way that it adapts and uses everything else that it comes across.
ISIS is not winning because it has the better hashtags. It’s winning because it’s utterly ruthless. Arguing about its ideology on social media not only misses the point about ISIS, it misses the point about Islam.
Islam did not build a worldwide empire by winning theological arguments. It won by winning. Islam is not an empire of faith. It is an empire of war that divides the world up into the Dar-al-Islam and the Dar-al-Harb; the House of Islam and the House of War. Harb originally meant sword. When ISIS beheads prisoners, it is meting out the same treatment that Mohammed did to those in the House of War.
Indeed Mohammed’s sword, one of them at any rate as he had quite a few, was named Dhu al-Faqar or "Cleaver of Vertebrae". This is the same sword that appeared on the war flags of the Ottoman Caliphate which, like Obama’s middle name, would never have existed if the Byzantine Empire hadn’t lost the war.
The Cleaver of Vertebrae, like the House of War, is one of those dividing elements of Islamic ideology. It divides the world between Islam and everyone else and divides heads from bodies. It is the central idea of Islam that we need a better idea to fight if we intend to keep our own heads.
Islamic ideas are simple, rather than sophisticated. They depend on tribalism and terror to mobilize force. They rely on honor and shame to mark defeats and victories. The only way to argue with them is on those same terms. Islam’s only big idea is that power is religion and victory is proof of its rightness.
The theological counterargument to the Islamic State is crushing it on the battlefield.
Obama’s Hearts and Minds strategy tries to win the war by losing it, putting us at a strategic disadvantage with restrictive rules of engagement on the battlefield to win over Muslims while potential ISIS recruits are shipped into the United States by the hundreds of thousands as Muslim immigrants.
minds” fails, as it must, then we will be in the same position as the old Byzantine Empire, exhausted, weary of war, fighting among ourselves and ready for defeat after having filled our countries with enemies while turning our soldiers into social workers.
Not even the worst leaders of the Byzantine Empire were as foolish as that.
If this “generational struggle” for “hearts and minds” fails, as it must, then we will be in the same position as the old Byzantine Empire, exhausted, weary of war, fighting among ourselves and ready for defeat after having filled our countries with enemies while turning our soldiers into social workers. Not even the worst leaders of the Byzantine Empire were as foolish as that.
Even now the war is on again for Egypt as ISIS fights in the Sinai. The Islamic Caliphate forces that defeated Byzantium passed through the Sinai. Their armies were invigorated by Sinai Bedouins joining them. Today the Islamic State once again wages war in the Sinai using the Bedouin.
Obama speaks of offering “a more attractive, more compelling vision”, but what does he have to offer that can compete with the reunification of the lands of Islam and the dominance of a Caliph? He has already tried offering his ideas in Cairo. Today Egyptians hate both him and his ideas.
The Battle of Heliopolis on a July 6th long ago shows us that the best way to defeat an enemy is not by appeasing it, but by fighting it with a united front. It was the Democrats who shattered the nation’s unity after September 11 by standing up for terrorists. Obama continues that tradition today as he tells us that we can’t win because our enemies are our friends and that we disgusting intolerant bigots. America does not need to win the hearts and minds of Muslims. It needs to win the hearts and minds of its own people. We do not need the goodwill of those who believe that we are less than human. What we need is confidence in our nation, our values and ourselves. The best antidote to July 6th is July 4th.
A strong and united nation can see off any number of barbarian raiders. A divided civilization struggling over bitter grudges can easily be divided and conquered even by bands of worthless murderous savages.
The ideas for defeating ISIS are those which unite us, which make us stronger and which resist foreign invasion. The ideas that make it easier for ISIS to defeat us can be found in any Obama speech.