I think our choices here are mass slaughter, or mass conversion to Christ.
The civil authorities have a responsibility to implement the former, if there's to be any defense of freedom at all.
The people of GOD have a responsibility to implement the latter.
There really is no other option that I'm aware of.
Religions merely reflect the cultures in which they are practiced. If Islam didn't exist, something else would act as a salve for the muzzies' deep seated (and well deserved) sense of inferiority & envy. After all, the entire religion is based on 'taking' ie banditry.
I'm much more optimistic. I think (Western) science will develop a gene therapy that will enable us to both raise their collective IQs & temper their violent tendencies. The mix is quite volatile, as we've seen, so the sooner we discover a cure, the quicker we'll have a more peaceful world.
You are absolutely correct, and have said it as plainly, as starkly, and as presciently as it can be stated. And because the "answer" is plain, stark, and hard, this is precisely why Bush _cannot_ state it.
There really _aren't_ any other choices.
I _am not_ one of those "bomb them back into the stone age" advocates. There are plenty of quickgun posters in here who immediately pop into any "Islam thread" with "nuke 'em" or "kill them all". Yahoos.
Of course, we can't kill them all. And we can't destroy Islam with nukes alone.
We can't win this struggle by merely toppling regimes, either. We are in the process of "discovering this" right now in Iraq and Afghanistan. The old solutions won't work, when the "regime" that must be toppled is Allah's.
Since we can't, our only other realistic option is your second one, as stated above. That is: our only possible "victory" can be to "de-Islamicize" the Muslim world, in the same way we "de-Nazified" Germany after World War II.
Of course, that will take tens of millions of soldiers, and the forced occupation of EVERY Islamic state for at least 50-80 years, in order to purge Islam from the hearts of those who are now held in its thrall. And today's West is not up to the task. Not yet, anyway.
The future looks hard, indeed.
- John