bomb Israelis. He shot at American and Brit planes in violation of the truce after Phase I. He violated the “no fly zone” agreement when he went after the Shiites.

If deposing him wasn’t “justifiable” then nothing ever was or ever will be.

The present chaos there is entirely due to Obama’s decision to abandon Iraq. The Kurds, Sunni tribal leaders and Sistani Shia all begged us to stay awhile longer in force. The Joint Chiefs, the Secretary of Defense and the CIA all advised Obama not to pull out, and predicted exactly what has happened if we did.

But having made it a campaign promise, Obama declared a “victory” he knew needed further guarding to be real, and pulled out.

Call it “Bush’s war” if you wish, but you have to also call what we have now “Obama’s senseless betrayal”.

And Iraq was certainly not stable under Saddam Hussein. Hated as he was by the majority, his rule was no more “stable” than that of Assad.

 

[GaryTaylor]

But having made it a campaign promise, Obama declared a “victory” he knew needed further guarding to be real, and pulled out.

Right we need more transparency and honesty not an attribute of the current party.

powerlineblog.com/archives/2015/12/in-case-you-missed-it-john-kerry-is-bringing-peace-to-syria.php

 

[Trader]

While I personally do not see any evidence of disillusioned Muslims turning to Christianity-statistics do not support that at any rate-I do think there is evidence of a turning away from Islam by many. Hirsi Ali is not an outlier, I don’t think.
I have heard some said that the people of Iran are some of the more thoroughly secularized in the Islamic world. Such is their disgust with experiencing an Islamic theocracy first hand
I think you are quite correct in noting that the most extremist and fundamentalist leaders in Islam today are among the most educated. I would also take note of the fact that the kind of education that these leaders have received is a thoroughly Western education. As such, while political Islam has been an essential part of that worldview from the very beginning, there is a nihilism and a willingness to end the world that has never been a trait of the religion like it is today. Underneath the fundamentalism, the vacuity of belief reaches almost hysterical levels. This is a throroughly modern response that has very little in common with the cool, calculated, measured, patient responses of strategic Islamic caliphs of the past.

I know I crafted my previous response trying to find an answer as to whether the mass conversion to Christianity contemplated in previous posts was a realistic possibility (short of a miracle, or course).

In the end, I was unable to come to the conclusion that this might be a probable outcome. This is because the nihilism inherent in the political Islamism of today betrays a nihilism that belongs very much to our modern world, and not the world of profound belief and a faith unencumbered by doubt.

I cannot help but think that today’s ISIS warrior has a closer kinship to Columbine punks than they do to the ancient faith of that medieval Arab marauder. They share the same spiritual father in nihilism Like the the high school losers who chose to go out in a blaze of unholy glory, this is the kind of future that ISIS chooses for itself as well.

This was a very thoughtful post, and made me think of another example of a mass conversion to Christianity.

Protestant Congregationalist missionaries were very successful in Hawaii in the early 19th century, but the people did not convert directly from their polytheistic paganism to Christianity. There was an intervening event where the Kapu system fell apart when their king and high priest did something unthinkable–he ate meals with women. When the gods did not strike him dead for this, the people lost their faith in the whole system. When the missionaries arrived they found a people with no faith at all and the basic human longing for the supernatural was satisfied by what they heard.

I am not predicting the future, but there is a possibility that Muslims who see Islam as a cruel and unreasonable religion that leaves them unfulfilled will at least become more secularized before they become open to Christianity. I don’t think the perpetual victimhood preached by Islamic Fundamentalism can motivate people forever. I hope when that happens Christianity will stand out for its faith, hope, and love, but we have our own problems with secularization, don’t we?

 

[GaryTaylor]

I am not predicting the future, but there is a possibility that Muslims who see Islam as a cruel and unreasonable religion that leaves them unfulfilled will at least become more secularized before they become open to Christianity. I don’t think the perpetual victimhood preached by Islamic Fundamentalism can motivate people forever. I hope when that happens Christianity will stand out for its faith, hope, and love, but we have our own problems with secularization, don’t we?

True and as education and information increases and is passed over time this indeed will be a factor. But the issue is time. Its not imho that they convert but take an honest look at the internal issues. Thats the direction I believe we are slowly moving and obviously there is much push-back and in particular with our present administration. By large the topic is off limits to them via denial

 

[Eric_Hyom]

Lots of Iraqis did want Saddam deposed, almost certainly most of them. .

Would they have wanted Saddam disposed if they knew 165,000 civilians would die, two million people forced out their homes to become refugees, and just a sense of destruction all around.

“Justifiable” is a complex thing.

Generally self defence is seen as justifiable. The United Nations secretary general, Kofi Annan said the war was not sanctioned by the UN security council or in accordance with the UN’s founding charter.

Call it “Bush’s war” if you wish,

We might disagree with how a country is run, but does that give us the right to invade?
As I remember, we were after WMDs, which then appeared to be invisible. It seems then they changed the obejtives of the war from WMDs to deposing Saddam.

And Iraq was certainly not stable under Saddam Hussein. Hated as he was by the majority, his rule was no more “stable” than that of Assad

But we have not replaced Saddam with anything better. Maybe the reason Iraq was unstable was because there were a number of volatile groups living together as neighbours. Once you depose a dictator, it seems chaos follows, not sure what the answer would be.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Would they have wanted Saddam disposed if they knew 165,000 civilians would die, two million people forced out their homes to become refugees, and just a sense of destruction all around.

Generally self defence is seen as justifiable. The United Nations secretary general, Kofi Annan said the war was not sanctioned by the UN security council or in accordance with the UN’s founding charter.

As I remember, we were after WMDs, which then appeared to be invisible. It seems then they changed the obejtives of the war from WMDs to deposing Saddam.

But we have not replaced Saddam with anything better. Maybe the reason Iraq was unstable was because there were a number of volatile groups living together as neighbours. Once you depose a dictator, it seems chaos follows, not sure what the answer would be.

First question: Probably they would have. 165,000 or so casualties, including combatants on both sides and an anticipated end to Saddam’s rule does not equal a million killed and no end to it. After all, all sorts of people are dying in Syria (and not just at the hands of ISIS) under Assad, because Assad is hated by the majority. In the American Revolutionary War, there were about 50,000 casualties, a massively larger percentage of the whole than those suffered in Iraq. Sometimes an oppressed people are willing to take casualties to rid themselves of a hated dictator.

And the current refugees are not related to the Iraq war. They are the product of the war between ISIS and other rebel groups and the Iran/Russia/Alawite alliance.

One is not surprised at Kofi Anan’s statement, given that his son was bribed in terms of millions of dollars by Saddam Hussein. So were many others in the UN, by money that was supposed to feed the Iraqi people, but didn’t.

WMD were part of the basis for the war. Repeatedly broken terms of the truce were as well. In any event, Saddam did have WMD. Americans disposed of the last known chemical weapons just this year. In 2013 the Brits did as well. Probably they’ll be found for years. Saddam’s crimes against humanity were not limited to WMD.

There was a good chance of stability in Iraq, but we left too early to ensure it.

 

[Eric_Hyom]

And the current refugees are not related to the Iraq war.

By 16 February 2007, António Guterres, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, said that the external refugee number fleeing the war reached 2 million and that within Iraq there are an estimated 1.7 million internally displaced people

There are some 1.4 million Iraqi refugees living in Syria, most having fled the extreme sectarian violence sparked by the bombing of the Golden Mosque of Samarra in 2006.

unhcr.org/pages/49e486426.html