That doesn't mean concern doesn't exist in other places as well. You don't have to be an autocrat to notice that transitions out of autocracy, especially those initiated by external meddling, are a very difficult and very dangerous time for many countries, and are often followed by violent competition for power and/or a slide back into even worse autocracy.Originally Posted by AmericanPride
Considered by who? Nobody who isn't a Saudi has a right to an opinion on the value of Saudi territorial integrity, any more than anyone who isn't Iraqi has a right to an opinion on whether or not Iraq should remain as a single state. These are matters for the people of the countries involved to resolve.
The ones I know are typically in business, not on the top tier and with no connection to the royals, but reasonably well off. They've traveled and in many cases studied abroad. Many are open to Western ways and admire democracy, but are very worried about how a transition would be managed and about the rather grim possibilities of a transition that's mismanaged.
I spent some time in the Kingdom in the 90s, and things actually seem more stable to me now... the oil glut was not a happy time there. As long as money is flowing, there's a lot of hesitation about rocking the boat. A fair number of people have a stake in the system and are reasonably comfortable, but are also not secure enough in their comforts to take them for granted and want to risk them. There's certainly discontent, but whether that discontent is anywhere near the level needed to initiate change remains to be seen.
Islamic fundamentalism and its violent offshoots are less a reaction to autocracy in the Muslim world than to a widespread perception that Muslims in general and Arabs in particular have been repressed, abused, manipulated, and maltreated by the West... the syndrome Bernard Lewis calls "aggressive self-pity". Emasculating and humiliating military defeats at the hands of Israelis, Americans, and practically anybody else have left a lot of people itching for payback. Have you ever wondered why Osama's calls for fighters to rise up against infidel invaders from the Soviet Union and the US got such a response, but his efforts to rouse jihad against the Saudi royals fell so flat? The "expel the infidel from the land of the faithful" narrative has a lot more traction than the "rise up against your effete rulers" narrative.
"Diplomatic and social pressure" accomplish nothing beyond getting people annoyed at foreign meddling.
One thing we need to recognize, but often don't, is that in many autocratic countries even people who hate their governments do not want the US meddling in their internal affairs... US criticism of a government is often the fastest way to get people rallying behind the government. In much of the world, particularly the oil producing world and most especially the Arab world, accepting money or support from the US instantly discredits a political group: they are seen as sellouts to manipulative Western imperialists. Somehow people have got it into their heads that we typically act to advance our own interests, not theirs. Can't imagine how.
Ok, we declare ourselves patron of the system and defender of the faith, and that gives us a moral obligation... to whom? Whether or not we think it's "our business" is not the question: do the people of the country involved think it's or business?
I have yet to hear any credible suggestion of how American political and economic means can effectively be used to compel change in other countries.
An internally initiated transition to pluralism has a real chance to achieve stability and marginalize extremism, though this is by no means assured, as we see in Libya. When a transition is internally initiated, the people behind it typically have at least a chance of mustering the support and the means to actually govern. They are typically at least to some extent organized and capable before they get to take power, because if they weren't organized and capable they won't have the chance to take power (sometimes less the case in the "color revolution" model).
When a transition is externally initiated, that is not the case, one reason why externally initiated transitions typically fail so miserably. You cannot lump internally and externally initiated initiatives together. Pluralistic government has to evolve, and its evolution is a process that we cannot dictate or control. If we try to skip or accelerate that process to suit our own objectives, we end up with a government that can't endure and a mess that can and does endure.
There may be times and places where the US can assist internally initiated transitions, but it requires subtlety, restraint, and deep awareness of local conditions, none of which are American strong points.
It is in the interests of America's many creditors around the world to actively promote and agitate for fiscal prudence and stability in the US. Do we let them dictate policy to us? Do you really think anyone in the world really wants Americans meddling in their internal politics?
No, I make the inference that you're suggesting that the US meddle in the internal affairs of other countries. I think that's something we should avoid to the greatest possible extent... not because of any moral principle, but because we generally make such a mess of it.
Strengthening political institutions in other countries? You redefine the term "hubris".
And if your "useful idiot" decides there will be no electoral process, or that he will manipulate the electoral process? During the Cold War we thought we were using "useful idiot" strongmen to fight Communism, only to find that in reality we were their useful idiots, supporting and sustaining them while they ravaged their countries and in many cases lent legitimacy to the Communists. Do you really think we can control a strongman once he's in the chair?
This is not something the US should even be considering, IMO. Whether another country needs or does not need a strongman ruler is not for us to decide.
What specific levers do you propose to use, and how?
Of course pluralist sentiment exists. So do lots of other sentiments. There are some who would fight to separate, and others who would fight to keep them from separating. There are any number of foreign powers just waiting for a chance to jump in and advance their own interests. There's Islamist sentiment in there too, in a number of varieties. There's an army and a security apparatus with the capacity to use force and interests of their own to protect.
If we can't predict or control what's going to happen when we start rocking the boat - and we certainly can't - it might be better not to start. It's not our damned boat to begin with.
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