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Thread: Egypt's Spring Revolution (2011-2013)

  1. #81
    Council Member Bob's World's Avatar
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    This is the air force model of Theater Security Cooperation. Just as the Navy does port calls (nothing builds US influence and rapport like letting loose a few thousand drunken sailors on some port community), the AF does foreign military sales. I don't see it helping much in the near term, but the long-term investment of such complex systems does lead to a stability of who the the government is going to work with. The question is, will we be able to swallow our pride and work with them if they are more closely aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood than with the current regime? I hope so.

    We had a similar deal in place with Iran, and when the Iranians ran us off I suspect we did not work too hard to leverage the need to maintain their "made in the USA" equipment as a rationale to establish and maintain relations with the new government. We should have. It would have saved a lot of the silliness between the west and Iran that has gone down since. But with both Israel and Saudi Arabia seeing Iran as enemy #1, there is a lot of pressure on the US to hold them in that light as well. That is too bad, as Iran is arguably the most pro-US Muslim populace and is a true nation that will endure into the foreseeable future.
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    Council Member tequila's Avatar
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    Just out of interest, have you ever read anything by the Lexington Institute that ever pointed out any of the downsides of our vastly expansive mil-industrial complex?

    The need for spare parts certainly worked wonders in Iran after 1979 ...

    I think the Mubarak regime is showing quite an interesting counterinsurgent strategy in a very fast-moving situation. Deniable violence against the demonstrators, while offering concessions, negotiations, and placid words in the press. The obvious objective is to thin the crowds in the streets to relieve immediate pressure on the regime. Long term, perhaps they hope to stay in by demonstrating staying power, making cosmetic concessions, buying off or imprisoning opponents, and clamping down to ensure no more mass demos. Operations against the foreign press are to get inflammatory pictures off the TVs in Egypt and around the world, and hope that everyone forgets in a week or so.

    In this case, the leaderless nature of the Egyptian demonstrators works for them. The movement cannot really be beheaded. At this point we will see just how much staying power an 83-year-old dictator really has, and how farsighted the Egyptian Army high command is.

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    Quote Originally Posted by tequila View Post
    Just out of interest, have you ever read anything by the Lexington Institute that ever pointed out any of the downsides of our vastly expansive mil-industrial complex?
    The Lexington Institute isn't one that I've ever paid much attention to. At this level of thinking, that will continue.
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    From the 1 Feb 2011 edition of Bloomberg: Kissinger Says Mubarak Exit a `Question of Months,' Urges Muted U.S. Reply

    Henry Kissinger, a former U.S. secretary of state and presidential adviser, said Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is certain to resign within “months at most” as the Arab world’s most populous country braces for “a period of great uncertainty.”

    Kissinger said on Bloomberg Television's "In the Loop with Betty Liu" that the U.S. should say little publicly about Egypt during this transition. The U.S. does not want to be perceived as trying to impose a government on the Egyptian people, he said.
    Mohamed ElBaradei, a leader of the Egyptian opposition and a Nobel Peace Prize winner, is likely only a transitional figure because he lacks a political base, Kissinger said.

    “I think almost certainly he will be a temporary figure,” he said. “In order to govern, you have to represent some sort of forces, and I don’t know what forces ElBaradei represents.”

    Omar Suleiman, a former Army general and Mubarak’s newly appointed vice president, is “highly intelligent and quite sophisticated,” Kissinger said. While stopping short of calling Suleiman a friend of the United States, Kissinger said he “has been very cooperative.”
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    Council Member Pete's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bob's World View Post
    We had a similar deal in place with Iran, and when the Iranians ran us off I suspect we did not work too hard to leverage the need to maintain their "made in the USA" equipment as a rationale to establish and maintain relations with the new government. We should have.
    Would the Iranians have given us our hostages back sooner had we continued to give them spare parts?

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    The GCCs do Theater Security Cooperation, ergo the term Theater. All Services do Foreign Military Sales, along with other Security Assistance and Security Cooperation programs. Programs are coordinated by the Defense Security Cooperation Agency and the GCCs.

