I Solve All The Problems In The Middle East

• If you want to understand ISIS you have to understand Whahabiism. To understand it and the Middle East in general read this article- twice.  

•  There are hundreds of nominally American people fighting for ISIS in Iraq and Syria and published estimates are there may be up to 20,000 jihadis there in total. One, there is of course no way to know for sure that number is correct although educated inferences can be made and two, there is no way there is anything less than 50,000 and it would not be a hard sell to convince me the number is somewhere well North of that.
• Americans oddly presume anytime there is something called an uprising it is just that- a rising up of the people against a government that must be real bad if the people want it overthrown.

• Our government in these situations also oddly presumes not only can we know the hearts of groups involved- we can discern which ones are moderate. 

•  The first problem with that is defining moderate. 
• We aren't dumb but we let our emotions, politics and preconceived notions of what makes people tick define policy in really bizarre and if nothing else, naive ways.
• Interestingly, our involvement in Syria might be the first time we actually fought in the Middle East with oil as if not the core of the issue- it will be way WAY up there as an important reason to intervene as the insurgents are making millions of dollars a day off oil revenue.  

•  My knowledge of the world is far from encyclopedic but you would be hard pressed to find somebody who at least tries as hard as I do to be well informed and I had literally never heard or read anything about the brutality of the Assad regime until our politicians, agitators and the insurgents themselves began referring to it as a, "brutal regime" as if it was a forgone conclusion it is true and common knowledge that the Syrian government is the worst in the world.
• The only way the US could win in Syria and Iraq would involve casualties- a lot of them and tons of civilian deaths  It would involve lots of air power and arty support to be sure but also thousands of troops operating more/less independently from dedicated bases, close cooperation between our men, disparate irregular fighters and Assad's and Iraqi troops and most of all- a willingness to die that most of our guys do not truly possess. These troops would also have to operate in very austere conditions in units small and large that aside from some reserves and logistical support would have to operate independently and of their own initiative so often to be effective that instead of being termed independent- isolated would be more correct. In short, we would not be thinking Iraq verses USA in 1991 the correct analogy would be Wehrmacht verses Russia at Stalingrad 1943.
• Many- many of our guys would be captured and murdered. This would strengthen our resolve and desire to see the fight through to the end- right?! Nah, we would lose our nerve quick and there would calls to withdraw before we ever really got started.
• The financial costs would be astronomical. For example, as of this writing, (08/29/2014) the ops which our air assets are engaging in are costing our treasury 7.5 million dollars a day. The strikes have have barely slowed ISIS and are known- without argument by any involved to not be a means to an end there without ground troop involvement.