U.S. Drone Attack Strategy Against Al-Qaeda May Be Wrong

An anonymous reader writes "A new study (abstract) in the journal Informational Security evaluates the U.S. military's strategy for killing off al-Qaeda's leadership using remote drone strikes. The study argues that the strategy is ineffective, calling into question both the military's rationale for doing so and the allocation of defense funds to run it. Essentially, there are two different types of terrorist organizations: those held together by a small number of charismatic leaders, and those who have developed their own bureaucracy, almost like a business. 'Companies don't fall apart when they lose their CEO or CFO; other people are being trained to do that job and there are institutional mechanisms preserving the knowledge the CEO brought to the table. Also, rules create clear lines of succession, so destabilizing struggles over who gets to take over the group's leadership become less likely.'

Intelligence on al-Qaeda indicates it's more of a bureaucratic group — unsurprising, since terrorist organizations that have been around for a while tend to evolve that way. Since the drone attacks started, there has been no significant correlation between successful strikes and a reduction in al-Qaeda attacks. 'The case for the drone program, at its heart, is that killing significant numbers of underlings AND a small number of high-level leaders is severely weakening the group's operating ability. Jordan's study suggests that al-Qaeda just isn't the kind of group that can be beaten that way.'"

Comments

The Air Force never wins wars. Film at 11.

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry to anyone listening at Fort Meade.

Re:The Air Force never wins wars. Film at 11.

[davester666]

not trying to win. we are working hard trying to boost their ranks via drone strikes on homes and funerals with a bunch of collateral damage, so there are a lot more younger people with a big grudge against the US and nothing better to do than join an organization that can do something about it.

Correlation vs correlation

[SplatMan_DK]

OK, so "there has been no significant correlation between successful strikes and a reduction in al-Qaeda attacks".

Am I the only one thinking things might have been much worse if no terrorist leaders had been taken out at all?

Re:Correlation vs correlation

[Simon Brooke]

You're not thinking at all, you're just emoting.

If you were thinking you would realise that drone strikes on a civilian population - on women, on children, on funerals, on weddings - recruit a thousand terrorists for every one they kill. Of course the CIA and the military promote this policy. More terrorists means more money for the CIA and the military, terrorism and counter-terrorism are inherently symbiotic. But foreign policy should not be dictated by the needs of inter-agency pissing matches in Washington DC.

Re:Correlation vs correlation

[rudy_wayne]

OK, so "there has been no significant correlation between successful strikes and a reduction in al-Qaeda attacks".

Am I the only one thinking things might have been much worse if no terrorist leaders had been taken out at all?

If there is no significant correlation between successful strikes and a reduction in al-Qaeda attacks, then, no, things wouldn't be worse. It would be the same.

The bigger issue that no one wants to admit is that we are dealing lunatics and engaging them, is a mistake. During World War II, both Germany and Japan eventually admitted defeat and gave up. But that's because you were dealing with people who were somewhat rational. The people we are dealing with today are literally insane. No amount of military action will ever convince them to quit. As a result, You only have 2 choices:

Kill every last one of them

Contain and isolate them

Re:Correlation vs correlation

[fredrated]

Probably not, but that doesn't make it correct. The drone murder of innocent people, which has been widespread and widely reported, is the best recruiting strategy for terrorists money can buy. I fear that much more than not replacing replacable leaders.

Re:Correlation vs correlation

[Charliemopps]

OK, so "there has been no significant correlation between successful strikes and a reduction in al-Qaeda attacks".

Am I the only one thinking things might have been much worse if no terrorist leaders had been taken out at all?

How would things be worse? Keep in mind, our actions in the middle east over the past decade have killed hundreds of thousands of people directly... and probably many more indirectly. How many innocent foreigners are you willing to sacrifice to save 1 US citizen? 3000 people died in 9/11 and we've killed at least 100x that to prevent another attack. It seems just a tad over board to me.

Re:Correlation vs correlation

[r1348]

You're not the only one, but you're wrong. The "collateral damage" is effectively supplying terrorist organizations with unlimited manpower.
Cut their fundings instead, this might also lead to some surprising discoveries...

Re:Correlation vs correlation

[kilfarsnar]

You're not thinking at all, you're just emoting.