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    Default We used to give Israel and Egypt $4 billion each

    Quote Originally Posted by Bob's World View Post
    The question is, will we be able to swallow our pride and work with them if they are more closely aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood than with the current regime? I hope so.
    So we should have worked with democratically-elected Hitler and today should embrace democratically-selected Hezbollah in Lebanon? And of course if President Carter had told the Shah that he needed to resign now, that would have made all the difference...

    Instead, seem to recall it was the promised threats of a new Presidential candidate who was unprepared to deal with Iran diplomatically that finally got our hostages released after 444 days of diplomacy.

    I suspect we did not work too hard to leverage the need to maintain their "made in the USA" equipment as a rationale to establish and maintain relations with the new government. We should have. It would have saved a lot of the silliness between the west and Iran that has gone down since.
    So if we imposed no sanctions today, Iran's government would cease funding Hezbollah and developing nuclear weapons?

    That is too bad, as Iran is arguably the most pro-US Muslim populace and is a true nation that will endure into the foreseeable future.
    And Iran is a perfect example of a nation whose people may appear secular and appear to like the U.S. but whose government is just the opposite. The NEW government is the problem no matter how much we try to placate the citizenry by appearing to be on their side during their ill-considered revolution.

    Sanctions and focused aid in support of allies aligned with our interests has arguably saved us considerably more than the money we gave/give Egypt and Israel each year. Which is more dangerous...appearing to abandon allies which drives Israel and Saudi Arabia to work together to attack Iran, or telling a 30-year ally that we understand his stated need for a smooth transition, and our past relationship will remain intact until you retire in September.

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    Council Member tequila's Avatar
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    Instead, seem to recall it was the promised threats of a new Presidential candidate who was unprepared to deal with Iran diplomatically that finally got our hostages released after 444 days of diplomacy.
    Umm ... didn't that same Presidential candidate also negotiate with that same Iranian regime when additional hostages were taken in Lebanon during his own term? Indeed, weren't weapons sent to that regime in violation of U.S. law in exchange for hostage releases?

    Sanctions and focused aid in support of allies aligned with our interests has arguably saved us considerably more than the money we gave/give Egypt and Israel each year. Which is more dangerous...appearing to abandon allies which drives Israel and Saudi Arabia to work together to attack Iran, or telling a 30-year ally that we understand his stated need for a smooth transition, and our past relationship will remain intact until you retire in September.
    Having a little trouble understanding what you are trying to say here. How does focused aid in support of allies save us money, exactly? Also, your second sentence is a bit confusing. Are you saying abandoning the "allies" will drive Israel and Saudi Arabia together to attack Iran? Or that abandoning them will separate this partnership?

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    Bob, I just wanted to say that I agree with every word you wrote about Iran.

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    Default Good point on arms for hostage, I raise you non-appeasement of the USSR

    Quote Originally Posted by tequila View Post
    Having a little trouble understanding what you are trying to say here. How does focused aid in support of allies save us money, exactly? Also, your second sentence is a bit confusing. Are you saying abandoning the "allies" will drive Israel and Saudi Arabia together to attack Iran? Or that abandoning them will separate this partnership?
    The war in Afghanistan is costing us $100 billion a year these days. The $4.7 billion in foreign aid we gave Israel and Egypt last year is considerably cheaper. How much did the last round of bail outs and stimulus cost the U.S.? Would you allow that $150 a barrel oil due to this short-sighted people's revolution spreading to Saudi Arabia or an attack on Iran would cause a repeat recession far more costly than foreign aid?

    http://www.vaughns-1-pagers.com/poli...oreign-aid.htm

    Yes, I'm saying that our government's appearance to abandon a long time ally will not go unnoticed. Abandoning an ally who has kept peace for 30 years and has enhanced the economy of one of the few Arab nations without much oil revenue constrasts with our assurances to Israel to "trust us," when we ask you to give Iran sanctions (and STUXNET) a chance. The Saudi Arabia reference in that context is a wink on Israeli use of their airspace. Think we could stay out of that war after the Straits of Hormuz get blocked?
    Last edited by Cole; 02-04-2011 at 01:44 AM. Reason: Clarification

