With so much at stake & everything going on in the world...
Fragment of a discussion from Comments:Qur'an-burning pastor jailed after mosque protest barred
For the record it is much, much, much easier to exterminate the population of a country (or a continent, or a planet) than it is to conquer and subdue a population, which is what they've effectively been trying to do in Afghanistan for the past decade.
Both of those types of action are, of course, stupid. No argument there.