Islamic Extremists Seem to in the news killing Westerners

It's almost comical watching the Politically correct news casters trying to cover this string of events. In one story, a reporter characterized the Black member, one appears to be ethnically Black, two appear to be Arab and one female, of the Charlie Hebdo Quartet as an African American. Interesting.

I saw a retired general interviewed who noted that to beat an opponent in a war, we need to go where they are and kill them. The option is to stay where we are and wait for them to arrive here to kill us. There is no other option besides these two. This seems to be a pretty straight forward and unvarnished appraisal of what has happened and what is happening.

His prescribed method to deal with them is to acknowledge that there will be collateral damage and we just have to accept that as we did in WW2. In a pretty close to a quote repetition of his statement, he said that we need to kill as many as we can until we can't find any more, leave weeping widows and homeless children in the smoking rubble and come home. If the danger reconstitutes, go back and do it agin and again until the reconstitution stops.

No nation building. No Marshall plan. No exit strategy. Kill everyone who acts like an enemy and then leave. If they start acting like an enemy again, go back and do it again. Weeping widows and homeless children in the smoking rubble.

This is the other extreme to the current, weak kneed and ineffective policies of winning hearts and minds and trying to build nations.

Is there a middle ground or is it a choice between trying to make them Western-minded Islamists or just try to eliminate them as threats?

I used to be hopeful that Islamists exposed to freedom could be made into functioning members of a world community. I have abandoned that hope. I see them now as murdering the thugs that they have proven themselves to be who are trying to dominate through terror and intimidation and must be removed from our world society with swift, unblinking and effective measures.

Is there evidence to prove that they are not hate filled killers who are bent on world domination?

You look at the wars America has involved itself in for the past 30 years, the war on terror, torture, drone strikes, the Patriot Act, and our continue involvements in arming Insurgent groups and think the solution is to do more of the same? That is not the answer to the problem in the Middle East, and it never has been.

code1211 said:

It's almost comical watching the Politically correct news casters trying to cover this string of events. In one story, a reporter characterized the Black member, one appears to be ethnically Black, two appear to be Arab and one female, of the Charlie Hebdo Quartet as an African American. Interesting.

I saw a retired general interviewed who noted that to beat an opponent in a war, we need to go where they are and kill them. The option is to stay where we are and wait for them to arrive here to kill us. There is no other option besides these two. This seems to be a pretty straight forward and unvarnished appraisal of what has happened and what is happening.

His prescribed method to deal with them is to acknowledge that there will be collateral damage and we just have to accept that as we did in WW2. In a pretty close to a quote repetition of his statement, he said that we need to kill as many as we can until we can't find any more, leave weeping widows and homeless children in the smoking rubble and come home. If the danger reconstitutes, go back and do it agin and again until the reconstitution stops.

No nation building. No Marshall plan. No exit strategy. Kill everyone who acts like an enemy and then leave. If they start acting like an enemy again, go back and do it again. Weeping widows and homeless children in the smoking rubble.

This is the other extreme to the current, weak kneed and ineffective policies of winning hearts and minds and trying to build nations.

Is there a middle ground or is it a choice between trying to make them Western-minded Islamists or just try to eliminate them as threats?

I used to be hopeful that Islamists exposed to freedom could be made into functioning members of a world community. I have abandoned that hope. I see them now as murdering the thugs that they have proven themselves to be who are trying to dominate through terror and intimidation and must be removed from our world society with swift, unblinking and effective measures.

Is there evidence to prove that they are not hate filled killers who are bent on world domination?

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What part of thread seems appropriate for the Breaking News section?

CMPancake said:

You look at the wars America has involved itself in for the past 30 years, the war on terror, torture, drone strikes, the Patriot Act, and our continue involvements in arming Insurgent groups and think the solution is to do more of the same? That is not the answer to the problem in the Middle East, and it never has been.

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That's not what he said. The general in question said the solution was to do them like WW2 and kill them en mass. The implication being, we didn't do nearly enough killing and destroying this last go-round.



Some days, bad days, I'm inclined to agree. The level of barbarism in that part of the world is truly incredible.

Goshin said:

That's not what he said. The general in question said the solution was to do them like WW2 and kill them en mass. The implication being, we didn't do nearly enough killing and destroying this last go-round.

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The implication he gave me was that more killing was the solution, and that what we have currently done is not enough. Since we don't have an official body count anymore for casualties, how many do you think is enough to end Terror in the Middle East?

