Your article on neutering DoD’s war fighting was informative as I was not aware of what had happened to the instructor. However, even though Islam is a problem for our country, your article only enrages the uninformed.
The reality of the situation is that so few people, especially Americans, know anything about Islam, and they are inclined to think the worst about it. There are 1.6 billion Muslims in the world, and only about 20 percent of them tolerate the radical views, and only about 5 percent would support those radical views. Thus there are literally over a billion Muslims who live peaceably throughout the world and do not support radical Islam in any of its forms. If we keep painting all of Islam as bad, then at some point those others are going to turn against us as well and we will really be in trouble. The West must find a way to reach out to the billions of peaceful Muslims who offer the only realistic chance to re-educate their radical brothers.
I have no idea what the exact teaching points were in the course in question, but if Lt. Col. Dooley was painting all of Islam with the radical brush, he was misrepresenting the situation on the ground and placing the West in greater danger. We can only reduce the effect of radical Islam by supporting and encouraging the peaceful segment and supporting programs that bring education to the Muslim masses. Pakistan is a good example where public education reaches only a fraction of the population and the void is filled by radical teachers in madrassas.
Any course of instruction in the West that demonizes Islam is only supporting the small radical elements within that religion.
Chris Nicholson
