Defeating ISIS Militarily Does Not Mean The War Ends

     If the religious ideology that drives ISIS is not defeated, then ISIS will be defeated militarily, but the war will not be over. ISIS as an organization may cease to exist, but it lives on in other organizations that already exist, or in new ones that will form. The brutality, bigotry and cruelty of ISIS already exists in a number of other organizations, including Boko Haram, Abu Sayef,  Al Shabaab, and more. ISIS alienated some Muslims because of its indiscriminate brutality, not because of the brutality itself.

      The west allows itself to be falsely reassured by certain Islamic nations and organizations that tell the west what it wants to hear, but provide different messages to their own citizens and Muslim audiences, messages that promote (or at best do not discourage) bigotry, hate, and violent jihad.

       Whether this world will know war or peace will be determined largely by the choices made in the Islamic world. If Islam as a religion of peace and tolerance prevails, then many intractable conflicts will end. If Islam is dominated by religious intolerance, superiority, exclusivity, and violent jihad, then it does not matter how many times this ISIS or other ISIS type groups are militarily defeated, the killings and wars will not end.