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    Council Member tequila's Avatar
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    The war in Afghanistan is costing us $100 billion a year these days. The $4.7 billion in foreign aid we gave Israel and Egypt last year is considerably cheaper. How much did the last round of bail outs and stimulus cost the U.S.? Would you allow that $150 a barrel oil due to this short-sighted people's revolution spreading to Saudi Arabia or an attack on Iran would cause a repeat recession far more costly than foreign aid?
    I will note a few things. First off, our aid has not exactly prevented instability in Egypt. Secondly, Saudi Arabia is not Egypt. Observers of Egypt already knew that Egypt was primed to blow --- if not quite in the dramatic way it has done so, but the disastrous attempt to implant Gamal on the throne alienated Mubarak's base and lent energy to the opposition. Tunisia was the spark on a quite dry field. The KSA, OTOH, has no such legitimacy crisis.

    Yes, I'm saying that our government's appearance to abandon a long time ally will not go unnoticed. Abandoning an ally who has kept peace for 30 years and has enhanced the economy of one of the few Arab nations without much oil revenue constrasts with our assurances to Israel to "trust us," when we ask you to give Iran sanctions (and STUXNET) a chance. The Saudi Arabia reference in that context is a wink on Israeli use of their airspace. Think we could stay out of that war after the Straits of Hormuz get blocked?
    Sorry, but circumstances change. Our "30-year ally" made his own bed. I was completely unaware that we were married to Hosni Mubarak or any other country or leader. The interests of the United States come first, not Mubarak's or Israel's. From a pure realpolitik standpoint, Mubarak has proven that his regime is no longer a guarantor of regional stability if it ever was (see: Ayman al-Zawahiri). The agreement between the Egyptian people and the regime has broken down - the only thing that can preserve him is brute force, and what kind of "stability" is that?

    Also, if an Israeli attack on Iran was truly the imminent and drastically costly threat that you describe, it is quite easy for the U.S. to deter it in a number of ways.

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    Default Seriously, please cite Mubarak's major crimes?

    Quote Originally Posted by tequila View Post
    I will note a few things. First off, our aid has not exactly prevented instability in Egypt. Secondly, Saudi Arabia is not Egypt. Observers of Egypt already knew that Egypt was primed to blow --- if not quite in the dramatic way it has done so, but the disastrous attempt to implant Gamal on the throne alienated Mubarak's base and lent energy to the opposition. Tunisia was the spark on a quite dry field. The KSA, OTOH, has no such legitimacy crisis.
    You mention perceived intent to get his son elected. Is that the horrible human-rights violation that led to this crisis? What else is he responsible for on par with the likes of Ahmadinejad and Kim Jung Il? Or was it the youthful, utopian, inexperienced views of unemployed internet users fueled by 24/7 news coverage that led to this mess. Do you really believe the replacement government will do better for the Egyptian people's lives?

    Sorry, but circumstances change. Our "30-year ally" made his own bed. I was completely unaware that we were married to Hosni Mubarak or any other country or leader. The interests of the United States come first, not Mubarak's or Israel's. From a pure realpolitik standpoint, Mubarak has proven that his regime is no longer a guarantor of regional stability if it ever was (see: Ayman al-Zawahiri). The agreement between the Egyptian people and the regime has broken down - the only thing that can preserve him is brute force, and what kind of "stability" is that?

    Also, if an Israeli attack on Iran was truly the imminent and drastically costly threat that you describe, it is quite easy for the U.S. to deter it in a number of ways.
    Have circumstances really changed? I have no special Middle East insight other than an unworthy-by-today's-standards Sinai year-long tour during the Intifada. I had a female relative who went to Egypt in that timeframe and was never seen again. Speed boats were assaulting Tel Aviv's coast. Folks were blowing themselves up all over Israel before they built the walls. Rockets land all over Israel. Yet overall, Egypt has been remarkably stable in contrast, and the economy actually appeared pretty healthy. There was no war with Israel despite extensive Palestinian unrest then and trouble to the north during Israeli occupation of Lebanon.

    Mubarak had already announced he would not run again. He may hand over power now to his vice president. Why did Obama feel the need to overreach his authority and tell him to leave now? He must have known how Mubarak would react to such external pressure. The other reasonable autocratic ruler in Jordan is also in peril. And you think we can pressure Israel not to act in its own defense?

