Airbrush

ISIS vs the entire World is technically WW3. They are conquering territory and making lots of money, just like the Nazis of WWII. How long before they have enough money to purchase a nuke from either N.Korea, Pakistan, or the former Soviet Union? Can you think of any organization that is MORE extreme than ISIS? They will execute in mass, behead, burn alive, and so why not destroy a major city to set an example? They are the level of delusion that would justify destroying entire cities. How do you retaliate against an organization living within human shields? ISIS is the prime candidate for the first nuclear attack since WWII. They feel invulnerable. Like the pundits on CNN say, ISIS is VERY Islamic. The good news is we have their game plan, the Quran and those other "holy" texts that they are following literally. They believe they are going to fight Armageddon soon and Jesus will return to reward them. This should allow us to ambush them, figuratively speaking. What is it like living the daily life of an ISIS fighter? Is their commanding officer abusive? Do they threaten recruits with death for minor infractions? Do you think some of the foot soldiers are somewhat disillusioned? How do you get out after you sign a contract with ISIS?

You stated: "The chances of a DVD (which is of little more value than a pamphlet) changing the minds of anyone who hasn’t already decided to leave is minimal; after all it takes weeks to de-program the converted, what chance does a DVD/pamphlet really have." You don't know what the value of a deprogramming DVD is. Have you seen them all and decided they are ineffective? "It has little more value than a pamphlet?" How do you know? Did you do a study and find out DVDs are only as effective as a pamphlet? You are guilty of logical errors. You don't know how hard it is to change the mind of a recruit that was lied to and abused after they joined ISIS. Cults always bait and switch. I read your link, which is quite good, and it does not support your supposition that recruits cannot be reached by a DVD. "....Former cult members, esepcially former jihadists educated about brainwashing and undue influence are the ideal method to connect, especially with young people. Invite us into mosques, churches and synagogues; police stations and politicians' offices; schools, libraries and town meetings. Community leaders are already talking about how terrorism prevention should be put on a par with anti-bullying, substance abuse and suicide prevention in our schools. They are looking for counternarratives to Flames of War and other ISIS propaganda and some have even suggested that the Department of Homeland Security offer a prize for the best counter message. This counter-narrative approach needs to be combined with the knowledge of cults, the social science of influence, theology and counter-terrorism expertise." Now you are going to argue that DVD debates alone will not change anyone's mind. Certainly. It will be hard to get any message to a recruit that is being programmed. Recruits are watched every minute of every day and will be prevented from watching ANY DVDs or any TV or see any movies, or any news, or do ANYTHING they may have enjoyed doing before they were tricked into joining. Certainly they are all disillusioned. They are brutalized and terrorized until they become robots for the leaders. They can be deprogrammed, and you don't know how long it will take.

OK, let's forget about that idea, since you decided it would have minimal value, and you are an authority on what it takes to change an ISIS recruit's mind. It doesn't matter if the good guys CAN be just as cruel. ISIS has publically demonstrated they are the MOST cruel. What has been implanted in the minds of the recruits from childhood and how deeply committed are they to ISIS? I think only superficially. They were promised good pay. I propose most of them were lied to, are borderline disillusioned, and there may be a tipping point for defecting that is not as difficult as you suggest. A DVD debate could have an impact.

The leaders of ISIS have entrenched views. Many may be Baathists friends of Hussein. They have nothing to lose, since they were as good as dead at the time Hussein was captured and executed. They may not be religious at all, but know they must act like pious holy men to their followers. They learned cruelty from the master of all thugs, Saddam. The FOLLOWERS may not have entrenched views, since they were probably told lies to get them to join the fight. After they have been fighting in 110 degree heat, wearing scarves and ski masks, hauling around heavy ammo, breathing dust from the technical in front, you see your friends killed, and the food is not quite as good as they expected. They may feel abused by their commanding officers (think how strict the command structure is in totalitarian regimes), they may DEFECT based on finding a DVD of a debate between an imam expressing the extremist view, and a moderate imam (that is carefully selected to be a better debater and more charismatic than the opposition) that can make the extremists look foolish. That is what I mean by truthful propaganda. Like I said, in movies the bad guys are always more cruel than the good guys. Are the girls recruited (one in six recruits are females) AWARE the recruiters burn people alive? Imagine how strict and militaristic the handlers are. They must treat recruits very harshly so they will live in fear and submit to their orders without question. They cry themselves to sleep thinking "What the hell did I get myself into?!"

