Trump Pledges War on Radical Islamic Terrorism
By Masood Farivar January 18, 2017
President-elect Donald Trump's campaign pledge to wage war on "radical Islamic terrorism" is about to become U.S. policy.
In its emphasis on ideology, it is a war that puts him at odds with his two immediate predecessors. While both former President George W. Bush and President Barack Obama have avoided casting the war on terror in ideological terms for fear of alienating Muslim allies, Trump has stressed that very dimension and the need to counter it ideologically.
"Containing the spread of radical Islam must be a major foreign policy goal of the United States," Trump said in April in the first of two major foreign policy speeches he delivered during the campaign. "Events may require the use of military force. But it's also a philosophical struggle, like our long struggle in the Cold War."
More than campaign rhetoric, it seems to be a deeply held view. In the weeks since his Nov. 8 election, Trump has steadfastly stuck to his hardline position on terror even as he's softened his views on other hot-button issues.
After a Tunisian man drove a truck through a crowded Christmas market in Berlin last month, killing 12 people, Trump tweeted: "This is a purely religious threat, which turned into reality. Such hatred! When will the U.S., and all countries, fight back?"
And when he was asked about his controversial campaign call to bar Muslims from entering the country, he replied: "You know my plans all along – I've been proven to be right."
Blaise Misztal, director of the national security program at the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, said Trump sees radical Islam as an ideological threat to his nationalistic vision of "making America great again."
"I think by seeing the threat as an ideological one, President Trump will see the problem as not just stopping attacks but stopping the spread of that ideology and stopping the potential for further radicalization," Misztal said.
Evolving view
Trump wasn't always so hawkish on fighting terror. Nor was he the first to warn about radical Islam.
The credit for popularizing the phrase goes to his Republican rivals – and some of his subsequent advisers, such as incoming chief strategist Stephen Bannon – who repeatedly chastised Obama for refusing to utter the words. Indeed, in his June 2015 presidential announcement, Trump made no mention of radical Islam and called China a "bigger problem" than Islamic State.
But Trump's rhetoric grew increasingly bellicose as the campaign wore on and a rash of terrorist attacks in Europe and the United States unnerved voters, leading him to make some of his campaign's most incendiary comments and proposals.
After a terror attack in Paris in November 2015 and a deadly shooting by a Muslim couple in San Bernardino, California, the following month, Trump proposed a temporary ban on Muslims entering the U.S.
In March 2015, he told CNN that "Islam hates us" and later defended his comment, saying "large portions of Muslims" have "tremendous hatred" for the West. And two months later when a Muslim-American gunman killed 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Trump blamed the violence on radical Islam and said he favored a suspension of immigration from countries with "a proven history of terrorism."
'Ideological warfare'
In August, with Americans still jittery over terrorism, Trump delivered what some experts saw as his most coherent policy statement on national security. Comparing radical Islam to fascism and communism, he championed a "new approach" and a "long-term plan" to fight what he branded an "ideology of death."
"All actions should be oriented around this goal, and any country which shares this goal will be our ally," he told supporters at Youngstown University in Ohio, echoing Bush's post-9/11 rhetoric.
He advocated "ideological warfare" against Islamic State and vowed to work with NATO and "our friends in the Middle East" and to find "common ground" with Russia to defeat the group.
"My administration will aggressively pursue joint and coalition military operations to crush and destroy ISIS, international cooperation to cut off their funding, expanded intelligence sharing, and cyberwarfare to disrupt and disable their propaganda and recruiting," he said. ISIS is an acronym for Islamic State.
Trump said the common thread among terrorist attacks since 9/11 was the involvement of immigrants or the children of immigrants, and he called for an ideological test for immigrants to screen out those who do not "share our values and respect our people."
The policy implications of Trump's call to arms remain to be seen. Colin Clarke, a political scientist at RAND, said it is too early to tell how the rhetoric of Trump and his advisers translates into policy.