Goshin said:

Some days, bad days, I'm inclined to agree. The level of barbarism in that part of the world is truly incredible.

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The Middle East is a dark place, and I can not agree with you any more on that. But I don't think more war and more death is the solution.

CMPancake said:

The implication he gave me was that more killing was the solution, and that what we have currently done is not enough. Since we don't have an official body count anymore for casualties, how many do you think is enough to end Terror in the Middle East?



The Middle East is a dark place, and I can not agree with you any more on that. But I don't think more war and more death is the solution.

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Let me be clear; I don't claim to have The Solution! (flourish of trumpets) to the issues of the Middle East, of the extremism and brutality that is so commonplace there. I wish I did.

After the attack on our embassy, and I saw the pics of what they did to our ambassador and the men who tried to defend him, I was so appalled I said that we need to pull ALL of our people out of the M.E., and quit trying to talk and reason with them and pretend they (most of them) are civilized folk when obviously savagery runs too deep in too many there for us to do so. Let them go back to killing each other in job lots over tribal identity or minor religious disputes.

Of course, dis-engagement is a problem. There's the oil issue; it may be ugly but it is important, and Russia and China would love to dominate that region to our detriment. There's our allies with interests there, including Israel, France and others. There's the fact that the Djinn is out of the bottle and Islamic terrorists strike all over the world now.

I was gravely disappointed when the Palastinians had a shot at free elections and CHOSE to be ruled by a terrorist organization. Appalling. I'd always believed that democratic republics tend to be more rational and peaceful, but when the majority of the people are filled with hate what can you do?


There aren't too many viable options.

One would be to isolate them. Cut them off from the rest of the world; deport any extremists found back to the M.E. and make them stay there. Problem is this won't work, because of the oil and because of the international Game of Thrones being played by dozens of powerful nations and interests there.


Another is what the general suggested: Go in there and kill Jihadis and extremists until you can't find any more. Wade hip deep in blood until there's nothing left but widows, orphans, and those unwilling to take up arms against you. Then leave them to their smoking ruins, and if they rise up again do it again.


None of these options fills me with joy, let me tell ya. But neither does pics of ISIS beheading women and children for the crimes of being the wrong sect of Muslim, or to demur against anything ISIS demands of them. Iran and Saud aren't much better, and similar brutality goes on away from the allegedly-civilized centers in many other M.E. nations. It is appalling, and to sit and do nothing about it is also appalling.


I don't claim to have The Answer (tm), but I can understand why the Extreme Solution is so tempting.

code1211 said:

Is there evidence to prove that they are not hate filled killers who are bent on world domination?

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It depends on who "they" are. Are they ISIS, Al Qaeda, the Taliban? No, no evidence at all that they are anything else. Are "they" all Muslims? Well, yes, I think we could find some evidence. Are "they" the Syrians, the Iraqis, the Iranians, all Middle Easterners except the Israelis, just who are "they"?

Before we go off on a mission to kill "them", we need to know just who "they" are. If not, we're not so much different from the enemy who seems willing to kill off anyone who has a different philosophy than they do.

CMPancake said:

You look at the wars America has involved itself in for the past 30 years, the war on terror, torture, drone strikes, the Patriot Act, and our continue involvements in arming Insurgent groups and think the solution is to do more of the same? That is not the answer to the problem in the Middle East, and it never has been.

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To be honest, I don't care about the problems in the Middle East.

I care about the hate filled, racist, supremacist bigots masquerading as religious zealots relying on the philosophies of the Middle East to justify their genocides who are killing people outside of the Middle East.

The question I posed was whether more of the same will work or if it should be taken up a notch.

What do you think?

CMPancake said:

The implication he gave me was that more killing was the solution, and that what we have currently done is not enough. Since we don't have an official body count anymore for casualties, how many do you think is enough to end Terror in the Middle East?



The Middle East is a dark place, and I can not agree with you any more on that. But I don't think more war and more death is the solution.

Click to expand...

The approach in WW2 was to fire bomb Dresden and Nuke Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The Battle of Leningrad produced about a million dead. The count seems to range between about 400K and 2 million. Casualty estimates for battles were pegged at 100's of thousands to millions.

WW1 wasn't much different. I want to say that there were battles in which 100's of thousands died in a matter of days as the outmoded tactic of charging en masse was met with the then modern machine gun and artillery barrages in response. Truly the definition of blood bath.

The question I pose is whether or not our message is making it through to the folks who are mounting the attacks on us.

