Actually I don't think that. But do please remember the Crusades. But let's separate religion from nations and empires. It was Europeans who, in recent times, invaded Islamic homelands - to take their oil. The extent to which those Europeans were more than nominally Christian is an untested question. But it would be wrong to blame Christianity for doing the invading.
It is probably reasonable to assert that the West sorted itself out when it figured that internal division and conflict was mutually destructive. I don't think Islam has gotten to that stage - mind you the West is working hard to ensure that it doesn't - because a united Islamic bloc could be a problem.
I am not a fan of the Abrahamic faith tradition religions generally. They all have a sense of entitlement and imagined moral superiority that can get out of control if exploited by cunning people of low moral character and bucket loads of ambition. The modernist distortions of Christianity and Islam in particular are very worrying - they see they have their backs to the wall and are defending against a rising tide inimical to their values. Their solution is to invoke extreme responses as defiant and transformative gestures.
We can object to Islamic terrorism as the manipulation of the vulnerable in service of dark ends, but let us weigh that against the Christians who crave Israel engaging in an end of times conflagration that will usher in the return of Christ - and see that as a kind of deranged suicidal act that imperils fa remora than those who just happen to be with the blast radius of a suicide bomb.
You may assert that Islam has not changed - except that the invasion of Spain and Eastern Europe was empire building - and now it is about defending turf and existential threat. The kind of aggression has changed - now it is frequently asymmetrical - just like the Russians actually.
This is the paradox of being so armed to the teeth. The US has invested so much in conventional weaponry nobody wants to take it one toe to toe. So you get what is politically called terrorism (because that masks the fact that defence against it very difficult).
You have to look at the history of the evolution of Christianity to understand that what we fear in Islam was once feared in Christianity - an extreme moral critique rooted in deep existential fear that led to murder and terrorising of those thought to be a threat.
I am not pro Islam. I am pro not getting sucked into misrepresenting motive to serve political agendas and not employing dimwitted macho solutions concocted by screwed up hawks with equally screwed up religious motives.
There is a problem that requires a solution. But the people who see the problems are not necessarily the people who have the best solutions. This is an eternal problem with politics. Solutions cost money and that means there is profit to be made and fame to be won. Politicians are fine for saying there is a problem but awful at analysing it and coming up with a solution. Were it otherwise we'd not be in the mess we are in. We are told the problems we have are because they are huge and the people involved are bad [or whatever] - and that's almost never the case. We mostly have the wrong people devising and delivering the solutions - on both sides of the political divide.
The crusades? Really? You have to go back that far? Come on man. Besides, the crusades can be interpreted, fairly, as a defensive action to protect Christians from Muslims.
Anyhow......I think you are missing something very key in all of this - and it gets back to Trump.
All of these wars of choice and the associated big military budget
are leftist in nature and in cause. I have told you before - though you didn't believe me - that all of that is
ideological at root.
People like you want to see it all as economic (very shallow and naïve thinking). It isn't. There is ample opportunity for pork/graft/cronyism in
any large govt project. Green energy has the same opportunity as contracting for missiles. Yes, Eisenhower mentioned the military industrial complex. So what? That just happened to be the lobby that was getting the money at his time. There are other lobbies and there are lobbies that could easily grow to that size over night
if the ideology driving decision making changed.
The MIC is leftist as are the other potential big lobbies. They believe that government can force change on people. They seek to use the govt to impose a world order and a way of life on its "subjects". That is Leftist. Leftist ideology really isn't about helping the poor and needy. It never does that in the end. It's all about POWER. What is the difference between Mao, Stalin, Hitler, Franco and a medieval king? None.
It just so happens that the US, being the wealthiest and biggest, gets to play the role of "leader" in this strategy. Your tiny nation, and other runts like Canada, the UK and much of Europe are totally on board and, if you noticed, offer support to the extent that they can, whenever the US asks for it.
Trump is an isolationist and a govt minimalist. He stands in opposition to all of the wars of choice, regime change, etc. That is why - they they being people in power - really and truly detest the man. People in power include the govts of all of the aforementioned runt countries. Masses of useful idiots get on board the hate train with propaganda about illegal alien, homosexuals coming under attack and other BS. Most all media these days is propaganda. Even Fox news. Notice that when it comes to foreign policy all of the sudden there is no daylight between CNN and Fox. It's one big Leftist ideology borg. This is what you must understand if you are to understand and comment intelligently.
What is ironic is that you are actually siding with the people you claim to dislike - the globalists/interventionist/war all the time crowd because you are a dupe that has bought the crap they sell. Some of that know better are willing to put up with Trump's eccentricities because he is the only non-interventionist game in town - and he's working out quite well for the economy. There are no other viable non-interventionist players because they have all been run out of town.
That is the "insider" perspective on Trump. Now you can tell me what your interventionist and/or useful idiot "sources" have to say.
Personally, I consider peace and a good economy as outweighing a stiffed contractor. Maybe you don't mind a few hundred thousand dead or dismembered foreigners as long as someone "nice" is in the White House. You tell me who we could have voted for that was for the former and against the latter. I sure didn't see it.
I f'ing hate Leftists. You?