There was plenty of "hard intel". We knew that Saddam Hussein was a petty criminal who rose in the Baathist ranks. We saw his brutal tactics against his political rivals. We saw him attack Iran for a 10-year war. We saw him invade and occupy Kuwait. We saw him set all the oil wells on fire in Kuwait, after he realized he was getting kicked out of Kuwait. We saw him kill thousands of Kurds with gas. You don't know how much the proponents of the war cared about the facts. You don't know they "cherry picked" info from dubious sources. I argue they stretched, but with valid intentions. The Iraq war was a mistake, not a delusion. Hind sight is 20 20 vision. You are the armchair quarterback that knows the best plays, AFTER the fact. The UN inspectors were denied access by Hussein. AFTER the war the inspectors searched for the nukes and bio weapons we suspected he had, but it took time to realize they did not exist. Not a delusion, only a mistake, like the Vietnam war was a mistake. Since ISIS leadership is probably populated with Baathists, who did Hussein's dirty work, thus beheading and burning people alive - let's see what Wiki says about "Ba'athism". It appears that ISIS is based on secular ideology, but masquerading as religious. "Ba'athism (Arabic: البعث‎ al-ba‘ath meaning "renaissance"/"resurrection") is an Arab nationalist ideology that promotes the development and creation of a unified Arab state through the leadership of a vanguard party over a progressive revolutionary government. The ideology is officially based on the theories of Zaki al-Arsuzi (according to the pro-Syrian Ba'ath movement), Michel Aflaq and Salah al-Din al-Bitar. A Ba'athist society seeks enlightenment, renaissance of Arab culture, values and society. It supports the creation of single-party states, and rejects political pluralism in an unspecified length of time – the Ba'ath party theoretically uses an unspecified amount of time to develop an enlightened Arabic society. Ba'athism is based on principles of Arab nationalism, pan-Arabism, Arab socialism, as well as social progress. It is a secular ideology. A Ba'athist state supports socialist economics to a varying degree, and supports public ownership over the heights of the economy but opposes the confiscation of private property. Socialism in Ba'athist ideology does not mean state socialism or economic equality, but modernisation; Ba'athists believe that socialism is the only way to develop an Arab society which is truly free and united. The two Ba'athist states which have existed (Iraq and Syria) forbade criticism of their ideology through authoritarian governance. These governments have been labelled as neo-Ba'athist, because the form of Ba'athism developed in Iraq and Syria was very different from the Ba'athism of Aflaq and al-Bitar; for example, none of the ruling Ba'ath parties actually pursued or pursues a policy of unifying the Arab world." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baathist

I disagree. Nobody knew the facts about Hussein's WMDs until after years of searching for them. He attacked and occupied Kuwait. He used WMDs on the Kurds, which crossed the "red line". We were not delusional to go into Iraq, only mistaken. There was no way of knowing the outcome, that Hussein's Baathists would disappear, and then reappear to lead ISIS. We were not delusional to go into Vietnam, only mistaken. Attacking Afghanistan was not a delusional act. We located Al Qaeda training camps there and did the reasonable thing to destroy them and began the search for Bin Laden, who PUBLICALLY declared war on the USA. No delusion there. ISIS is the most delusional organization that has existed in modern times, according to abundant evidence.

