MVP, I would ask this (just for me to gain insight into your perspective as it pertains to your points)
Do you have "boots on the ground" "eyeball to eyeball" detailed experience with the way Muslims think and live ( living amongst them in their own world) as a whole or either experience in fighting terror or combat with them?
Of are your thoughts just developed from internet and media based information?
Thank you
I've never gone to the middle east, but I've known a few Muslims and Christians from the middle east. When I was in University, back in the late 70s, there was a relatively large number of Iranian students attending schools in the State of New York University system. This was when the Shah was in power.
One, my friend Mohsen J,was a Persian and not an Arab. At the same school I met a young woman who was Lebanese who constantly harrassed her Jewish roommate and I found out through conversation with her that she was actually Palestinian.
At Stony Brook, where I finally graduated, I met another Iranian though I wouldn't call him a friend. I also worked at times with a Lebanese Christian from around 1989 to 91 and had opportunity to talk about the relationship between the various peoples living around Israel. Peter H. has since moved back to Lebanon to run his own business there, but explained to me what I already suspected because I studied a little bit of Anthropology and know something of tribalism.
People who've spent their lives in western nations usually haven't a clue how tribes work socially or how tribal people think unless they've been involved in street gangs.
Peter H. put it this way, in Islam people tend to squabble with their own tribes, tribes tend to fight with each other, and the only thing that unites them is Jihad against common enemies. In Islam any invading or occupying force is the enemy.
That was Peter's impression of Islam from his youth in war torn Lebanon, but the behavior he described is not unique to Islam. It's common to tribal people and all nations were once tribal.
People are not difficult to understand, but experience killing them is not an indication of understanding.
I'm a natural empath though I wish I wasn't. I've never sought out a friend in my life, but have had plenty of friends that sought my company. That's because these friends always saw something of themselves in me whether it was really there or not. I naturally become a bit like the people I spend time with, which makes them more comfortable with me and open to honest conversation. Consequently, though I've never left the US, I've been friends with or had friendly acquaintances from every continent except Greenland and I haven't had to point an M-16 at any of them.
I've also had some good friends and acquaintances from the North and South American tribal peoples and I've discovered that very few people outside of the US think the same way about us as we do.
Many like our wealth and the lifestyle it affords, but few agree with or appreciate what we do as a nation. Almost everyone wants freedom, almost no one appreciates our military adventurism and meddling in the affairs of other sovereign nations.
Absolutely no one appreciates fully armed military personnel patrolling streets and standing sentry in public places, enforcing the policies of other nations.
Occupied nations smile and wave at their occupiers, but my brother, as a medic in "the green hell" observed that the friendly smiling civilians in South Vietnam sometimes put on their "black pajamas" at night to go out and set booby traps on trails used by US troops.
Turn on the TV and you'll see Afghani government soldiers that have either just laid down their weapons or joined the Taliban. The news makes much of the fact that we've trained them, but doesn't mention that we also trained the Taliban back before the attacks of 9/11 and during the Soviet occupation.
I served for 3 years in the USAF in the all volunteer force and had plenty of conversation with active duty military about reasons for enlisting, worldview, and attitude towards their service, including lifers. While combat is transformative in nature, there is nothing insightful about being pumped up on adrenaline or wacked out on opiates or Qaat in the middle of a fire fight. On the contrary, warfare is dehumanizing and transforms our behavior and thought into the most base sort we're capable of. War let's the beast out and suppresses godly behavior, but everyone appreciates it when the gun is lowered and the immediate threat of death has passed (that's one I have experienced. )
