Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson said Wednesday that he would defeat Islamic State terrorists by air-bombing their oil fields, blocking their propaganda on social media, arming local forces in Syria — and by banning Syrian refugees from coming into the United States.
"We are at war," the retired pediatric neurosurgeon said in an op-ed piece in
The Washington Post. "It is not a war against an opposing nation.
"The Islamic State is not a sovereign in the territorial sense but is a sick and twisted ideology that seeks to engulf the region and turn back the clock to the Dark Ages."
Crucial to Carson's strategy is "dramatically" increasing "efforts to appeal directly to the moderate Kurds, Syrians and Iraqis.
"We must convince them that the Islamic State poses a fundamental threat to their existence," he added. "And we must equip them with the means to convey that message to their people."
He also would cut off ISIS' financial pipeline by destroying its oil fields or by seizing them and holding them "with a coalition of local … ground troops and Western military advisers and Special Operations forces."
Other efforts include blocking the ISIS presence on social media — "We must not allow their macabre murder videos and threats to be promoted anywhere," he said — and establishing safe zones in Iraq and Syria.
Carson also would fortify the U.S. border with Mexico.
"The United States must be willing to lead the free world," he said. "We need to restore America’s standing by winning over the hearts and minds of populations affected by radical Islamist violence.
"And to do that we need to create a winning strategy to dismantle and destroy the Islamic State while planting seeds for a more peaceful, healthy and cohesive society in the war-torn regions of the Middle East."
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