To be educated in ONE field does not make a comprehensive thinker. It may give the person a false sense of understanding. Remember the saying "a little knowledge is dangerous"? An "educated" person can be as delusional as anyone else in EVERY field, except in their ONE field of study.

"...While the term propaganda has acquired a strongly negative connotation by association with its most manipulative and jingoistic examples, propaganda in its original sense was neutral and could refer to uses that were generally positive, such as public health recommendations, signs encouraging citizens to participate in a census or election, or messages encouraging persons to report crimes to law enforcement...." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda When a brutal, violent group is challenging ALL nations, majority rules, it is obvious WHO are the bad guys. In movies the bad guys are always the most cruel. We have all been conditioned to this all our lives, even if we think we are not. Better propaganda DOES equate to better argument. "Better propaganda" is truthful propaganda. If propaganda is truthful, it should win a debate over deceptive propaganda. A good debater can show how deceptive the ISIS recruitment machine is. Jihadis are absolutely NOT "freedom fighters" because they are imposing their will upon conquered populations. Even THEY know they are fighting AGAINST freedom. Freedom is contrary to an Islamic Caliphate. This is very similar to the Nazis in WWII. The Vietnam war was a huge delusion. That war accomplished nothing but kill a lot of people. Years before we gave up there, the war protests were raging across the USA and other nations. But our govt had noble intentions, to stop communism, and support freedom, a democratic South Vietnam, which happened to be corrupt and not worth supporting. But we didn't know that until it was too late.

When the US invaded Iraq, because we were deluded by mythical WMDs that Hussein was supposedly going to use to attack the USA, it was not clear that action was delusional. When we invaded Afghanistan because of 9/11, that was not clearly a delusional act. According to ALL nations currently affected by the current rampage of ISIS, and according to the majority moderate Muslims of the world, ISIS is obnoxiously delusional, in the extreme.

That certainly is high level delusion, but brutal, blatant, world-conquest even trumps that. They believe they can conquer all nations.

Then this is a debate between the forces of moderate Islam and extreme Islam. Challenge them to debates using the most charismatic imams. Have the debates on media that ISIS followers use. Tape the debates and drop them into enslaved populations. The good guys should win the debates because they make better more reasonable arguments, unless you believe ISIS are freedom fighters and not terrorists. You also need to find something productive for disillusioned ISIS followers to do while they are deprogrammed.

The time to educate is never past. You can always change people if they are exposed to the truth and facts through education. The problem is how to enlighten them? South Koreans send DVDs by balloons into the north. We need to do better than ISIS in the media. They have been winning the propaganda war so far. If ISIS is using dark twisted education to recruit, then we need to do better by exposing HOW it is dark and twisted. To do that you need the services of the most charismatic imams, which is the mantra I keep repeating. We need to sew dissent in the ranks, so they quit the fight.

I'm not denouncing the Middle East or hating anyone (except ISIS leadership), I'm only observing how that region has an undue influence over the rest of the world, only because of OIL. When the oil is gone (or when we can force the price of oil down far enough) the Middle East will lose that kind of influence. How is that denouncing or hating anyone? I'm merely recognizing economic forces. If I was a hater, would I propose getting problem ME youths into Boy Scouts? Would I propose a search for the most charismatic imams to run re-education camps? Maybe intentionally burning people alive will not prove to be a tipping point. 40% of all imports into the USA pass through the port of Los Angeles at Long Beach. Can you think of any group that would want to nuke the Port of LA more than ISIS would? That would be more of a tipping point. Rationally most people of most nations realize how interconnected the world is and to cripple the USA would have a negative effect on the world's economy. However, ISIS is such a severe group delusion that their leadership would rationalize that setting off a nuclear bomb, or dirty bomb, in the port of LA would be effective and much more severe an attack on the USA than 9/11 was, and think it would force the US to give up and join the ISIS caliphate. Or could it have the positive effect of forcing the USA to become more self-reliant, when it cannot depend upon foreign imports? Everyone is delusional to some degree about something. Certainly Americans and others are delusional in some ways, but the ISIS delusion is much more severe and insidious. It is on a par with Hitler's or Tojo's plans for world conquest, a delusion that resulted in the needless death of millions, as well as Trillions of dollars spent (in today's dollars) on military operations. But that was a boon for the military-industrial complex and pulled the USA out of the depression into a period of unpresedented economic growth.