"That still doesn't tell you what he'll do differently in terms of combating the threat," Clarke said. "It doesn't tell you how he's going to allocate resources any differently than the Obama administration."
Homeland secure
Critics of Obama's refusal to acknowledge a link between terrorism and Islam hailed Trump's drive to highlight the issue, but they cautioned against painting the world's 1.5 billion Muslims with a broad ideological brush.
"Actually it does have something to do with Islam," said former CIA Director Michael Hayden. "A lot of it is about Islam. But I quickly add, it's not all about Islam, and for God's sake, it's not about all Muslims."
Apart from his controversial Muslim ban and proposal to work with Russia, nearly everything Trump has proposed to fight terror – bombing IS, working with Middle Eastern allies, and using drones and special forces – are policies that have been carried out by the Obama administration.
"I haven't seen anything [new]," Clarke said. "I've been looking. Trust me. I think a lot of people have."
In securing the American homeland against terrorist attacks since 9/11, the U.S. may have exhausted nearly all the law enforcement, investigative and intelligence tools at its disposal, Hayden said. While mass-casualty attacks like 9/11 have grown highly improbable, he warned that so-called lone wolf attacks by homegrown extremists will be hard to prevent.
New strategy?
According to Pentagon data, in the two years since the U.S. launched a bombing campaign to roll back IS, coalition aircraft have carried out nearly 17,000 airstrikes in Iraq and Syria, damaging or destroying nearly 32,000 targets.
"Getting tough" has its limits, Hayden cautioned. "I'm fond of saying, if being tough is all you needed, if you could kill your way out of this, we'd have been done a decade ago," Hayden said.
But Trump advisers say the threat of international terrorism has grown over the last eight years and requires a new strategy.
"I do think there are, there are clear and broad distinctions between the past administration and the future administration," said James Carafano, director of foreign policy studies at the conservative Heritage Foundation who advises the Trump transition team on foreign policy. "And it's logical that there ought to be big changes because by almost every observable measure, the problem of transnational terrorism is worse than it was eight years ago."
http://www.globalsecurity.org/security/library/news/2017/01/sec-170118-voa01.htm?_m=3n%2e002a%2e1917%2eqx0ao0791x%2e1rhg
By Masood Farivar January 18, 2017
President-elect Donald Trump's campaign pledge to wage war on "radical Islamic terrorism" is about to become U.S. policy.
In its emphasis on ideology, it is a war that puts him at odds with his two immediate predecessors. While both former President George W. Bush and President Barack Obama have avoided casting the war on terror in ideological terms for fear of alienating Muslim allies, Trump has stressed that very dimension and the need to counter it ideologically.
"Containing the spread of radical Islam must be a major foreign policy goal of the United States," Trump said in April in the first of two major foreign policy speeches he delivered during the campaign. "Events may require the use of military force. But it's also a philosophical struggle, like our long struggle in the Cold War."
More than campaign rhetoric, it seems to be a deeply held view. In the weeks since his Nov. 8 election, Trump has steadfastly stuck to his hardline position on terror even as he's softened his views on other hot-button issues.
After a Tunisian man drove a truck through a crowded Christmas market in Berlin last month, killing 12 people, Trump tweeted: "This is a purely religious threat, which turned into reality. Such hatred! When will the U.S., and all countries, fight back?"
And when he was asked about his controversial campaign call to bar Muslims from entering the country, he replied: "You know my plans all along – I've been proven to be right."
Blaise Misztal, director of the national security program at the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, said Trump sees radical Islam as an ideological threat to his nationalistic vision of "making America great again."
"I think by seeing the threat as an ideological one, President Trump will see the problem as not just stopping attacks but stopping the spread of that ideology and stopping the potential for further radicalization," Misztal said.
Evolving view
Trump wasn't always so hawkish on fighting terror. Nor was he the first to warn about radical Islam.
