Islam is Islam, there are no radical elements or moderate elements. Neutrality the West sees is based on “cultural” Islam which is a blasphemous stance against “Allah”. Cultural Islam is the equivalent of a person claiming to be Christian, but denying the divinity of Christ. CI is based on “virtue signaling”, attention, and arrogance. The danger in this comes from those who take Islam seriously. Said this many times but Islam is a counter-hegemonic force. The Socialist found this out rather quickly so instead of subverting their religion, they attempted to use Islam for their political advantage.
One glaring example is how the CIA and the Joint Chiefs were completely buttf*ed by the Iranian revolution in the late 70’s. Contrary to popular belief, the supposed “radical” element are not comprised of uneducated camel humpers, they are pious and their leaders are highly educated. This trickles down because the leaders want their “minions” educated in Islam and various tactics used by previous Islamic strategists. The revolution was a student led victory after all despite what McMaster believes the radical element is comprised of.
This subject is complex, especially on the Sunni side which we are beholden to the most so I will get to my point: Trump is compromised by “pie in the sky” strategy that has failed many times over. His natural instinct is correct, especially for the long-term and the way our government is set up (Administrations change and so does strategy). You win wars quickly, COIN is just a theory on paper, in practice, its an expensive failure due to not taking post-Medina Islam seriously.
Or maybe he’s simply a convert like Brennan. We don’t really know.
But I agree with you re: Islam—it was outrageous when Trump named him to run the NSC and the outrageousness about it was only ratcheted up this week.
God save us.