Quote Originally Posted by Lastdingo View Post
Actually, I don't think it's a grand strategy. Grand strategy should involve much more, this one is just a strategy of how to deal with a specific foe.
It's furthermore very unilateral and -I'm sorry- quite simplistic in some regards. Isolating yourself from some states won't help much.
Musharraf probably needs some intelligence service's aid to keep himself in power in his domestic struggles with Islamists. You don't want Islamists to take over the nuclear power Pakestan, don't you? So it would be more wise to keep him in power and not to cut all ties.
Quite the same applies to Saudi-Arabia, although on a lesser scale.

And what did you mean with spoiling attacks?
Attacking enemies everwhere with bombs or commandos would often violate other nation's sovereignty and I believe it's understandable that this does not help. Imagine Some third world coutnry killing dissidents in the USA - that would certainly upset some people...

Islamists aren't a solic bloc, but a huge crowd that communicats with each other but co-ordinates largely through what their ideology allos or not (afaik). So it would be a possible strategy to reduce the level of threat by spreading disunity and let factions oppose each other. Other than islamist factios could be strengthened (not so much with compromising direct aid, but otherwise) in important regions. National leaders and faction could be allowed to humiliate the west on some occasions to strengthen them in comparison to Islamists.

What you propose is a slightly isolationist policy with some offensive actions that do not involve large contingents abroad. It sounds a lot like a collection of "that will make us feel better" measures.
Nevertheless, it could evolve into something that would convince me if this strategy would include more co-operation with partners and more specifically tailored solutions to specific problems.
On Egypt, this is an interesting essay:

...In May and June, Egyptian State Security arrested Amr Tharwat, Ahmed Dahmash, Abdelhamid Mohamed Abdelrahman, Ayman Mohamed Abdelrahman, and Abdelatif Sayed, who are all members of the "Quranist" network. On June 21, they were charged with "insulting Islam."

These Quranists promote a reformist view based entirely on the Koran (www.ahl-alquran.com) and are committed to religious freedom and an open society. They oppose a penalty of death for apostasy since the Koran nowhere mentions it. Amr Tharwat had coordinated the monitoring of Egypt's June Shura Council elections on behalf of the pro-democracy Ibn Khaldun Center, headed by prominent Egyptian democracy activist Saad Eddin Ibrahim. Former Jemaah Islamiya member Tawfik Hamid told me that it was Quranists who gave him the space to develop critical thinking and so helped wean him away from jihadism.

State Security has now also leveled charges against Quranist founder Ahmed Subhy Mansour, who formerly taught Islamic history at Cairo's Al-Azhar University, the major center of Sunni learning. He was fired because of his views and imprisoned in 1987. Subsequently he found asylum in the United States and lives in Virginia. Also charged is Dr. Othman Mohamed Ali, who lives in Canada.

These arrests are part of the Egyptian government's double game in which it imprisons members of the Muslim Brotherhood when the latter appear to become too powerful, while simultaneously trying to appear Islamic itself and blunt the Brotherhood's appeal by cracking down on religious reformers, who are very often also democracy activists. A similar strategy was followed in the February 22 arrest of blogger Abdel Kareem Nabil, who was sentenced to four years in prison--one year for insulting President Hosni Mubarak, and three for "insulting Islam..."