Letter to the Blind

He who blinded by ambition, raises himself to a position whence he cannot mount higher, must thereafter fall with the greatest loss. - Niccolo Machiavelli

This post is written with two audiences: to he who is blinded by his own ambition and to those who are unable to see this post because they cannot access the Internet.

Hosni Mubarek took office in 1981 and has held his power ever since. The United States government has supported him because he represented Egypt without Islamic fundamentalism and because he supported efforts to bring peace to Israel-Palestine. When Barack Obama took office, he gave a speech in Cairo that was widely criticized. He spoke about ending what seemed to be a United States jihad on Islam and a new sense of cooperation between the West and Middle East. When the United States makes an ally with an Islamic nation, it is hard pressed to break that alliance (see Turkey, Pakistan, Afghanistan). Turkey is helping Iran deal with sanctions, Pakistan is harboring terrorists, and Afghanistan is led by a corrupt president. Even though all of that is true, the United States will not sanction Turkey, invade Pakistan, or oust the corrupt president it put in place as the lesser of plenty of evils. Mubarek doesn't really like Iran, isn't a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, and wasn't put into office by the United States military. However, Egypt as a country is overwhelmingly Muslim (as is Iran), is home to the Muslim Brotherhood (terrorists), and is led by a corrupt president (Mubarek).

What is the United States supposed to do? It can't jump up the tree, else be knocked to the ground. It can't stay on the ground and listen to the cries of the smaller cat and risk the smaller cat falling, either. To apply that to the situation: the US can't explicitly back Mubarek because if the protests turn to revolt and revolt to overthrow, it will have backed the wrong horse. The US also can't sit back and not support the government in charge or else the international community will think it doesn't want to support its allies. A major problem with supporting the protesters is the unreliability of the protesters to pick a pro-US replacement. It would be very easy for the protesters to overthrow the government with US support and then snub the US in favor of a more Egypt-first domestic policy (Iranian Revolution, 1979, anybody?).

The United States could look to others for help in the situation. The United Nations is busy with things like the Afghanistan conflict. The European Union has a few money problems. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are military organizations and aren't equipped or intended to maintain peace during anti-government protests. The African Union is dealing with Somalian pirates, money problems, uprisings in Tunisia, bloodshed in Darfur, tyrants in more countries than not, and diseases like AIDS and malaria.

Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security adviser in 1979 and current Johns Hopkins University professor, said that, "Egypt is seething." The youth are doing what they always do, they get angry about what they cannot change, and they set about changing it. I had a history professor in college who said that any time a political movement had the word 'young' in the name, it was probably in favor of violent regime changes (Young Italy, Young Tunisians, etc.). The difference this time around is that the Internet has allowed young people from a much larger area to communicate with each other to compare ideas and strategies. Hence the internet being shut off across the country.

Peter Beinart wrote in Newsweek:

Middle Eastern tyrannies aren’t falling the way George W. Bush predicted. America isn’t the hammer; if anything, we’re the anvil. But Bush’s argument that Middle Eastern democracy could help drain the ideological swamp in which Al Qaeda grew may yet be proved true. Osama bin Laden has never looked more irrelevant than he does this week, as tens of thousands march across the Middle East not for jihad, but for democracy, electricity, and a decent job. It’s a time for hope, not fear. America can survive having less control, as long as the Arab people have more.

Egyptians have a right to control their political destiny. The Middle East needs more countries like Turkey, willing to snub powerful Western nations to protect domestic interests. Iran and Syria are close behind, but they are still waiting for their own democratic revolutions to really work. It is a scary thought for the US to allow Middle Eastern nations to control their own policies. Then again, I'm sure most European nations were uneasy in 1776 when a few colonies declared that they were independent from England.

I know that Hosni Mubarek will not read this article. I also know that if he did it wouldn't really change his mind. I know that the people of Egypt can't read this article. If they could, I doubt they would feel like they needed my words of justification. The message applies to anyone who can read this, however. This drama is the same that is played out anytime a third party tries to assume its interests are more important than the first two parties. It was the the wise Nunya Bidness who said, "This is an A and B conversation, so C your way out of it."