An interesting idea is on an Asian studies forum:

" .. am a journalist for the BBC, based in Singapore. At the moment I am working on a radio documentary we would like to make about how Japan re-adjusted after WW2; specifically how former kamikazes made their way back in to society and whether or not there is anything European leaders can now learn about how citizens and soldiers were 'deradicalised' after the war."
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So it seems to be looking at terrorism. Probably the thing would include Nazi Germans after 1945. But how about Yanks who bombed the daylights out of Vietnamese villagers and Vietcong who did the same even to their own people and then rejoined society after the war? How about Port Jackson and Brisbane, Norfolk island and Port Arthur army officers who flogged British subjects to death, and went home? Maybe an inquiry to BBC ..hmmm?

I've never quite understood the view that the kamikaze were somehow otherworldly fanatics. The were just soldiers prepared to die a certain death for their homeland. There are plenty of examples of similar 'fanaticism' in western tradition from Leonidas and his 1000 compatriots to Publius Decius to Constantine XI through to the Alamo defenders (and many more in between), who are lauded as heroes. But not the kamikaze. On the wrong side I guess.

But as to the point....

The reason the fanatics in Germany and Japan were 'deradicalised' was that their societies and way of life, the very essence of what they believed, was utterly destroyed and delegitimised. Not just defeated as was Germany in 1918, but obliterated, occupied and rebuilt in the image of their conqueror.

Effectively there was nothing left to be radical about. If you are prepared to suicide in battle for a greater 'good' be it the 1000 Reich or the volk, or a God-Emperor and you find that these things no longer exist and were always an illusion anyway, then a new world-view is the only logical response.

Even allowing that many of these radicals were just people doing a job in a cause or just doing a job (read "Eichmann in Jerusalem" re the banality of evil), there were still true radicals in their midst. I'm not sure these were ever deradicalised, but they were delegitimised and their influence forever curtailed.

/tbc

/cont

So where does that leave us with regards Islam? If we intend to deradicalise on a mass basis, it means that Islam, or at least the radical version of Islam (which is also the more literal version) needs to delegitiimised. The tenets of this branch holds that the victory of Islam is inevitable, that the caliphate is near, that the kaffir is weak, that Allah is on their side. While any of that remains possible, while ever it seems they may be right, adherents will gravitate to their cause. So we, the west need to disabuse them and their potential converts of these notions.

ISIL can't be allowed to win and must be shown to comprehensively loose. The caliphate must fail and any future pretender to that aim must be squashed. They must be shown that Eurabia is a pipe-dream. That the great satan will not be defeated. That the kaffir isn't weak. That Allah isn't supportive of their cause. Support those who support a Muslim reformation, exclude those that don't.

The notion of medinan Islamic is pervasive. You can't destroy it by destroying one nation or one culture as we destroyed fascism in the 40's. It'll be a long and difficult path with setbacks along the way. But I think we see the signs of the rise of western leadership which will, at last, send us don that path.

It could be tricky to do the legal thing and for US , Oz and others to declare war before actually bombing. And tricky to say it's against IS and Allah's caliphate because Muslim allies may not be keen on bringing the boss into it and their prospects of deceased retirement.

mhaze,

In the case of Japan the US did everything that it could to downplay the fact of the Japanese being defeated, the Emperor was left as nominal ruler and as actual spiritual ruler.
The transition to peace in Japan was so smooth because the Emperor ordered it so.

It was in 1953 that Allied troops in Japan became subject to Japanese law, a bare eight years after the end of WWII; probably something of a record in post conflict normalization.

The Japanese emperor declared he was not divine which calmed things down. It seems kamikaze was a hard sell and several planes returned. As far as suicide goes that was the routine every day in WWI trenches when the whistle blew to go over the top. The British gods seemed more worthy than what the Germans had, the French lost faith.