The solution is education, and by education I mean REAL education about how the real world really works, not fantasies and verses from the holy book.

How can ISIS have long term success when they are based on delusion? It takes delusional people to want to join. The tactical advantage they have is a large supply of delusional people willing to blow themselves up, or fight in hopeless battles believing they will go to heaven. They are serving the shepherds who are talented, skilled manipulators, . But strategically the leaders are as delusional as Hitler to believe they can conquer ALL countries combined. Impressionable youths, who have no clear path in life so they may join criminal gangs for identity, need to be channeled into something positive and productive, something like boy scouts where they learn boy scout virtues and values, and also science, math, critical thinking, and perhaps training for a career. They also need to be educated in moderate Islam by the best, most charismatic imams that can be found. These impressionable youths can become well versed in the theory of Santa Claus, that their precious "God" is just the good lie about a benevolent spirit that lives in our hearts. How much longer will the supply of oil last in the Middle East? When the oil is gone I think ISIS will also dry up. Their money comes from doners who are wealthy only because of oil. When oil is gone, the M.E. will once again become inconsequential on the world stage, and they can return to the Dark Ages of religion and superstition. How much genius does it take for people to simply suck oil out of the ground and sell it?

Are you sure that "Political Islam" needs to be defeated? I think you mean how to defeat extreme, militant Islam. Political Islam is about as harmless as the Tea Party.

Education can help defeat political Islam. Boko Haram, which is often called "Western education is forbidden", is really "Education if forbidden". Religions don't like science and math. When people are well educated in sciences, they become more skeptical of religions, consistent with the "Theory of Santa Claus". Religions do not encourage critical thinking, but rely totally on FAITH, and encourage "group think". Moderate religious people are moderate because they have a healthy agnosticism and are educated so they can see that religion is mostly a social structure and a group delusion for wishful thinking. Freedom of religion is really freedom to live within a delusion. The leaders of ISIS must be fairly intelligent people because they are able to manipulate their sheep. So they are probably skeptical and agnostic about Islam, but they teach their sheep to follow Blind Faith.

Start with a Ministry of Propaganda to get across a slick message with cool music of young men singing heroic songs.

Observation is a kind of infiltration. The spies watching Bin Laden's compound posed as locals renting an apartment near Bin Ladens. True I propose going further, to pose as leaders of ISIS, which takes time building your credibility within the cult. That is why I say it will take time to implode ISIS. Operatives need time to gather a reputation and following. You seem to agree with me that infiltrations are probably taking place now. How likely is it that ISIS leaders are basing their decisions on what they read on this forum? Would it be a bad thing for ISIS leaders to become more distrustful of recruits? And by "recruits" I mean recruits to leadership positions in the organization, not recruiting more sheep to be slaughtered in battle. Think of Stalin's great purge of military commanders when he became distrustful of them to the point of paranoia. Does anyone know what proportion of ISIS leaders are actually Saddam Hussein's Baathist henchmen that went into hiding during the Iraq war?

Anyone else out there watch a lot of CNN everyday, as I do? ISIS is always much discussed there all day. Latest discussion of Fareed Zakaria ZPG is that ISIS is shooting itself in the foot, with their latest strategy. They are all set to collapse from within. Let's hope that we don't hear about them much longer, as they fade on the world stage into trivial obscurity.

