I never agreed with this idea. That we can directly influence macro-events there is a "fallacy of control," and I do not see our "engagement" with Muslim nations bringing any benefit to the USA whatsoever.
You’d think that if the entire history of the Middle East since the fall of the Ottoman Empire taught us anything, it’s that intervention from the West doesn’t work. We’re like Bernanke on interest rates, though, and tge only answer is the price of money just hasn’t been zero for long enough. We just haven’t invaded and cut up the Middle East enough. Invading the next country will do the trick.
Did it ever occur to anyone that maybe intervention is part of the problem? Maybe one of the reasons terrorists wanna bomb us is that we constantly break into their houses, rearrange furniture, and leave behind Frankenstein’s monsters like the tri-ethnic Iraqi state. Gosh forbid we should step back for a second, for fear of OPEC ransoming us or our ally Israel having to stand on its own two feet for once after 60 or so years.