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    From the 2 Feb 2011 NYT: Frank Wisner, the Diplomat Sent to Prod Mubarak

    This week, Mr. Wisner, whose stints around the globe have included four ambassadorships, one of them to Egypt, was briefly President Obama’s man in Cairo, charged with prodding an old friend, President Hosni Mubarak, to make his exit.
    An imposing presence with a resonant voice whose last posting was as ambassador to India, Mr. Wisner has spent the years since his retirement in 1997 operating at the nexus of diplomacy and business. For more than a decade, he was vice chairman of the insurance giant A.I.G.; he left in 2009, just as the company was getting bailed out by American taxpayers, and joined the lobbying firm Patton Boggs.
    Wikipedia backgrounder on Patton Boggs

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    Default Cheap shot, Bob...

    Quote Originally Posted by Bob's World View Post
    This is the air force model of Theater Security Cooperation. Just as the Navy does port calls (nothing builds US influence and rapport like letting loose a few thousand drunken sailors on some port community), the AF does foreign military sales.
    Thanks for the cheap shot on the USAF. As already pointed out, FMS cases are not Theater Security Cooperation. And they normally are driven by political (read OSD) policy, not service prerogatives. In this case, the decision that providing the Egyptian AF with the same F-16s the Israelis got was a decent way of influencing them as well as keeping a peaceful strategic balance...

    Also, you could easily say the same thing about the Army and the M-1s that rolled into Tahrir Square...

    I don't see it helping much in the near term, but the long-term investment of such complex systems does lead to a stability of who the the government is going to work with.
    As I pointed out before, the big advantage is that you have a relationship. When you pick up the phone to call the generals in Cairo, you are talking to someone that knows and understands the US. Relationships matter, hardware is merely the key to unlock the door. Also, note that the hardware is what allowed Egypt to feel secure and be at peace with Israel since the 70's- would a war between them have made you feel better?

    The question is, will we be able to swallow our pride and work with them if they are more closely aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood than with the current regime? I hope so.
    We will undoubtedly have to work with them... but that doesn't mean we have to support the Muslim Brotherhood, even if they have renounced violence...

    We had a similar deal in place with Iran, and when the Iranians ran us off I suspect we did not work too hard to leverage the need to maintain their "made in the USA" equipment as a rationale to establish and maintain relations with the new government. We should have. It would have saved a lot of the silliness between the west and Iran that has gone down since. But with both Israel and Saudi Arabia seeing Iran as enemy #1, there is a lot of pressure on the US to hold them in that light as well. That is too bad, as Iran is arguably the most pro-US Muslim populace and is a true nation that will endure into the foreseeable future.
    Iran was arguably different in that the military there WAS seen as being an instrument of the Shah. The military in Egypt (thus far) is far more respected and has yet to align itself against the protesters. We'll see what happens if the crowds march on the Presidential Palace tomorrow on "Departure Friday"... but I would still argue that the relationships we have with the Egyptian brass allow us to pressure them to show restraint and protect the people. Which is probably a good thing.

    I also fail to see how the Iranian populace was pro-US in the 80s... any poll numbers to back that up? I agree with you on engagement though... even at the height of the Cold War we at least tried to talk to the Soviets and maintain a mil-to-mil relationship...

    V/R,

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    Council Member CrowBat's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bob's World View Post
    This is the air force model of Theater Security Cooperation. Just as the Navy does port calls (nothing builds US influence and rapport like letting loose a few thousand drunken sailors on some port community), the AF does foreign military sales. I don't see it helping much in the near term, but the long-term investment of such complex systems does lead to a stability of who the the government is going to work with.
    I am sorry, but this conclusion is confusing me a little bit.