The credit for popularizing the phrase goes to his Republican rivals – and some of his subsequent advisers, such as incoming chief strategist Stephen Bannon – who repeatedly chastised Obama for refusing to utter the words. Indeed, in his June 2015 presidential announcement, Trump made no mention of radical Islam and called China a "bigger problem" than Islamic State.
But Trump's rhetoric grew increasingly bellicose as the campaign wore on and a rash of terrorist attacks in Europe and the United States unnerved voters, leading him to make some of his campaign's most incendiary comments and proposals.
After a terror attack in Paris in November 2015 and a deadly shooting by a Muslim couple in San Bernardino, California, the following month, Trump proposed a temporary ban on Muslims entering the U.S.
In March 2015, he told CNN that "Islam hates us" and later defended his comment, saying "large portions of Muslims" have "tremendous hatred" for the West. And two months later when a Muslim-American gunman killed 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Trump blamed the violence on radical Islam and said he favored a suspension of immigration from countries with "a proven history of terrorism."
'Ideological warfare'
In August, with Americans still jittery over terrorism, Trump delivered what some experts saw as his most coherent policy statement on national security. Comparing radical Islam to fascism and communism, he championed a "new approach" and a "long-term plan" to fight what he branded an "ideology of death."
"All actions should be oriented around this goal, and any country which shares this goal will be our ally," he told supporters at Youngstown University in Ohio, echoing Bush's post-9/11 rhetoric.
He advocated "ideological warfare" against Islamic State and vowed to work with NATO and "our friends in the Middle East" and to find "common ground" with Russia to defeat the group.
"My administration will aggressively pursue joint and coalition military operations to crush and destroy ISIS, international cooperation to cut off their funding, expanded intelligence sharing, and cyberwarfare to disrupt and disable their propaganda and recruiting," he said. ISIS is an acronym for Islamic State.
Trump said the common thread among terrorist attacks since 9/11 was the involvement of immigrants or the children of immigrants, and he called for an ideological test for immigrants to screen out those who do not "share our values and respect our people."
The policy implications of Trump's call to arms remain to be seen. Colin Clarke, a political scientist at RAND, said it is too early to tell how the rhetoric of Trump and his advisers translates into policy.
"That still doesn't tell you what he'll do differently in terms of combating the threat," Clarke said. "It doesn't tell you how he's going to allocate resources any differently than the Obama administration."
Homeland secure
Critics of Obama's refusal to acknowledge a link between terrorism and Islam hailed Trump's drive to highlight the issue, but they cautioned against painting the world's 1.5 billion Muslims with a broad ideological brush.
"Actually it does have something to do with Islam," said former CIA Director Michael Hayden. "A lot of it is about Islam. But I quickly add, it's not all about Islam, and for God's sake, it's not about all Muslims."
Apart from his controversial Muslim ban and proposal to work with Russia, nearly everything Trump has proposed to fight terror – bombing IS, working with Middle Eastern allies, and using drones and special forces – are policies that have been carried out by the Obama administration.
"I haven't seen anything [new]," Clarke said. "I've been looking. Trust me. I think a lot of people have."
In securing the American homeland against terrorist attacks since 9/11, the U.S. may have exhausted nearly all the law enforcement, investigative and intelligence tools at its disposal, Hayden said. While mass-casualty attacks like 9/11 have grown highly improbable, he warned that so-called lone wolf attacks by homegrown extremists will be hard to prevent.
New strategy?
According to Pentagon data, in the two years since the U.S. launched a bombing campaign to roll back IS, coalition aircraft have carried out nearly 17,000 airstrikes in Iraq and Syria, damaging or destroying nearly 32,000 targets.
"Getting tough" has its limits, Hayden cautioned. "I'm fond of saying, if being tough is all you needed, if you could kill your way out of this, we'd have been done a decade ago," Hayden said.
But Trump advisers say the threat of international terrorism has grown over the last eight years and requires a new strategy.