Do we stick with our current approach or follow the advice of the general who is calling for an enhanced response? His prescription was shocking to me. Calling for weeping widows and homeless children in the smoking rubble is a pretty strong plan.

To be honest, it sounded to me downright Islamic in its barbarism.

code1211 said:

The approach in WW2 was to fire bomb Dresden and Nuke Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The Battle of Leningrad produced about a million dead. The count seems to range between about 400K and 2 million. Casualty estimates for battles were pegged at 100's of thousands to millions.

WW1 wasn't much different. I want to say that there were battles in which 100's of thousands dies in a matter of days as the outmoded tactic of charging en masse was met with the then modern machine gun and artillery barrages in response. Truly the definition of blood bath.

The question I pose is whether or not our message is making it through to the folks who are mounting the attacks on us.

Do we stick with our current approach or follow the advice of the general who is calling for an enhanced response? Hi superscription was shocking to me. Calling for weeping widows and homeless children in the smoking rubble is a pretty strong plan.

To be honest, it sounded to me downright Islamic in its barbarism.

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I have to ask why it is that we think that if we bomb them enough, that they'll eventually give up? If somebody came and bombed every American metropolis to ashes, would we give in to them? No? Then why should we think that the Muslims would give in to the same?

Dittohead not! said:

It depends on who "they" are. Are they ISIS, Al Qaeda, the Taliban? No, no evidence at all that they are anything else. Are "they" all Muslims? Well, yes, I think we could find some evidence. Are "they" the Syrians, the Iraqis, the Iranians, all Middle Easterners except the Israelis, just who are "they"?

Before we go off on a mission to kill "them", we need to know just who "they" are. If not, we're not so much different from the enemy who seems willing to kill off anyone who has a different philosophy than they do.

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The general attitude of the General (no pun intended) was pretty much to kill anyone in front of the guns and let God sort them out after the fact. When there was no more opposition in the area, then the area could be abandoned. Not re-built and not rehabilitated. Left in ruin and ready for the next visit if needed.

The problem in fighting the Islamic terrorists in the Middle East and in other parts of the world is the same one we had in Viet nam in that the opposition could just disappear into the country side and the country side's residents were more than willing to help them be invisible.

The HUGE DIFFERENCE in the battle is that the terrorists are coming to us and not staying near the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

His assertion was that our current approach does not seem to be working. He was suggesting that we take it to level used to fight our enemies in WW2.

Glen Contrarian said:

I have to ask why it is that we think that if we bomb them enough, that they'll eventually give up? If somebody came and bombed every American metropolis to ashes, would we give in to them? No? Then why should we think that the Muslims would give in to the same?

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At some point, even if the will to fight is there, if the people to do the fighting are gone, the fight ends.

There was a battle in which one of the Roman Generals in conquest released all of his prisoners, but cut the right hand off of each. The thinking was that if there was no right hand, the sword hand, the battle could not be rejoined.

The question is predicated on the situation currently existing on the ground.

What we are doing is not working. Should we try something different? If yes, should that something be a return to the resolve and commitment of the Greatest Generation used by them in their battle against world wide barbarism?

That is the question.

code1211 said:

The approach in WW2 was to fire bomb Dresden and Nuke Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The Battle of Leningrad produced about a million dead. The count seems to range between about 400K and 2 million. Casualty estimates for battles were pegged at 100's of thousands to millions.

WW1 wasn't much different. I want to say that there were battles in which 100's of thousands died in a matter of days as the outmoded tactic of charging en masse was met with the then modern machine gun and artillery barrages in response. Truly the definition of blood bath.

The question I pose is whether or not our message is making it through to the folks who are mounting the attacks on us.

Do we stick with our current approach or follow the advice of the general who is calling for an enhanced response? His prescription was shocking to me. Calling for weeping widows and homeless children in the smoking rubble is a pretty strong plan.

To be honest, it sounded to me downright Islamic in its barbarism.

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Case in point.... the Islamic extremists (like ISIS) would do it to US with glee and without hesitation if they had the means, and then dance in the streets while they beheaded any of the surviving widows and orphans who didn't quickly toe their mark, and count it a great victory and celebrate it for centuries.


That we hesitate to do such things to them, when we certainly have the means, shows the difference for those who question it. Also, to the likes of ISIS, they take our restraint and humanity as weakness.

Glen Contrarian said:

I have to ask why it is that we think that if we bomb them enough, that they'll eventually give up? If somebody came and bombed every American metropolis to ashes, would we give in to them? No? Then why should we think that the Muslims would give in to the same?