If you were thinking you would realise that drone strikes on a civilian population - on women, on children, on funerals, on weddings - recruit a thousand terrorists for every one they kill. Of course the CIA and the military promote this policy. More terrorists means more money for the CIA and the military, terrorism and counter-terrorism are inherently symbiotic. But foreign policy should not be dictated by the needs of inter-agency pissing matches in Washington DC.

Agreed, but it's not about pissing matches. It's about the ability to project power to get what you want, using those counter-terrorism and other agencies. It's also about using the blowback to demand ever more power. Hegelian Dialectic anyone?

The US's core policy of manipulating governments and societies in the Middle East to secure energy sources and stave off competitors isn't going to change any time soon. So the coercive tactics used in that policy likewise will not change. We'll just go on pissing off local populations, creating more terrorists, and treating it as a problem to be managed, like industrial waste.

I don't see the situation changing unless the US changes it's foreign policy, or the locals give up national pride and radical Islam.

Re:Correlation vs correlation

[AthanasiusKircher]

The bigger issue that no one wants to admit is that we are dealing lunatics and engaging them, is a mistake. During World War II, both Germany and Japan eventually admitted defeat and gave up. But that's because you were dealing with people who were somewhat rational.

Yep. 'Cause gathering up millions of people and mass murdering them is "somewhat rational" behavior. (Germany -- see "Concentration Camps") Or ordering thousands of soldiers to go on suicide missions, sometimes without any hint of success, and without any good evidence that it actually was a more successful strategy... very rational. (Japan -- see "Kamikaze") Or... well, isn't that enough for a start?

The people we are dealing with today are literally insane.

Yeah, I know. They are willing to blow themselves up in suicide attacks, and they don't even care about whether they take women or children with them. Oh wait... that sounds just like some of the things Germany and Japan did.

No amount of military action will ever convince them to quit.

No amount of military action convinced Hitler to quit -- when surrounded, he simply committed suicide, along with convincing a lot of others to do the same. As for Japan, well, the militarists who were basically running the show through much of the war would have never given in -- in fact, they staged a coup against the Emperor's wishes to surrender, taking over the Imperial Palace. Luckily, the surrender broadcast recording had been hidden, and once that was played on the radio, it was over.

There was a "whole lotta crazy" going on during WWII as well -- and it was only through superior military forces and intervention at the highest level of leaders (the general staff in Germany after the suicide of Hitler, the emperor himself in Japan, who had previously been less assertive in reining in the militarists) that they were "convinced to quit."

Re:Correlation vs correlation

[dave420]

No, "They are feeling marginalised, whether correctly or not, as a group, and want to regain some control over their existence by removing the very visible foreign influence being exerted upon them" is more apt. They don't hate "our" freedom - they want their freedom. I'm not saying they're right or wrong, but to assume it's something so ridiculously childishly simple as that trite 4-word-saying is only going to ensure the violence continues.

No-one wakes up one day and thinks "I'm going to become a terrorist" - it takes years and years (and frequently generations) of external pressure on a group by perceived outsiders, to the point where their only perceived options are violent struggle. If they lack military superiority, then they do whatever they can to effect their ends, which usually means terrorism, as that is the most cost-effective means at their disposal. This often causes counter-factions forming to battle the first group, increasing the violence and diminishing the chances of a successful (read: peaceful) outcome. I don't expect you to understand, as you most likely live an incredibly comfortable life compared to those who would engage in terrorism.

If people in power started to listen to concerned groups of citizens, and earnestly engage them regarding their perceived grievances, either the groups would be happy with the outcome of any talks (if their grievances are legitimate and the talks are indeed earnest), or their grievances are shown to be illusions - either way the powers that be don't have egg on their face, and if anyone does try to attack them (using terrorism or otherwise), they have the moral high ground without doubt, enabling them to use diplomacy to find allies who will help with their cause, as well as being able to show the world just who they are dealing with without having to lie about the intentions and grievances of those who are attacking.

A great example of this is in Northern Ireland, where systematic abuse of Catholic areas caused great consternation among the Catholic people, and the British government simply refused to listen to the increasing cries to do something about it. That continued for decades, until elements from the Catholic population decided the only way they could get Britain to listen was to pick up arms and make them listen. This caused elements within the Protestant community to also up arms to defend themselves. The fucked up thing is that it worked - Britain took steps to end the carnage which included the initial requests of the concerned Catholics a generation or two ago. If the British had listened to the Catholics at the beginning, had fixed the institutionalised discrimination they faced, and didn't act like they had every right in the world to do what they were doing, then the Troubles would never have happened.

