Can the Islamic State Survive?

by Ross Douthat

May 23, 2015

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/24/opinion/sunday/ross-douthat-can-the-islamic-state-survive.html?comments#permid=15040240:15040488

Ross, what you seem to forget is that US blundering military action in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the hapless "support" to in Lybia and Syria has set this monster loose in the first place.

After more than 12 years of abject military and political failure in Afghanistan and Iraq, what evidence do you have to suggest that the US can stop this madness? More troops? We've tried several surges, and their effect was at most very localized and temporary. Sending more weapons? We see that US supplied weapons in Afghanistan, during the Soviet invasion, and now from retreating Afghan and Iraqi troops, are being used against us.

And you, of all people, who loves to natter on about religion, should know that the major difference between the Soviet experience and that in the Middle East, is the power of religious fanaticism.

It seems to me that there is a different ray of light, which may show that over the (very) long haul, barbarism caused my religious fanaticism, brain-washing and ignorance, the hall mark of the long running Sunni/Shia conflict in the Middle East, will one day burn itself out: the pro-gay-marriage vote in Ireland.

The dogmatic, ignorant and fanatic wing of Catholicism has long held sway in Ireland, longer than in most other European countries. But INTERNAL changes in that society (perhaps with a little help from the outside, the EU) have caused the Irish to discard the shakes of religious dogma and prejudice and join the modern world.

It is only through INTERNAL changes in a society that lasting changes from centuries of prejudice and ignorance can gain a foothold. Trying to force such changes from the outside, especially through military force, is completely self-defeating, as the US's disastrous interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan have shown.