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"If the enemy swears they will fight to the last man, the only solution is to show them we are willing to kill their last man."

Goshin said:

"If the enemy swears they will fight to the last man, the only solution is to show them we are willing to kill their last man."

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So your solution is to kill a billion or so Muslims?

Dude, you need help.

code1211 said:

At some point, even if the will to fight is there, if the people to do the fighting are gone, the fight ends.

There was a battle in which one of the Roman Generals in conquest released all of his prisoners, but cut the right hand off of each. The thinking was that if there was no right hand, the sword hand, the battle could not be rejoined.

The question is predicated on the situation currently existing on the ground.

What we are doing is not working. Should we try something different? If yes, should that something be a return to the resolve and commitment of the Greatest Generation used by them in their battle against world wide barbarism?

That is the question.

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Problem is, y'all seem to think that since there is some terrorism going on around the world, that the only solution is to bomb them back to the stone age. It's the same old thing - when your only tool is a hammer, then that's all you know how to use.

Y'all need to realize that as long as there are weapons and cell phones and the internet, there will be terrorists, people using whatever excuse they can think of to do terrible things. Think about it - the terrorists that just hit Paris killed fewer people than were killed at either Columbine or Sandy Hook. By that metric, our nation's teenagers are more of a threat than terrorists! Are we going to attack our teenagers? Of course not. But we need to have some real perspective on how bad the problem really is...or is not.

This isn't to say we should sit back and do nothing about terrorism - because you will NEVER rid the world of terrorism - but we need to remember that weapons aren't the only solution. Sometimes the best solution, the best way to minimize terrorism is to make the people more prosperous - because people who are happy, healthy, fed, and safe are a whole heck of a lot less likely to be radicalized.

Glen Contrarian said:

So your solution is to kill a billion or so Muslims?

Dude, you need help.

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Not what I said at all. I was referring to those who wage Jihad and practice barbarities like ISIS.


Are you trying to say ALL Muslims are extremists??? Why Glen, what an ugly thing to say...

Goshin said:

Not what I said at all. I was referring to those who wage Jihad and practice barbarities like ISIS.


Are you trying to say ALL Muslims are extremists??? Why Glen, what an ugly thing to say...

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Dude - you obviously seemed to be supporting Code1211's 'solution' to go down the road of Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Leningrad. I'm simply pointing out how stupid - and futile - that solution is.

Glen Contrarian said:

Problem is, y'all seem to think that since there is some terrorism going on around the world, that the only solution is to bomb them back to the stone age. It's the same old thing - when your only tool is a hammer, then that's all you know how to use.

Y'all need to realize that as long as there are weapons and cell phones and the internet, there will be terrorists, people using whatever excuse they can think of to do terrible things. Think about it - the terrorists that just hit Paris killed fewer people than were killed at either Columbine or Sandy Hook. By that metric, our nation's teenagers are more of a threat than terrorists! Are we going to attack our teenagers? Of course not. But we need to have some real perspective on how bad the problem really is...or is not.

This isn't to say we should sit back and do nothing about terrorism - because you will NEVER rid the world of terrorism - but we need to remember that weapons aren't the only solution. Sometimes the best solution, the best way to minimize terrorism is to make the people more prosperous - because people who are happy, healthy, fed, and safe are a whole heck of a lot less likely to be radicalized.

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In general this is true. There are of course exceptions, like Osama Bin Millionaire for instance, but it is well known the tangos do their best recruiting among the poor and uneducated.

But a big part of what is keeping so many in the Middle East in poverty is the top-down system by which they are governed, is it not?

Kuwait, for instance, has a program where everyone gets a share of the oil revenue. Kuwait is known for being among the more prosperous, better educated and more civilized of Middle Eastern nations.

But most nations are governed in a more traditional way, with a pretty steep economic/political/religious pyramid that leaves most in poverty.

Nor is prosperity and education a sure fire solution, as there are also a good many Jihadis that come from prosperous and well-educated backgrounds.


It would be hard to make all these countries change without violence.

Glen Contrarian said:

Dude - you obviously seemed to be supporting Code1211's 'solution' to go down the road of Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Leningrad. I'm simply pointing out how stupid - and futile - that solution is.

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I'm discussing it, Glen. I never said it was a preferred solution or my favorite method, nor did I explicitly endorse it.


The mark of a great mind is the ability to entertain an idea without necessarily accepting it, you know.