For the US to end terrorism against itself, it should have listened to the people from the Muslim countries when it started to push its weight around - they cried foul when they perceived the US was treading all over their values, and instead of addressing it, they were ignored, causing their grievances to fester and spread over the generations. The US kept on doing what it was doing, unabated, and we found ourselves on 9/11 2001. You should read the Al Qaeda manifesto - most of it is serious common sense, calling for the US to simply be respectful of the cultures it was knocking around, for its own benefit, in the Middle East.

Or you can just say "they hate our freedom" and ignore everything. I guess that's easier, so it must be right.

Re:Correlation vs correlation

[Savage-Rabbit]

OK, so "there has been no significant correlation between successful strikes and a reduction in al-Qaeda attacks".

Am I the only one thinking things might have been much worse if no terrorist leaders had been taken out at all?

The problem is that US has gone overboard with these 'decapitation strikes' (read: assassinations) and they are causing blowback. A further problem is that Al-Qaeda is highly resistant to this kind of strategy because it is just as much an idea as it is an organization and you cannot kill an idea with a drone strike or an M4 carbine. Because it is primarily an idea or a philosophy, Al-Quaeda operates more like a franchising company (or maybe like an MLM outfit) than a traditional guerrilla organization. In addition to a religious philosophy, Al-Quaeda provides information on bomb making, how to train, how to operate weapons and how to obtain them, how to communicate securely and how to evade security forces etc... People motivated by Al-Quaeda's message often form cells first and then contact the organization for support, not the other way around. Al-Quaeda will bankroll promising groups and operations but their control over these groups can be pretty limited. I've heard accounts of motivated 'Mujahideen' showing up in the Pakistani tribal country, seeking out al-Quaeda and 'pitching' operations to them like a Hollywood director would 'pitch' a movie script or a TV show to a studio. Decapitating al-Quaeda cells with drone strikes or special forces ops is like a never ending game of whack-a-mole because there is an endless supply of martyrs that are often recruited from the human 'collateral damage' of drone strikes. Even if the director of the CIA could snap with his fingers and every al-Quaeda fighter on earth would drop dead today the idea of al-Quaeda would live on and new cells would form and the 'war on terror' would continue tomorrow because, as I said before, you can't kill an idea.

Wait, so dropping bombs on people isn't working?

[terevos]

So let me get this straight.... Dropping bombs on people doesn't make them stop attacking you?

Whenever I get into an argument, I just punch the other guy in the face. That usually stops the argument and everyone walks away with a happy smile.

Am I the only one

[kyldere]

Am I the only one who finds this article comparing terrorist orginizations to (US) corporations darkly humorous? ... Maybe I just haven't had enough coffee this morning.

Maybe just get out of the middle east altogether?

[walterbyrd]

No troops, no money, no sanctions, no weapons sales, nothing. Not to any mid-east country, including Israel.

Just buy their oil, and that's it. What other business do we have there? Let the chips fall where they may.

Why is the US putting itself in the middle of their ancient, perpetual, non-sensicle, squabbles?

I hate to say it, but: let the crazies kill each other, if that's what they want to do. They have been doing it forever, and US presence only gives them somebody else to blame.

  All those lives, all of those trillions of dollars, for what? We are no safer from terrorism. In fact, we may be more at risk.

Help one tribe, and you piss off another. Never fails. The "good guys" one day, are despotic leaders, and US haters the next. I think the US supported both Sadam, and Osama, at one point.

As the computer said in "War Games" : "The only way to win is to not play."

Re:If you have the opportunity

[Anonymous Coward]

Using laughable intelligence from foreign powers and bad actors, using signature kills, and making errors that murder innocent civilians effectively turns a non-supportive population into a supportive population IS the problem. Your final solution will just create more opportunities for people to become supporters of the terrorists (and not the USian ones that are raining down death on everything remotely from thousands of miles away), so you're really suggesting genocide. Good luck with that.

Killing va remote control and video game interface

[Anonymous Coward]

When you kill their friends and family via remote control and using a video game interface is it any wonder that there are more "terrorists" created every year?
Keep in mind that one person's "terrorist" is another person's "patriot", we should reverse all the Presidents' "Foreign Policy" which is really a Foreign Entanglement Policy.