"I do think there are, there are clear and broad distinctions between the past administration and the future administration," said James Carafano, director of foreign policy studies at the conservative Heritage Foundation who advises the Trump transition team on foreign policy. "And it's logical that there ought to be big changes because by almost every observable measure, the problem of transnational terrorism is worse than it was eight years ago."
http://www.globalsecurity.org/security/library/news/2017/01/sec-170118-voa01.htm?_m=3n%2e002a%2e1917%2eqx0ao0791x%2e1rhg
» The Ministry of Commerce decides to open sales outlets for those covered by social care in installme
» Minister of Oil: Iraq's decision to reduce OPEC Plus to achieve balance and stability in the markets
» Despite sending money from Baghdad.. Politician: The regional government refuses to release employee
» Baghdad is a cash cow...and the regional government steals the camel with what it carries
» Anbar Environment monitors violations of land conversion in Ramadi
» Federation of Arab Stock Exchanges: The Iraqi Stock Exchange accounted for 61% of November trading
» The Minister of Labor reveals a campaign to grant loans and plans to expand the employment process f
» Southern Gas: The agreement with the French company Total includes 4 main projects
» Sudanese directs to suspend working hours on Sunday
» Revealing the latest developments in choosing the new President of Parliament
» Media and Communications signs a contract with Azerbaijan to protect civil aviation radio navigation
» Al-Party accuses “sectarian” parties of delaying sending the $700 billion to the region
» The Kurdistan Oil Industry Association announces the joining of an American company
» A fine of 3 times the price.. Iraq reveals how to deal with goods that “violate specifications”
» Regional Government: Next Sunday, official working hours in all government departments
» A deputy reveals the loss of 35 trillion dinars and determines the extent of smuggling
» Al-Nouri: Most of the Central Bank’s decisions are political and do not have an economic content
» Representatives: The region’s failure to adhere to the decisions of the Baghdad government is causin
» 15 illegal outlets in Kurdistan cost the Iraqi treasury a billion dollars annually
» Naguib Sawiris: We are negotiating with government agencies to build an entire city outside Baghdad
» Commerce decides to open sales outlets for those covered by premium care at cost
» Directed to legislate a law that activates partnership between the public and private sectors
» The management of the North Refineries Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Project sets the date for o
» Problems between the region and foreign companies delay the export of oil through Ceyhan
» Parliamentarian: Baghdad has nothing to do with the salary crisis of the region’s employees
» Prime Minister: The Development Road Project will contribute to achieving economic development for t
» Iraq and 4 Arab countries possess more than one million tons of global gold reserves
» The stock market announces weekly trading indicators
» The Prime Minister blesses the activation of the partnership between the Iraqi and Saudi private sec
» “Incompetent” figures are removed.. An expert indicates the influence of “tribal and partisan favori
» Al-Sudani: The path of development will contribute to achieving economic development for the region
» The current stability in Iraq is “temporary,” and this is what Al-Sudani succeeded in doing..An anal
» Shipments worth millions of dollars arrive in Iraq
» Government source: New shipments of dollar supplies arrive in Iraq
» In pictures: Iraqi Special Forces achieve first place in a global exercise in Pakistan
» Dismantling international drug networks in southern Iraq
» “Our soldiers are in a trap.” An American report calls for “courage” to withdraw from Iraq and Syria
» Labor launches electronic application to recruit foreign workers
» Audit Bureau: More than 5,000 financial reports will be issued in 2023
» Advisor to the Ministry of Oil: Iraq achieved 4% of its climate commitments this year
» Iraq is at the top of the 5 largest oil deals within a month
» A year later... where did Resolution 320 arrive at converting agricultural land to residential?
