[jyl]

fint, you and others propose this solution often. "This solution" meaning "let's just go in there and kill all the bad guys".

However, I've never seen you explain how you would actually carry out this solution, in practice.

Do you believe that we have located the terrorist leaders are, but we've just been too polite to send them a missile or a bullet? Do you think we have a list of all the young Arab men who are terrorist recruits, that we can simply hand out to the Marines as they land in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Syria, etc?

If you have a practical answer, let's hear it.

If your answer is simply to nuke every Arab country and kill all the "animals" who live there - a plan I think you've expressed before - then come clean about it, and people can judge how sane your ideas really is.

In my opinion, some people have watched too many movies, and think there is a Rambo-esque solution to everything. "If only the liberals would stop molly-coddling the terrorists, the righteous conservatives could unleash the Marines and take care of the terrorists." It sounds like such an easy answer. It is also total B.S.

Islamic terrorism against the US has some deep-rooted causes, and those causes have to be attacked.
- There is a large population of young, poor Arab men, who don't have an outlet in work/earning/spending or in peaceful political activity, in Middle Eastern countries that either lack oil wealth, or are so corruptly run that the people are poor despite the country's oil. These angry young men are fertile ground for extremism.
- There is widespread anger against the US, due to the long Israel/Palestinian conflict, US support for unpopular Arab governments, and US military activity in the Middle East. Again, fertile ground for terrorists.
- Some Arab governments tolerate recruiting, funding, training of terrorists. Better this energy be directed towards to the West, than towards their own undemocratic governments. (Saudi Arabia comes to mind - a major source of funds and recruits for Bin Laden.)
- As Muslim populations increase in the West, but are poorly integrated with high unemployment, a fertile ground for terrorist recruiters is forming in the West. Particularly in Europe.

Yes, I understand there are religious/extremist Islamic leaders who want to destroy the West for ideological reasons unrelated to anything I've described. But if they can't recruit followers, and can't raise funds, they won't be as much of a threat. We've got to attack these root causes that leads young Muslim men to follow those extremist leaders.

For example:
- Use our influence, money, and power to force a settlement of the Israel/Palestinian conflict. The inability of those parties to make peace is a major threat to US security.
- Pressure rich Arab governments to clamp down on terrorist funding and recruiting in their countries. It is unacceptable for Saudi Arabia to enjoy US military protection and warm relations with Presidents from Bush to Clinton to Bush, while being the leading funder of Islamic terrorists.
- Pressure Arab countries to become more democratic and to make life better for their poor young men. This means using the bully pulpit. The US has tremendous influence - love us or hate us, everyone pays attention to us - and we can put a withering spotlight on corrupt monarchies in the Middle East.
- Pressure Western countries to better integrate their Muslim populations, and/or to control the growth of those populations. Actually I think the UK, Germany, France have woken up to that need on their own.
- Reduce the US military presence in Arab countries, including Iraq where US soldiers are the #1 attraction for terrorists, and also including Saudi Arabia. This doesn't mean having less military capability, but it means relying more on aircraft carriers, fast transports, etc.
- Reduce the US dependence on the Middle East. As long as our oil consumption grows unchecked, sending oil prices to dangerous levels, we will be dependent on and entangled in the Middle East. Imagine if US oil usage were 10-20% lower, the price was $30-40, and we were selling other countries the technology to use less oil every year. We could be a lot tougher on Middle Eastern governments.

Taking these sorts of actions to attack the root causes of Islamic terrorism, along with the increased security, border controls, global law enforcement, covert operations, etc that we are already doing, are how we and our allies will control terrorism in the real world.

As opposed to the movie world.