Tahir Square Again

A group of students have gone back into Tahir Square in Cairo in an effort to maintain their influence in the political process. Some among them are calling for the removal of Mubarak supporters from the current government and all of them are increasingly worried about the strength of the Muslim Brotherhood. The so-called students fear that they will be unable to organize in time for the forthcoming elections. It will be interesting to see how the Egyptian military responds to these demonstrations and even more interesting to watch the Muslim Brotherhood. I would imagine that there are a lot of very dramatic and very intense debates going on in all three groups. When the history of the revolution is written, this will be determined to be a critical time.

It is, of course, impossible to know how the political situation in Egypt will develop over the years ahead, but the safe bet is that it will be a turbulent process. I presume that, if left to their own devices, the military will do everything in their power to maintain a secular state that they can control without having to actually occupy all of the civil governmental positions. The Muslim Brotherhood will work for an Islamic state that they control through the clergy and the mosques, a la Iran. The student group, which is, in reality, an amalgam of everybody else, will push for something close to genuine democracy. National elections will appear to the outside world to be the focus of the battle, but the real battle for the future of Egypt will take place in the neighborhoods. Coercion will be relevant, but interpersonal conversation will be the dominant battleground.

I have a great respect for the power of the gun and do not lightly dismiss the influence of the Egyptian military, but I know of no military government that has been able to hold on to power once public aspirations fail to be met, as appears to be the case presently in Egypt. I also know of no rag tag bunch of idealists that have been able to stand up to an organized group such as the Muslim Brotherhood and simultaneously invent a functioning democratic government. If I had to place a bet in Las Vegas on which of the three groups would emerge victorious I would bet on the Muslim Brotherhood. My assumption is that they are already well along, not only preparing for the next election, but, even more importantly, working to solidify their influence in every community in Egypt.

The frustrating part of all of this is how little the United States can do to impact this process. President Obama appears to have concluded that the radicalization of North Africa and the Middle East is inevitable, and we must find ways to cozy up to extremists like Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Muslim Brotherhood. By so doing, he feels that we can modify their behavior and thus minimize the harm done to ourselves. The President has made Green Energy a principal interest and is attempting to convince America that it must continue to spend in order to meet the challenges of the future. I assume that he foresees a day when all countries in the Middle East and Africa are controlled by radicals and the supply of oil that currently fuels our economy is no longer as available as is the case today.

There is logic to the argument that we need green energy, but not that we should attempt to pacify religious zealots. I do not believe that appeasement is the best route for this country to take, nor do I believe that it is the best outcome for the rest of the world. I don't find any of the countries that are being run by radical theocracies to be responsible members of the international community and I certainly do not see those governments as being good for their own citizens. We are in serious trouble at the present time because we did not do the necessary earlier. We can not change that, but we should not just give up because of past failures. We must find ways to blunt the momentum of radical theology in this critical part of the world. In the process we must understand that the real battleground is not in the deserts of Libya, but rather in the conversations on the Arab Street.

This is a much bigger problem than just Egypt. It extends throughout all of North Africa and the Middle East and, if not addressed now, will certainly face us in other parts of the Muslim world in the future. In Egypt, I would sit down with the current rulers of that country, all of them military men that America has supported for their entire adult lives, and talk turkey - literally. I would use Mustafa Kemal Ataturk as my example. Ataturk was a military man. He created a functioning secular democracy in a Muslim country. I would do my very best to convince my Egyptian military contacts that it is in their long term interest to not make the mistakes that Mubarak made in attempting to control the government. Somehow they must ensure that the so-called students win this fight with the Muslim Brotherhood. I presume that we are talking along these lines, and I presume that at least a few in the Egyptian military see the logic of the argument, but I worry about how determined we or they are. My worry stems in large part from my view of President Obama's attraction to a policy of appeasement.