<p>barrons,</p>
<p>Not saying that extremism isn’t a problem for us. Do you think we can bring moderation as long as we are there militarily? Doesn’t that provoke extremism? Or is the best we can hope for is to keep the extemists at bay? Isn’t that just a standoff?</p>
<p>I don’t know the answers, but I sure do know the questions! :(</p>
<p>
We stayed in Japan and Germany militarily for long after the war was “over” and it didn’t provoke extremism. Same thing with Kosovo.</p>
<p>The Japan and Germany examples are wide of the mark in every fundamental aspect:</p>
<p>a) We comprehensively defeated, to a point of surrender, both countries in a state versus state war. We did not comprehensively defeat the Sunni Baathists in Iran, instead allowing them to disperse and regroup.</p>
<p>b) Japan and Germany both had homogeneous populations with the foundations (economic and political traditions) for rapid rebuilding and modern governance).</p>
<p>c) Having wiped out their military capabilities, we provided a security shield for both Japan and Germany well past the point of a traditional occupation.</p>
<p>d) There was no ongoing combat in either country. Our occupation forces were immediately focused on reconstruction and quickly relocated to self-contained bases. Armed battles were not occuring in downtown Berlin or Tokyo five years after the end of the war.</p>
<p>The situation in Iraq shares nothing in common with any of those factors.</p>
<p>There does seem to be some confusion as to two issues: “Shia vs. Sunni” and “Islamic extremism”.</p>