    If we gauge by the example of Iran...within the period 1971-1978, that country purchased (note: contrary to the Egyptians, the Iranians paid for every single screw - and they usually paid two or three times its actual worth) not only enough of best aircraft, weapons and spares the USA could provide, but in such amounts that they proved able to run their air force through a pitched war well into the late 1980s without any particular problems. On the top of this, the Iranians purchased also an entire infra-structure capable of manufacturing (not only maintaining) aircraft and weapons for them. Mind that the huge state-owned companies like Iranian Aircraft Industries, Iranian Aircraft Manufacturing Industries, Iranian Helicopter Overhaul Industries, Iranian Electronic Industries etc. were all launched in the 1970s, in cooperation with companies like Northrop, McDonnell, Bell Textron, Hughes etc.. Over 150,000 Iranians found jobs in this sector alone, back then (today it's more than 200,000). As was nicelly illustrated in 1978 and 1979, this did not bring any kind of stability to Iran.

    In the last 30 years, Egypt was primarily receiving aid in form of not the best aircraft (F-16 is really not the best the USA can offer), armour (M1 Abrams MBTs), warships (Perry-class frigates) and similar. Large parts of the Egyptian defence sector - otherwise existing already since the early 1950s - were retooled to become capable of at least assembling some of these (M1s), and manufacturing spares for them. As we are witnessing in these days, this did not bring any kind of stability to that country either.

    In the case of Saudi Arabia, the situation is actually "worse", then they bought plenty of downgraded US armament (see F-15S) and then more of it than they can maintain, yet still not enough to fight a war (see their involvement in the "anti-Houthi" campaign in Yemen, last two years, when the run out of ammo within only a few days) and without any kind of infrastructure that would enable them to maintain all that equipment without foreign help. I might now state something that plenty of people prefer not even to think about, but let's be sincere and frank: the country is meanwhile one of largest exporters of international terrorism (right behind another "most important non-NATO ally", Pakistan), and if we do not get to hear about internal unrest there then almost exclusively because the King and his corrupt clique wouldn't let anybody report about that.

    We had a similar deal in place with Iran, and when the Iranians ran us off I suspect we did not work too hard to leverage the need to maintain their "made in the USA" equipment as a rationale to establish and maintain relations with the new government. We should have. It would have saved a lot of the silliness between the west and Iran that has gone down since.
    I'm really sorry, but there was no such leverage at all. The new Iranian gov was not the least interested in running the huge military machinery left behind by the Shah. Immediately after climbing to power and long before the US Embassy in Tehran was occuppied, the gov in Tehran first killed orders worth some US$10 billion, then cancelled all the ongoing projects and then began demobilizing the army. The manpower of their air force was slashed from more than 100,000 to less than 50,000 within less than a year, and - because the new Iranian government was shocked by the costs of operating such types like F-14 Tomcats and F-4 Phantoms - flying hours of their pilots from more than 300 annually, to less than 20. As next, they opened negotiations with the Pentagon for selling much of the equipment back to the USA. One of best-known such negotiations was the one about Iran returning the 77 F-14s (out of 80 originally purchased) back, Grumman overhauling these and re-selling them to the UK, Canada or even the US Air Force (not the USN). This process ended only when Iraq invaded Iran, in September 1980: without that invasion, Iran wouldn't have had a military to speak about as of 1982 or so.

    So, sorry, but there was no such leverage for the USA to talk about: the Iranians did not (originally) intend to maintain a military that would require US spare parts and thus there would've been no point in the USA talking with them about relevant issues. That aside, as described above, even when they had to re-mobilize that military in the face of the Iraqi invasion, they still had so many spares at hand, they could fight for years without any major problems. Indeed, once the Iraqis attacked, their air force went from "doing nothing since months" to "fighting a full-scale war" in a matter of two hours. The problem was rather that in the chaos that reigned the country since the revolution, they literaly lost the keys to some of their immense underground depots... that in the priod 1978-1980 they did their best to get rid of more than half of their highly-qualified technical personnel (less so the pilots)... and that by September 1980 they began feeling shortages of kerosene because they simply did not purchase any for months...

    But, that's an entirely different story...

    But with both Israel and Saudi Arabia seeing Iran as enemy #1, there is a lot of pressure on the US to hold them in that light as well. That is too bad, as Iran is arguably the most pro-US Muslim populace...
    A certain part of the Iranian population is, no doubt. The trouble is that nobody can precisely say how big is that part compared to the entire population.