Now, have you changed your mind or are you still equating "radical jihadis in arms" with ALL muslims?

code1211 said:

The general attitude of the General (no pun intended) was pretty much to kill anyone in front of the guns and let God sort them out after the fact. When there was no more opposition in the area, then the area could be abandoned. Not re-built and not rehabilitated. Left in ruin and ready for the next visit if needed.

The problem in fighting the Islamic terrorists in the Middle East and in other parts of the world is the same one we had in Viet nam in that the opposition could just disappear into the country side and the country side's residents were more than willing to help them be invisible.

The HUGE DIFFERENCE in the battle is that the terrorists are coming to us and not staying near the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

His assertion was that our current approach does not seem to be working. He was suggesting that we take it to level used to fight our enemies in WW2.

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That's what I thought. The problem with that is that killing off everyone is simply genocide. While it might work, it is not something that any civilized society would support.

Killing off everyone in front of the guns would be like fencing off all of West LA and simply shooting everyone inside. It would clean up a lot of gang activity and drug dealing, to be sure, but the cure would be worse than the disease.

Goshin said:

In general this is true. There are of course exceptions, like Osama Bin Millionaire for instance, but it is well known the tangos do their best recruiting among the poor and uneducated.

But a big part of what is keeping so many in the Middle East in poverty is the top-down system by which they are governed, is it not?

Kuwait, for instance, has a program where everyone gets a share of the oil revenue. Kuwait is known for being among the more prosperous, better educated and more civilized of Middle Eastern nations.

But most nations are governed in a more traditional way, with a pretty steep economic/political/religious pyramid that leaves most in poverty.

Nor is prosperity and education a sure fire solution, as there are also a good many Jihadis that come from prosperous and well-educated backgrounds.


It would be hard to make all these countries change without violence.

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So we agree that there will never be a perfect solution - we are all human, after all. That's good. We will never, ever end all terrorism - that's a fool's errand - but we can do what can be done to minimize terrorism.

Looking at your example of Kuwait, then, it seems that a more effective way of dealing with terrorism would be to use diplomacy (which isn't always in the genteel form of kind words, but is often hard-nosed and even extortionist) to convince other nations in the region to follow the Kuwaiti model.

Of course we have to stay as vigilant as humanly possible, and we have to maintain the ability to respond to violence with greater violence. But those are reactionary measures. A truly proactive measure is the Kuwaiti model.

Goshin said:

I'm discussing it, Glen. I never said it was a preferred solution or my favorite method, nor did I explicitly endorse it.


The mark of a great mind is the ability to entertain an idea without necessarily accepting it, you know.


Now, have you changed your mind or are you still equating "radical jihadis in arms" with ALL muslims?

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I never "equated 'radical jihadis in arms' with ALL Muslims". But if the "Dresden Solution" - to give Code1211's 'solution' a name - were used, not only would many, many innocent Muslims be killed, but many more would be radicalized - "The heretics are slaughtering our fellow believers in Islam!"

And while a great mind may entertain an ideal without necessarily accepting it, we must remember that intelligence is not wisdom, for a wise man would know that the more a truly terrible idea is discussed, the more likely that some idiot out there will think, "Hey, that's a great idea!" and may well work towards making that very thing happen.

For instance, I wrote a book wherein something truly terrible (an artificially-enhanced H1N1-type influenza that affects only one race) is done - but I made doggone sure that the terrible thing was flatly impossible to do before I wrote it. What sorta sucks, though, is that the plot line of the newest Call of Duty installment has a very similar plot device. But I think I did a better job than they did. Of course I'm biased, but I'm right nonetheless.

And in case you're wondering, the reason I took such pains was because I was following Tom Clancy's example. I used to love his books back when I was a conservative, but now.... Anyway, in "The Sum of All Fears" he describes the construction and operation of a nuclear weapon...but he openly said that it could not work the way he described it because he didn't want his idea to be used for ill. I think that was a great idea, and one worth emulating.

Goshin said:

That's not what he said. The general in question said the solution was to do them like WW2 and kill them en mass. The implication being, we didn't do nearly enough killing and destroying this last go-round.

Some days, bad days, I'm inclined to agree. The level of barbarism in that part of the world is truly incredible.

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So we're going to kill... the people willing to die for their beliefs... until those people no longer want to die for their beliefs? Is that how this works? We just keep killing people who find honor in dying at the hands of infidels? This stops... when they're no longer radicalized by what we're doing in the first place? Sounds like tilling the ocean but okay. :lol: