The Real Reason Why We Can't Defeat ISIS [View all]

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http://www.alternet.org/world/real-reason-why-we-cant-defeat-isis


Black oil pump jacks in the desert of Bahrain, Middle East
Photo Credit: Philip Lange


In a recent AlterNet piece, I pointed to studies showing that Islamic terrorism is rooted more in politics and economics than in fanatical religious belief. In a blog response to that piece, evolutionary biologist and professor Jerry A. Coyne asks, “Even if Werleman were right, and I don’t think he is, what are we then to do? Let ISIS roam free, killing as they go?”

It’s a good question. Unfortunately, the answer is both simple and difficult to reconcile: we can’t defeat ISIS, and even if we could, there will be another group in its place, fueled by the same grievances and objectives but with slightly different branding.

The U.S. has killed no less than a half-dozen al-Qaeda number twos and number ones. From Yemen to Iraq, from Afghanistan to Somalia, the U.S. has proven skillfully adept at taking out the leadership positions of Islamic terrorist groups, but 13 years after 9/11, and after $3 trillion and the deaths of 7,000 U.S. soldiers, the threat against the U.S. is greater than ever.

Despite this extraordinary and focused effort, the question then becomes: why does the threat against the U.S. remain unbeaten? The answer is that our overall foreign policy in the Middle East remains unchanged, and while we remain addicted to the region’s cheap oil, our efforts to arm and fund oppressive despotic regimes will continue.