I feel like this “taking the fight to Garlemald” is a huge assumption on behalf of the fanbase.
SE or Yoshi have never really suggested this, in fact it was suggested that Stormblood was us taking the fight to Garlemald (we liberated their territories after all, and the Garleans were the main villains)
Compared to other Final Fantasies, you typical have the ignorant/totalitarian human enemies, who are defeated fairly early on and pave the way to the cosmic villain, whom the previous human villains were either pawns of, or naively working into their plans.
Think Shinra > Sephitoth, Galbadia > Ultimecia, Ghestalian empire > Kefka, etc.
Going into Shadowbringers, while some seem to think of this as a sidequest/diversion from the main story for some reason, it actually appears to be leading directly into our Hydaelyn/Zodiark conflict, and this could be our big cosmic villain showdown.
So Stormblood will have been our fight with Garlemald.
Frankly I’m not sure what else people would expect we would do in a ‘fight against Garlemald’. Would we be invading/ransacking Garlean home territories? How would exploring these areas as fugitives work in an MMO?
I feel like people just want to SEE Islabard, and SEE the Garlean capital, which frankly I don’t think would really be possible until we have concluded our conflict with Garlemald.