After over a decade of democracy promotion following the 9/11 attacks, the idea that liberal evangelism may not be the best policy after all has hit the West square in the face:
To totally defeat the Islamic State means to leave it not just militarily vanquished, but robbed of support. To do this, we must recognize the simple fact that not everyone wants to be us. To offer economic and political cooperation in pursuit of peace and order in the region means accepting that we are working with a largely Sunni population which embraces traditional Islamic values. They have lived side by side with Christian, Shia, Kurdish, and Yazidi neighbours for literally centuries and most are no doubt glad to continue doing so in peace. The establishment of a Western-style democratic state in Iraq created a situation where these populations are in constant competition to capture and maintain control over the state apparatus. The neoreactionary also understands this causal relationship between liberal democracy and inter-group violence. The average liberal democrat does not.
It all boils down to local control vs. competing for the prize of national centralized control.
Like the black community, the U.S. foreign policy community has a really difficult time admitting that, for at least the last 25 years, most of their problems have been self-created, so, like some blacks, they scream with moral outrage when the logical consequences of their ill-conceived actions occur. ISIS and Ukraine are the U.S. foreign policy establishment’s Ferguson.