What the Arab world needs is a Santa Claus. The theory of Santa Claus in the USA is you teach your children that Santa Claus exists, up until about the age of 5 or 6 then you reveal to the children that Santa Claus is merely "a spirit that lives in our hearts" as my Mom told me as a child. In other words there is NO literal Santa Claus, in the usual sense. Then I immediately began to question the existence of God, since God is like Santa Claus, a good lie about a good spirit that lives in your heart. But I was not through with God yet. I learned in my religious upbringing in the Catholic church, by devout Catholic parents, that God listens to your prayers and I was led to believe that if your prayers are sincere enough, God would answer your prayers. I was a very devout Catholic child and decided that I would pray to God to allow me to fly. I dedicated myself to saying prayers to God humbly asking for the power to fly. After hours of prayers, Hail Marys and Our Fathers, I decided to test God's power. But God did not answer my prayers and I tried but could NOT FLY. Then I really began to doubt the literal existence of God. There is no truer demonstration of faith than to blow yourself up believing you will go to heaven for it. These believers who are the extremists that blow themselves up, need a healthy dose of DOUBT about religion. Fine to be religious but dont take it so seriously. Keep a healthy agnostic overall view. Moderate Muslims, like moderate Christians, don't believe TOO much. Bin Laden and Zarqawi were killed because of human intelligence on the ground, from "foward observers" or spies. Technology cannot see through the head scarfs both leaders and followers wear. The shepherds and sheep all look alike to drones. "Zarqawi was killed in a targeted killing by a Joint US force on June 7, 2006, while attending a meeting in an isolated safehouse approximately 8 km (5.0 mi) north of Baqubah. One United States Air Force F-16C jet dropped two 500-pound (230 kg) guided bombs on the safehouse...." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Musab_al-Zarqawi This is how you do it, you target meetings of leaders. That is hard to know unless you have someone on the ground, in harms way, telling us who is where and when.

The kind of forward observer I'm thinking of is one who recognizes facial features. We don't have drones that can spot "leaders" in a crowd. The only way to target leaders is by human intelligence on the ground. Best would be a MEMBER of the terrorists who knows who the leaders are or can tell the outside when the leaders will be somewhere. There are basically 2 kinds of terrorists, the shepherds and the sheep. The sheep are helpless without guidance from the shepherds. The way to locate leaders is to get a spy inside who is good at playing the role of leader. After a year or so of trustworthy performance, they are given more security clearance, until they can tell the outside world when and where the next meeting of leaders will be, so you can take them all out with one bomb. Maybe they should have a cyanide cap somewhere handy in case they are caught.

Pinpoint air strikes require foward observers, or FO, as the military calls them. You can't get more forward then as a trusted MEMBER of ISIS. This is not from evidence but common sense.

It is amazing how many mafia bosses can be put into prison because of the work of only one informant. To infiltrate ISIS will take very dedicated operatives, with nerves of steel, who can act like real psychopaths. The current bombing campaign is quick and dirty, but locating the ISIS leaders for pinpoint strikes is the most effective way to disable ISIS. They burned the pilot alive because the bombing is doing exactly that to ISIS. "You burn our people alive, so we will burn the pilots who drop the bombs." However bombing always creates collateral damage, unless you have operatives INSIDE ISIS to pinpoint strikes on the ISIS LEADERS. It looks like Jordan can do something about this. Their spokesman made a statement hinting at efforts beyond simple bombing that will take time. It takes time to train willing fighters to slip inside ISIS in order to destroy them, but that is the best way to conquer ISIS. Deprogramming can only be done by expert, CHRISMATIC Imams who can use their religion to get inside the heads of the youths with jihad on their mind. This takes time in a secure environment, a concentration camp for misguided youths. They can have fun playing soccer in the camp, but they need to attend deprogramming meetings all day long, every day.

The material in the asteroid belt orbit is spread out evenly, like clothes evenly distributed in a washing machine. If you put a mass the size of Earth in one place it becomes an off balanced washing machine. Every orbit Jupiter will pull the Earth more and more, maybe throwing the Earth-size mass out of the solar system.