    Quote Originally Posted by Cole
    The war in Afghanistan is costing us $100 billion a year these days. The $4.7 billion in foreign aid we gave Israel and Egypt last year is considerably cheaper. How much did the last round of bail outs and stimulus cost the U.S.? Would you allow that $150 a barrel oil due to this short-sighted people's revolution spreading to Saudi Arabia or an attack on Iran would cause a repeat recession far more costly than foreign aid?
    I think you're forgetting the following equatation:

    - The war in Afghanistan costs 100 Billion a year now, because the USA failed to invest perhaps a few hundred of millions in Afghanistan, and instead left the country to the mercy of the ISI, back in the early 1990s.

    True enough, the US never really "run" the Mujjs in Afghanistan: it was the ISI that did - with help of US and Saudi money. But then, perhaps the USA could've said ISI at least in 1992, that it's an American issue how they spend their taxpayer's money, and not that of the Pakistani military intelligence...

    - Furthermore, paying Israel and Egypt not only 4.7 billion annually now, but actually much more (then, this amount accounts only for officially provided military aid, not for all the other sorts of aid, like large-scale deliveries of grain, various US-granted loans etc.) is equal to curing the effects of a desease, but not curing the desease itself.

    "So, Egypt got a cancer in form of the Brotherhood? No problem: provide arms to Mubarak so he can better kick their backsides. And never mind if it's granted he can't do that forever: my term lasts only four years - eight, if I convince the Congress Mubarak needs another 40 F-16s from Lockmart to counter the Brotherhood..."
    Last edited by CrowBat; 02-04-2011 at 06:07 AM.

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    Default Agree with you that had we spent more earlier, Afghanistan would not be as tough now

    Quote Originally Posted by CrowBat View Post
    I think you're forgetting the following equatation:

    - The war in Afghanistan costs 100 Billion a year now, because the USA failed to invest perhaps a few hundred of millions in Afghanistan, and instead left the country to the mercy of the ISI, back in the early 1990s.

    True enough, the US never really "run" the Mujjs in Afghanistan: it was the ISI that did - with help of US and Saudi money. But then, perhaps the USA could've said ISI at least in 1992, that it's an American issue how they spend their taxpayer's money, and not that of the Pakistani military intelligence...

    - Furthermore, paying Israel and Egypt not only 4.7 billion annually now, but actually much more (then, this amount accounts only for officially provided military aid, not for all the other sorts of aid, like large-scale deliveries of grain, various US-granted loans etc.) is equal to curing the effects of a desease, but not curing the desease itself.

    "So, Egypt got a cancer in form of the Brotherhood? No problem: provide arms to Mubarak so he can better kick their backsides. And never mind if it's granted he can't do that forever: my term lasts only four years - eight, if I convince the Congress Mubarak needs another 40 F-16s from Lockmart to counter the Brotherhood..."
    If Wikipedia is correct, 12.8 million tourists visited Egypt in 2008 spending $11 billion and employing 12% of the workforce. When I saw the horses/camels running through the crowd, it was not difficult to imagine them as irritated workers losing tourism revenue rather than paid thugs. I'm sure there are plenty of those courtesy of the Interior Ministry, but an objective observer would probably admit that many more are unhappy with the economic disruption this is causing and the starvation it risks.

    Spent an hour watching C-SPAN with Egyptian experts who met today talking at The Frontline Club in London (Mod added podcast link:http://frontlineclub.com/events/2011...nesday-10.html ). Highly recommend it if you can catch a rerun. Several admitted there is no clear leader ready to take power in either Tunisia or Egypt. A student getting his masters in London said none of the organizers of the protests were remotely qualified to govern. The interesting thing to me was several Iranian men in the audience who compared the protesters to teen-agers talking back to their parents.

    Another point of interest was a reporter saying that the Muslim Brotherhood has not hurt Turkey. A second Turkish economist agreed while others were less sure that has been a positive Turkish influence on what was once an extremely secular country. At 25-30%, it is pretty easy to see some coalition including the Muslim Brotherhood eventually ending up in power...along with communists, socialists, and all those other fun groups.

