Winnable?

[Update 11:30PM-I've added a reply to the critics of this post: no, I'm not looking to parking lot Islam as a whole.]

This paragraph has gotten a lot a play and I've yet to get back to it-

Asked "Can we win?" Bush said, "I don't think you can win it. But I think you can create conditions so that the – those who use terror as a tool are less acceptable in parts of the world."

Of course, many Democrats have piled on that statement. However, I think the president is right and the Democrats scarily wrong.

What will it take to truly win the "war on terror"? It will require wiping Islam off the map, destroying each and every copy of the Koran and declaring it contraband and killing and or converting each and every Muslim.

Ain't gonna happen, at least not in a world that prizes freedom of religion. In a classic-liberal vision of the world, doing away with an entire religion is unacceptable.

"Mark, isn't it just a warped version of Islam that's the problem?" Yes, but there's enough in the Koran proper to get people to warp themselves into jihad mode. Even if people preach a moderate Islam that focuses on the "greater jihad" (jihad means struggle, but takes on the connotation of holy war in modern use) against personal sin, there will be a few yahoos that will want a more literal interpretation.

I recall a story from Vineyard founder John Wimber, who was reading the Bible as a clueless new believer and was expecting the modern church to be doing the stuff that was happening in Acts. When he wandered into a mainline church seeking a church home, he asked if they had the kind of miracles happening that the early church had. When they told him no, he said something to the effect of "Well, I'm going to go someplace where it is."

Even if we root out all the radical madrassas and all the jihad-preaching mosques, you're still going to find Islamic Wimbers who will want to have a full-Koran mosque as much as modern Pentecostals and charismatics will be seeking a "full-Gospel" church. For many, such a full-Koran mosque will include a literal war against the infidels.

Thus, it's unlikely we'll ever fully wipe out Islamic terrorists short of wiping out Islam. Such a dream is not part of a classic-liberal dream. It might be part of a secular dream, of wiping out any religion that doesn't serve a secular state. The French might dream that and the Germans might dream that, but Americans dare not dream that, for our system just doesn't allow the outlawing of an entire religion.

Can we make life harder for the jihadis? Yes. Can we limit their scope and limit the weapons at their disposal? You bet. Can we improve their lives and make a holy war less attractive? Yes. Can we totally wipe them off the face of the earth? Not until Jesus returns in person; it's above our pay grade.

Comments

[Pen]

Mark... it is hard for me to think that the *only* way to win the War on Terrorism is to wipe out Islam...

Could it be that if we give poor, unemployed, young muslim men and women something more to hope for then an afterlife filled with virgins that will do their beck and call -- we might find the tide of the War on Terrorism turning in our favor -- and that -- without destroying a single copy of the Koran.

Your view may be right, Mark, but it suggest a pogrom that would rival some of the worst names in history.. Genghis Khan, Attilla the Hun, Pol Pot, Jim Jones, and do I dare say it ... Hitler?

Is that the only way to fight evil? with evil?

[Richard Hall]

Mark - you're not the first I've heard to write that way, but I'm certain it is wrong to assume that Christians and Muslims must always be enemies. In any case, terrorism is not a tactic exclusive to radical Islam. Even if you could drop a smart bomb to instantly remove all of Islam you would still be left with terrorism.

I'm convinced that the war on terrorism can be won - but not by force of arms. Not if we want to retain any semblance of being a just and free society. We tried to defeat terrorism in Northern Ireland by military means, and even in that small province it couldn't be done. Politics and negotiation are succeeding where years of violence failed utterly.

[Bene Diction]

As I write this the death toll at a school in Russia is over 200. Hundreds more are injured.
Moms, dads, children, teachers, brothers sisters, grandparents...

Chechen school children held a protest yesterday.
They volunteered to take the place of the children in Beslan. They spoke out. They have lived through war, and they are sick to death of it.

**What will it take to truly win the "war on terror"? It will require wiping Islam off the map, destroying each and every copy of the Koran and declaring it contraband and killing and or converting each and every Muslim.**

Put different groups of people in your words.
Anyone - political, religious, ethnic and any time in history.

**Can we improve their lives**
He called us to nothing less.

[Mark Byron]

This might be another one of those posts where I played the Devil's advocate all too well before taking the argument down.

What we need to do is make militant Islam unattractive; we can't wipe Islam out and still retain a small-l liberal society.