It really is no wonder that the peoples of the Middle East refer to the USA as the Great Devil, I think I would too were I borne there.

start shipping truck loads of money there

[alen]

get the governments to support western investment into the business structure to put people to work. people who have a life tend to not become terrorists.

look at the US. military recruitment falls with a good economy

Re:If you have the opportunity

[cayenne8]

I can't imagine that killing off AQ leaders doesn't hurt them some, which is good.

So, keep droning them and add in other measures that even more effectively kills them, weakens them and brings them down.

There is no one single method that will eliminate them, so use all tools at your disposal.

Re:Whats the alternative?

[Simulant]

IMHO,

Ultimately this is a culture war and will only be won over the long term. For starters we could push back against Saudi Arabia instead of coddling them. I don't see how anyone can expect to win a war against Islamic fundamentalist terror when the spiritual center of Islam is controlled by fundamentalists with unlimited funds from oil sales. We also need to promote a more equitable distribution of wealth, world wide. Poverty breeds violence, ignorance, and fundamentalists of many stripes.

We could quit behaving like hypocrites, ignoring blatant and obscene human rights abuses by our Islamic dictatorship "allies" because it's profitable in the short term.

We could quit pissing our pants at the thought of terrorism, accept that it may occasionally happen (as it always has), and carry on instead of over reacting. Islamic fundamentalist terrorism has never represented the existential threat to western society that some would have us believe. It may be a thorn in our side for quite some time but the pain and damage it inflicts is entirely absorbable.

We should quit using this pathetic war on terror as an excuse to destroy ourselves.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[bluefoxlucid]

Right. Strategic bombing was always a dumbass move.

Anti-Drone arguments are so frequently flawed.

[Kelbear]

The problem with the VAST majority of criticisms against drone warfare is this: /They don't cite alternatives./

If an author has a problem with intervention policy. THAT is what the author should be targeting! Drones are incidental to the intervention policy and are off-point. If the goal is to persuade the audience against intervention, then the subject of intervention needs to be directly addressed.

If an author has a problem with drone warfare itself, then present the alternatives. If "boots on the ground" is a more effective way to ensure surgical precision and minimal collateral damage, advocate for that and present the supporting arguments, and preemptively address the counter-argument of the potential for taking casualties along the way as a necessary cost of preserving civilian life and reducing the amount of backlash that creates new terrorists. If the author believes that counterintelligence and local partnerships is more effective, then THAT should also be presented, citing past successes in reducing insurgency and improvements to civilian quality of life.

But if the author has a beef with drone warfare, and presents no alternatives, then they leave the massive hole in their argument of "If not drones, then what?". If the perception of drones is that they kill enemies and prevent us from losing soldiers in the process, and the author wants to do away with drones, then the audience is left to wonder: "Is this author really suggesting that we should lose our soldiers for no good reason, when we could have used drones instead?" Address that question head on!

Re:Anti-Drone arguments are so frequently flawed.

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with drone warfare is that deployment of US military assets against civilian criminals in another nation is several kinds of wrong (violation if the US constitution, international treaty, and basic human rights)

It would not magically get better if a US SEAL team were kicking in the door instead of a remote controlled plane dropping a missile.

The targets of these attacks are civilian citizens of a nation we are not at war with (no declaration of war from Congress) where the US does not have police powers (not a US territory so not our jurisdiction). We have no business being involved at all.

Re:Anti-Drone arguments are so frequently flawed.

[david_thornley]

Look, the argument is that drone strikes aren't effective against terrorism, and the critics give reasons why. If correct, that means that drone strikes aren't working, and that we should look for other ideas. Suppose we were using voodoo dolls to attack terrorists, and somebody pointed out it didn't work. Would you then insist on using voodoo dolls until the guy came up with other ideas? Isn't it useful to know just that something isn't working? Is it sane and intelligent to do something that you know doesn't work because you don't get an alternative wrapped up like a present?

Re:If you have the opportunity

[bluefoxlucid]

Imagine you're at a wedding.

You have a Pakistani friend, nice girl. Moved here to get away from all this bullshit.

She invited two of her cousins. They have friends as well, who were invited. One of those friends is a suspected--but not proven--terrorist. He's on a list of people who may or may not be associated with a terrorist cell which may or may not exist and may or may not be associated with Al Qaeda.