    Finally, while I have been as addicted as most to watching the chaos on TV, I had to chuckle when Pierce whatever-his-name-is asked an Israeli observer about attacks on the press. He answered honestly that the American press was guilty of "professional narcissism." Anderson Cooper is going for the record of showing himself getting beat up over and over from "an undisclosed location," while I noted Christiane Ammanpour being snooty on camera.

    While the press needs to be there, there is little doubt that they are accessories to some of the violence. Plus, one tires of hearing networks claim to be objective as they repeatedly interview Fouad Ajami from Johns Hopkins who can't say enough bad about Mubarak in flowery language.
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 02-04-2011 at 08:31 AM. Reason: Insert link

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    Hmm. Subtle inter-service jab at my AF and Navy brothers went off course a bit...

    I'll try to regroup my point a bit: The upfront costs of buying influence and subtly thwarting popular will in favor of stability with a semi-cooperative government is indeed cheaper than what an Iraq or an Afghanistan costs; there are subtle costs that are being ignored because we have misplaced the causation for what is going on in the world.

    Are we in Iraq and Afghanistan and spending Billions there, and spending billions on increased counter-terror security initiatives across our society; and spending billions re-framing the military from one well trained, postured and equipped to deter and defeat major threats to our nation because of Islamist ideology?

    Or has Islamist ideology taken root across these populaces due to 65 years of increasing US manipulation of political processes and the resultant impunity in which these governments (All on the Freedom House list of least free states) have come to treat their own people with while secure in the support of the US?

    Making matters worse is this information and transportation technology that allows the oppressed in Yemen to connect with those in Jordan, with those in Egypt, with those in Algeria, with those in Libya, etc, etc, etc.

    A critical part of the quid pro quo from these governments was that they would control their populaces. With today's information age, they can't. There is a tremendous synergy and it is no longer possible to "separate the insurgent from the populace."

    The same thing happened on a slower scale when Great Britain connected the world with a great network of telegraph cables and steam powered fleets. Events in South Africa affected India, events in India affected Malaya, etc. Co-options of local systems of legitimacy that result in local national governments that grow emboldened in their foreign protections and come to act with increasing impunity can survive in isolation through strong military action. They cannot survive once connected and exposed.

    So, while a billion here and a billion there may have been a economical model of securing national interests over the past 65 years, it is a model that is unsustainable. It is a model that is now requiring us to drop a $100 Billion in various places where we are acting out to try to keep the wheels on. Do we now intervene in Egypt and drop a $100B/year there as well?

    The irony is, that we are not being attacked by the populaces of our enemies, we are being attacked by the populaces of our billion dollar a year friends. Then, in response, we ignore those populaces and those governments and instead go to Afghanistan and Iraq and attack them. We are chasing symptoms of the problem and pointedly avoiding the root causes.

    The root causes are that we have allowed our foreign policy to get out of line with our national ethos and principles. We have backed shady characters, and they have grown more shady as they became emboldened by our backing. Now that house of cards is coming down. To act out to continue to prop up these governments is a suicide move for US power and influence. We've run out of fingers to jam into this dike.

    We need a new approach that is more tuned to the growing power of connected populaces. We need a new approach that is more in line with our national ethos. This is where I came into the SWC to begin with. I wrote a paper and published it here on the SWJ.

    Populace-Centric Engagement – A Positive Change of Strategic Perspective for Winning the Long War. Small Wars Journal
    http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/200...ic-engagement/

    Then, a couple weeks later some guy named Slap sends me an email and says that people are arguing about my paper and that I should weigh in. I had no idea what he was talking about, but followed the link he sent me to here:

    http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...&highlight=win

    Don't blame me, blame Slap...
    Robert C. Jones
    Intellectus Supra Scientia
    (Understanding is more important than Knowledge)

    "The modern COIN mindset is when one arrogantly goes to some foreign land and attempts to make those who live there a lesser version of one's self. The FID mindset is when one humbly goes to some foreign land and seeks first to understand, and then to help in some small way for those who live there to be the best version of their own self." Colonel Robert C. Jones, US Army Special Forces (Retired)

  18. #98
    Council Member CrowBat's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cole
    If Wikipedia is correct, 12.8 million tourists visited Egypt in 2008 spending $11 billion and employing 12% of the workforce. When I saw the horses/camels running through the crowd, it was not difficult to imagine them as irritated workers losing tourism revenue rather than paid thugs. I'm sure there are plenty of those courtesy of the Interior Ministry, but an objective observer would probably admit that many more are unhappy with the economic disruption this is causing and the starvation it risks.
    I had a talk with several Egyptians on the telephone today. A friend of mine, who grew up in Egypt, called his family and friends too. The outcome was quite similar: shop-owners, middle-aged people are scared to death and want the protests to end, and the protesters to go home. "It's bad for business".

