Originally a comment by AJ Milne on They cried all day.
I do not, for an instant, believe the Trump administration has any real interest in reducing tensions with the Muslim world, nor actually encouraging modernisation, secularisation, there or anywhere else, nor undercutting the appeal of violent Islamism. Let alone, of all things, encouraging women to succeed in STEM disciplines, in Afghanistan or anywhere else.
… on that former thing: it’s no more in his interest than it’s in the interest of any would-be strongman who relies upon a perceived/created need for ‘security’ to maintain power. An infinite supply of visceral but largely ineffectual terror events supplies that need perfectly. Polarised, broken, angry, powerless populations supply these, in turn.… Read the rest
