Quote Originally Posted by tequila View Post
But I wonder if parts of the Army are going to begin thinking for themselves. This is a conscript army, whose company and battalion officers come from the same urban middle class which is flooding the streets of Cairo and spearheading the strikes and demonstrations. Omar Suleiman had a chance to oversee some sort of transition, but he threw that chance away tonight with his "all you meddlesome kids go home" speech. The higher ranks of the armed forces appear to be with Mubarak, at least for now. The question is if the colonels, majors, and captains will follow them if the choice is between saving an 83-year-old Mubarak or firing on their own people.
Exactly. That's why there's a choice. The choice happens on all kinds of levels. For the footsoldier it may be a decision not to fire on his own people. For an officer it might be the realization that the regime is probably going to lose, and committing to the wrong side could be big trouble.

When we had this situation in Manila, many units near the city delayed movements, giving all kinds of excuses: the commanders wanted to avoid committing until they had a better read on which way the wind was blowing and which side was likely to come out on top. That's especially true a few steps below the top level, where people haven't had an opportunity to feather a nice cushy nest abroad for retirement if things go south. Nobody wants to be caught on the wrong side when the music stops, especially the people who don't have a bolt hole and are not influential enough to avoid being thrown to the sharks when somebody has to take the rap for the bloodshed.

All kinds of things influence these decisions. Again in Manila, the first real head-to-head between the armed forces and the crowd involved Marine units just back from combat in Mindanao. They were clearly not prepared to cope with crowd control or a confrontation with a crowd. When the first of their armored vehicles knocked down a wall (they cut through an empty lot to circumvent a barricade on a major thoroughfare) the driver came face to face with a group of maybe 3-4 guys standing in front of him. I don't know what orders he had, but he stopped. Once he stopped, a few dozen more people jumped in. When soldiers on foot came through the hole in the wall the people who came forward to meet them were women and middle aged men, well dressed, respectable people. The soldiers just stopped, didn't seem to know what to do. Within 10 minutes there were 500 people in front of them, in 30 minutes there were 5000. It snowballed from there. If there had been a dozen thugs with tear gas and truncheons in front of the Marines they would have gone through with ease. If anyone from the crowd had thrown a rock or a bottle things could have gone to #### in a heartbeat.

I don't think anyone but those individuals knows the names of those few guys who stood unarmed and did not move as a big chunk of steel rolled at them. I don't think anyone remembers the driver who stopped. I saw a man maybe 50 walk straight at a nervous kid who was pointing a rifle at him. He put his hands out and said "hijo, hindi kami kalaban" ("son, we are not enemies"). That's not from a news report: I was standing next to him. For sure nobody remembers his name. That little cluster of moments, though, had a huge influence on what followed.

It comes down to moments, and anyone who says they know what will happen is full of it. Having been there and done that I know how those people in the street feel, and I hope it goes right for them... but we shouldn't pretend the key choices are going to be made by the US, or by Mubarak or his officials, or by the leaders of the opposition. It's very likely that the people who will be involved in the key moments do not know that in a few hours or days or weeks they will stand center stage.

We will see.