    From what I hear from a member of a bedu family now working in the tourist industry in the Sinai, many from that sector think exactly the same. What is going on in Egypt since eight days practically caused a collapse of tourism, and is thus surely to have grave economic consequences.

    Furthermore, I know from own experience that the Ministry of Interior's Central Security Forces (CSF) have plenty of informers in the tourist industry, so it might not surprise if some of them go protesting, then get caught by the anti-Mubarak protesters only to have police or CSF IDs with them. However....

    The problem is that there are only a very few such people compared to the numbers of those that do not own shops, or can only dream about working in the tourism industry.

    Even more so, believing in anything like "spontaneous pro-Mubarak demos"...borders on believing in miracles - or simply denying reality. Ordinary, "everyday" people don't have printed placards, or stocks of flags, sticks, rocks, and even less so lenghty convoys of buses ready to take them to Cairo - where most of them then did not know their way around (!) - and even less so are they ready to voluntarily charge a crowd on horseback or riding a camel; ordinary people staging "spontaneous" demonstrations do not challenge their opponents for a violent confrontation, grab one or two and then beat them, shot them and then drop their bodies in some alley...they do not loot and then burn down one of largest shopping mals (happened 3 days back in Alexandria), and I also do not know of ordinary people who shot at the others with a sniper rifle from the roof of the nearby building. If this is not enough, ordinary people involved in protest of whatever kind also do not launch decisive attacks on offices of two major human-rights associations, beat and then take away around a dozen of people in "some civilian bus", escorted by the Central Security Forces car...- and this while explaining to the crowd around them that these are Iranian-paid, Hezbollah agents.

    Nobody does that unless he's paid and ordered to do it and promised to be backed up and protected later.

    And at that point this all turns into a SOP for a dictator clinging to power - against all odds, and regardless the cost.
    Last edited by CrowBat; 02-04-2011 at 12:22 PM.

  19. #99
    Council Member Bob's World's Avatar
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    The American Revolution was horribly disruptive on the economy and stability of the society for at least a generation. The majority of the populace had little interest in revolution going in, and perhaps even those who were enthusiastic had "buyers remorse" once it was over.

    Egypt and her people have a long, hard road in front of them. The easy path is to simply submit to despotism. To accept one's role in life as assigned to them by birth and the government. Populaces will typically submit to this unless something jolts them to action.

    Sometimes it is a period of major economic hardship that turns the bad into the intolerable, and the people act out. This is why so many believe that economics are the key to such revolts. My take is that bad economics without a corresponding high-level conditions of insurgency due to perceptions of poor governance is spark without fuel.

    Sometimes it is an internal or external leader who emerges, armed with some ideology tailored to speak to the target populace that provides the spark.

    Sometimes, as in the Middle East today, you have a vast "fuel supply" of despotism, with economic and ideological sparks flying, all connected through real-time communications. A spark in Tunisia ignites a conflagration in Egypt. Far too many of those fuel supplies link directly back to the US. Breaking those linkages, and applying influence to help keep these inevitable events from getting out of control is a prudent course for the US. Insanely difficult, but prudent.
    Robert C. Jones
    Intellectus Supra Scientia
    (Understanding is more important than Knowledge)

    "The modern COIN mindset is when one arrogantly goes to some foreign land and attempts to make those who live there a lesser version of one's self. The FID mindset is when one humbly goes to some foreign land and seeks first to understand, and then to help in some small way for those who live there to be the best version of their own self." Colonel Robert C. Jones, US Army Special Forces (Retired)

  20. #100
    Council Member slapout9's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bob's World View Post

    Yea,it's all my fault

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