A missile comes in. You're at the edge of the crowd, fortunately; you get scraped up a little, but you're fine. You find yourself surrounded by the wounded, by pieces of bodies. The mangled upper half of your cute Pakistani friend lies beside you, silent, bloody, almost unrecognizable. There's nothing left of the maybe-could-be-might-not-be-terrorist, of course: we got him.

This is the story of many. For many more, there is no story: they were too close.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[mfh]

If anything happened to Musk as of right now, Tesla would be divided and absorbed into the old model. He is a visionary and visionaries have to be protected like you protect the King in a game of chess. Look at what's happening to Apple.

Re:Maybe just get out of the middle east altogethe

[walterbyrd]

You are making the classic mistake of fighting the last war.

These are not the 1930s or 1940s. We are not fighting countries but loosely connected groups.

There is no way to win in the middle-east. Any involvement just makes us the bad guy.

Of course

[Richy_T]

Of course it's a bureaucracy, it was created by the CIA.

Am I joking? I don't even know.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[Anonymous Coward]

Strategic bombing involves a beatable enemy with clearly definable material & infrastructure. "Ending terrorism" is about as likely as "ending drug abuse", you'll never do it and you'll do a massive amount of damage in the process of trying. You mitigate its effects (building design, reasonable security measures, arrest/prosecution, etc) & try to remove the impetus for those committing it (listen to complaints from the region, stabilize economy, prevent collateral damage, etc) and accept that there will still be a few crazies who will commit. Most of the areas where terrorism flourishes are war torn or in economic shambles, removing those two factors and 98% of the worlds terrorists will vanish within a generation. Simply bombing them is a great way of making more terrorists, as you almost certainly have significant numbers of innocent casualties, making more people in the area sympathetic to their cause and don't remove any of the reasoning behind why they are doing it in the first place.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[MachineShedFred]

And somehow, this administration finds these stories and situations to be perfectly fine; but "walling" someone (and leaving them alive) is somehow morally reprehensible.

I find both to be repugnant, but let's get serious: The Obama Justice Department finds killing innocents that happen to be in the same area as a suspected bad guy to be okay, but smacking around known assholes to get information on other known assholes to be a prosecutable offense.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[Anonymous Coward]

Replace the word "terrorist" with "criminal" and see how absurd your argument is in the context of *BOMBING CIVILIANS*. No, the correct thing to do is to treat terrorists like the criminals they are, try them, and arrest them. The point isn't to end terrorism by capturing all the terrorists. It's to have a system of justice in place so (1) less people have a desire to become terrorists and (2) because it's just to have a justice system and unjust to just bomb civilians because one of the people may be a criminal.

Nah. We should start drone striking board rooms with CEOs in America. In America, the mere fear of being arrested for the white collar crimes you commit is so horrible and catastrophic to the organization--and all the other organizations which apparently also have CEOs guilty of white collar crimes--we must let the CEOs free and at most demand a percentage of their ill gotten gains from the corporation (with no admission of guilt). Organized crime on the other side of the planet gets a lot of collateral damage with bombs where they "try" not to kill civilians. Imagine if during Prohibition the fed had used car bombs against the mob. And, hell, the mob at times was more respectable than what we have today in corporate America.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with this is in 10-20 years they too will have flying remote bombers and when they bomb our military and hit our civilians, they can legitimately claim, "Well that's what the US gets for hiding its military leaders within civilian populations." Don't doubt that what comes around will go around regarding this technology. And that is a scary thought.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[gweihir]

Well, the one thing the US has never understood is that basically all opposition it faces is because nobody likes a primitive bully. Rater obviously, pissing people off more is not the solution to make them less pissed-off. Killing a lot of innocents in a Goliath-like and completely unapologetic fashion makes the US the of of the least likable and least honorable nations on the planet, and that is saying quite something.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[Alioth]

That's no excuse for the drone attacks.

The young man in the (not really hypothetical, but real situation since it happened) is that he's now probably gone from a young man trying to just get on with life to an angry young man who now wants revenge against the United States and is thinking of joining a terror group. You may have or may not have killed a terrorist off in your drone attack, but you've almost certainly turned a lot of not-particularly-bothered-about-the-US young men into angry young men now out for revenge and liable to become terrorists.

Drone attacks are also extremely cowardly. People perfectly safe sitting in bunkers thousands of miles away attacking wedding parties is cowardly. Cowardly and unproductive. If you're going to kill people at least have the valour to do it while facing them.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[Anonymous Coward]

The US has only performed strategic bombing twice, and it was back in WWII over Japan. Nuclear bombs are strategic. A GBU dropped from a Predator, Reaper, of manned fighter is tactical bombing.