» The judiciary orders the Communications and Media Commission to adopt the Internet Services Licensin
» It does not include cuts or imposing a ban. The Commander-in-Chief approves the plan to secure local
» The discovery of about 50 archaeological sites and new heritage buildings in Kirkuk
» Iraq's exports of oil and its products to America exceed 70 million barrels within 7 months
» Salah al-Din Municipalities: A government move to refer cleaning work to the private sector
» The Sudanese government sends 700 billion to the region again
» Integrity: The Authority’s authority will extend to the private sector
» Preliminary designs for the construction of the Vanguard Bridge
» Maritime studies students prepare for the opening of the Grand Al-Faw Port
» Electricity signs a strategic contract with two companies
» Sudanese: We are serious about restoring the business environment and rehabilitating the institution
» The absence of programs and the presence of material temptations in {electoral propaganda}
» Experts: Integrity deals a strong blow to the corrupt
» Audit Bureau: More than 5,000 financial reports will be issued in 2023
» Dhi Qar adopts a plan to zero all requests for land plots and distributes more than 10,000 residenti
» The Kurdistan government demands Baghdad to achieve justice, pay salaries, and amend the budget
» Employees complain about their low salaries: The government does not appreciate our efforts
» OPEC production declined last month to control the oil market
» Al-Sudani and Talabani discuss “national issues and files” and the progress of implementing the gove
» America is pressing to save the normalization of Zionism.. Calls for Al-Halbousi to be tried on char
» Sudanese: $26 billion was not subject to customs duties and taxes
» 9 million Iraqis live in Baghdad
» "Sponsored ads" drained nearly a million dollars from the pockets of candidates in Iraq
» "Comprehensive discussions"... A Kurdish delegation will visit Baghdad soon, and Erbil announces the
» The Iraqi Central Bank sells more than $200 million at auction on Thursday
» Al-Sudani told the International Crisis Group delegation: Iraq has become a key to solutions
» Iraq declares its support for Guterres' position regarding the blatant violations occurring in Gaza
» Sudanese approves the plan to secure local elections
» Al-Sudani calls on international organizations to recognize the real progress achieved in Iraq
» Desert and rocky lands occupy 41% of Iraq's area.. What about water?
» Population growth in Iraq raises the need for electrical energy to 50 thousand megawatts
» The exchange rates of the dollar against the Iraqi dinar today... recorded an increase
» A year later... where did Resolution 320 arrive at converting agricultural land to residential?
» An upcoming international meeting to discuss a “strange situation” that occurred in the airspace of
» Iraq issues a statement regarding the activation of Article 99 of the United Nations Charter
» Kurdistan Democratic Party: The elections will pave the way for activating Article 140 of the Consti
» Parliamentary services announce an “explosive service” budget for next year
» The regional government calls for amending the budget law
» America's "lapses" scatter Iraq's papers... Parliament moves to "expel" it, and the government's voi
» The Kurdistan government demands Baghdad to achieve justice, pay salaries, and amend the budget
» Investors: The Iraqi market is promising and its investment environment is excellent
» Al-Nusairi: The Central Bank has achieved an important step to finance trade with Türkiye in the eur
» Minister of Oil: The government has succeeded in implementing gas investment contracts
» Commerce discusses procedures to accelerate the completion of the ration card automation project
» The Commission: All electoral preparations have been completed and the security plan has ended
» Alekti explains the reasons for the delay in completing the financial agreement between Baghdad and
» Al-Rafidain launches the second issuance of Emaar bonds
» Al-Sudani and Talabani discuss “national issues and files” and the progress of implementing the gove
» Parliamentarian: The number of candidates for the Presidency of Parliament rises to 8, and the selec
» Al-Sudani told the International Crisis Group delegation: Iraq has become a key to solutions
» Under the guidance of Al-Sudani... starting the first steps of tax reform in Iraq
» Al-Sudani meets with senior leaders of security formations... confirmation of this file
» Al-Sumaria Bulletin: Government emphasis on the importance of tax reform and the seriousness of rest
» Al-Sudani calls on international organizations to recognize the real progress achieved in Iraq
» utube `12/06/23 iraqi dinar IQD Updates Three Zeero Notes Stronger Today News 2023 / Iraqi Dinar /
» The Central Bank sells about $214 million at auction on Wednesday