Our approach is grounded not only in the recognition that killing civilians is wrong but also in the understanding that indiscriminate violence encourages radicalization. We do everything we can to limit deaths in counterterrorism strikes, both to minimize the effects of those in the immediate area and to deprive those streaming propaganda videos on their computers thousands of miles away of fodder for outrage.

It’s often said that the United States practices counterterrorism with a scalpel while Russia uses a chain saw. That has been made clear in Syria, where Airwars, a London-based monitoring group, estimates that Russian airstrikes cause civilian deaths at a rate eight times that of United States-led coalition missions. While Mr. Trump was pilloried during the campaign for suggesting that the United States murder the families of terrorists, that has long been standard practice in Russia, along with “disappearing” and extrajudicially killing suspects. Consequently, the Muslim-majority Russian republics of Dagestan and Chechnya still smolder after decades of rebellion and oppression; other Russian Muslim communities seethe.

The experience in the Caucasus and the rest of Russia underscores the dangers of Moscow’s approach. President Vladimir V. Putin’s tactics have led to jihadist violence at home and the export of thousands of terrorists to Syria, where they make up one of the largest cohorts of foreign extremists, alongside Tunisians and Saudis. Russian citizens have also been a major presence in Afghanistan, Iraq and around the world. A Chechen-led cell is believed to be responsible for killing 45 people in an attack on Istanbul’s airport in June. Numerous smaller attacks against Russians at home have been carried out and jihadist calls for violence against Russia have been escalating worldwide.

Mr. Trump, it seems, is oblivious to these trends.

Embracing Russia and its brutal tactics has the potential to stoke anti-American sentiment and encourage radicalization among Muslims around the world. The thought that we would run that risk, particularly when the United States’ Muslim community is one of the best-integrated, least radicalized in a predominantly non-Muslim country, is simply foolish.