This is completely wrong.
Strategic bombing was employed extensively in WWII.
When you bomb factories, worker populations, or rail and transportation networks, that is strategic bombing.
When you bomb the enemy units directly engaged with your units, that is tactical bombing.

Strategic bombing was the bombing of choice for particularly the British Air command in WW2 and used extensively by the United States as well. We also did tactic bombing of course, but it was quite an argument at the time of which was preferred.

I'm sure additional examples from other conflicts can be provided as well, but to suggest that strategic bombing strictly implies nuclear weapons is false.

Missing the (well, a) point

[Ghostworks]

Saying that drone warfare is not particularly good at decapitating an institutional terrorist organization like Al Qaeda is missing the point. Or at least a key point. Drone warfare has made large scale terrorist training largely impossible. The boot camps and months long, practical courses in guerrilla warfare that used to be an Al Qaeda staple are now just very visible, attractive targets for drones. Drone warfare occasionally knocks out a head, but it really undermines the base.

In all force, there is some deterrence power. For some technologies, the deterrence is the whole point. For example, land mines aren't meant to be a good way to blow up people, they're meant to be a good way to prevent groups of people from traversing an area once you advertise that it's full of mines. Here, drones are useful for rapid, cheap attacks of opportunity... but the fact that they are almost always ready means long-term, open-air training camps are suicide.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[Jmc23]

Wow, you sure have a lot of unfounded beliefs for someone who is a proponent of Science.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[mrxak]

It won't take genocide to win the war. It will take a lot of deaths, but considering they want to wipe out everyone who doesn't follow islam, we should at least acknowledge the stakes.

There are secular muslims. Just like there's secular people in every religion and society. There are cultural muslims just like there are those who put up Christmas trees and talk about Easter bunnies but don't go to church every Sunday. Not everyone in muslim countries is convinced they should slaughter the infidels as their prophet commands. The problem is, those secular muslims are terrified of the practicing muslims, and for good reason. You don't dare speak out against jihad, call yourself an atheist, or suggest that maybe mohammed wasn't right about absolutely everything.

So long as we can prevent nuclear weapons from falling into the hands of the fundamentalists, I'm actually pretty optimistic that this war can be won with a minimum of bloodshed (and by minimum, I think back to the minimum of bloodshed it took to defeat fascism or communism in the last century). The world is becoming more and more interconnected. I certainly believe that, given a real choice, everyone would rather live in a westernized democracy than a fundamentalist theocracy where you can be executed for your beliefs or speaking your mind. The more they know about us, the more they will want to be like us. It's just a matter of getting our message, our ideology, out there for people to hear it.

But, in the meantime, we do need to wage the war that they declared on us. We need to do so with all the tools at our disposal, recognizing that there are, indeed, secular and cultural muslims that would support our ideology if given the opportunity to do so, and can be allies against the fundamentalists in the long term. Killing those individuals would be a mistake. But don't for a second think a lot of those individuals are hanging out with terrorist leaders.

Re:If you have the opportunity

[OneAhead]

Thanks for illustrating the concept "whackjob" in my previous post. Saves me some explaining. Or wait, was that for real? You never know with Poe's law...

Re:If you have the opportunity

[mrxak]

I believed very much as you do, once. But after seeing how terrorist leaders tend to be more affluent than most, and the foot soldiers come from every economic background, I wanted to find out for myself the actual causes of jihad.

So I'll ask you, have you bought into a narrative? Have you done your own research or are you just listening to what others tell you? Have you read the qur'an and hadith, and the writings of islamic scholars who have studied islamic scripture? Seriously, go do your own studying of the issue and reach your own conclusions. I was surprised by what I found and you will be too.

I am not advocating genocide, here. I recognize that there are secular muslims who do pay only lip service to islam to prevent from getting killed by those who do more than just pay lip service. I would much rather empower them and make them our allies. But I don't think we should do nothing while the fundamentalists are killing us. This is a war that mohammed himself declared on all non-believers, and there will be no peace negotiation because the only acceptable end to them is the extermination of our way of life and all who oppose them. Again, not everyone who calls themselves a muslim thinks that way, but those who don't are considered heretics and the terrorists want to kill them too.