Egypt - I told you so...

"Police backed by army troops fired salvos of gas canisters and charged demonstrators in the square as darkness fell on Sunday, temporarily sending protesters fleeing. Demonstrators brandished spent shotgun cartridges and bullet casings, although police denied using live rounds.

Security forces burned down banners and Internet clips, which could not be independently checked, showed police beating protesters with sticks, pulling them by the hair and, in one case, dumping what appeared to be a corpse on piles of rubbish." J-Post

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Is it clear now that the Egyptian officer corps intend to continue ruling the country as they have since 1952? Is it clear? There will be a place for theMB and other Salafists in the "new Egypt." That place will be in prison camps in the western and eastern deserts. Nasser was one of these offcers. There was a place for communists in his Egypt. It was called "prison."

University students should be very careful of their actions. Students of the American University in Cairo should be exceptionally careful.

Some fool in the streets screamed today that Mubarak is still running the government. I would respond - No, but you might as well kill him to make yourself feel fulfilled. pl

http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=246448

Comments

[mo]

Colonel,
Its hard to give up what the Saudis have made very lucrative. If I remember correctly, Nasser was as anti MB as he was the Communists and in fact relented on the Communists after the USSR started giving arms.

But the people will prevail and killing would be too good for Mubarak.

[turcopolier]

Mo

Killing would be too good for Mubarak? I thought you were an adult. Would killing be "too good" for anyone whom you think ill of? How about Rafik Hariri? egyptians are acting like egyptians. Mubarak was acting like an Egyptian. Egypt's problems are economic and compounded by their mad desire to have huge families. Tyrants are just tyrants. Mubarak did not make Egyptians poor. They did. pl pl

[mo]

Colonel,
Theft, corruption, political skulduggery are part and parcel of the political experience in the ME and Mubarak was no more guilty of that than any of the various kings and tyrants and businessmen (including Hariri) and yes Egypt was poor long before he came along (probably poorer under Nasser); So no, not for that do I have such ill will for the man.

What he is (was) guilty of that makes me bode such distaste for the man was his policy, attitude and connivance in the killing of Palestinians and Lebanese; Of being such a useful tool in the misery suffered by the people of Gaza and of being a friend to those that caused such misery.

I do not begrudge any person in the Arab world who does not feel like I do towards the Palestinian cause and would not expect all to do so. But if that person actively works to heap the misery on those of his brothers then I do find it difficult to dredge up sympathy or pity.

[turcopolier]

mo

Now we are on the same page. HM's abandonment of the Palestinians for reasons of state is unacceptable. Let him be tried in a Palestinian court. You want justice? Turn TTG and me loose with a few hundred million. pl

[William R. Cumming]

There is a reason the Founding Fathers distrusted standing armies.

[securecare]

I assume you mean dollars and not people.

[FB Ali]

In Feb the protesters stood up to the police and regime thugs, and finally put them to flight (at considerable cost to themselves). Mubarak then moved troops in, but they showed no appetite to kill the people and even started fraternizing. That is when the military pushed Mubarak out.

It is obvious that the generals have used the last ten months to train and equip the police (besides trying and imprisoning a large numbers of activists). This time the police seem to be standing up better against the crowds.

However, if the current demonstrations are big enough and last long enough to render the police again ineffective, will the generals risk sending in the army again?

The military, especially the officers, can no longer be insulated, even in their barracks, from what is going on in the street, and being affected by it. The generals might be determined to hang on to power, but their power comes from their troops. If these go 'wobbly', the generals will join Mubarak in his prison.

[Adam L Silverman]

Sir,

Apparently the Egyptians are justifying this based on how various American cities are racking down on the Occupy folks and on how the Germans are cracking down on green movement protestors:
http://gawker.com/5861191/
"We saw the firm stance the US took against OWS people & the German govt against green protesters to secure the state," an Egyptian state television anchor said yesterday (as translated by the indispensable Sultan Sooud al Qassemi; bold ours)."

[turcopolier]

Adam

Nah! Talk to me when we have gunned down a lot of people. p

[Babak Makkinejad]

Yes, Col. Lang and the only country that is cheering the Egyptian protestors is the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Mr. Obama is nowhere to be seen; likewise for the leaders of Turkey, Israel, EU, etc.

[Babak Makkinejad]

That is only a Hope Gen. Ali.

To my knowledge, no Sunni-majority Muslim polity has yet broken free of the Military-dmonated state model; Turkey having gone furthest.

[Babak Makkinejad]

It is not standing armies; it is something in nature of Sunni-dominated Muslim polities.

[William R. Cumming]

Pretty much agree with Babak perhaps out of ignorance. But it is amazing that religion and religious litmus tests even in the USA may be what ends up separating the Republican candidates and who wins next fall's USA Presidential election. Polls that seem fairly reliable still indicate that 20% of eligible voters in USA would never vote for any MORMON. In what I predict is one of the lowest percentage of eligible voter turnouts ever in USA history this could be enough to pick the winner by default.

[Patrickhuss]

Three Americans arrested in Cairo as unrest enters 4th day

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/three-americans-arrested-in-cairo-as-unrest-enters-4th-day/2011/11/22/gIQAlOdikN_story.html

It did not take long for your warning to AUC students to prove prescient.

[walrus]

There seems to be a certain similarity between Egypt, OWS, 99%, the UK riots and similar disturbances.

The pretext that anyone in power cares about the average person is wearing pretty thin everywhere in the world.

I think we might be in for a replay of the 1850's.

....But without Marx, Karl, not Groucho.

[R. Whitman]

Any word from Yusuf al-Misry on this??

[tequila]

Babak - The Gulf states and most of the Maghreb (Tunisia, Morocco, Libya) do not fit your Sunni military-dominated model, possible exception of Mauretania. Neither did Iraq for that matter despite being dominated by Sunnis. How about Jordan or any of the former Soviet Central Asian states?

[optimax]

I never thought I'd say this but I miss the commie influence on our economic system. It pulled the country to the left, giving us the New Deal and decades of prosperity based on a large middle-class. Now the country's dialogue is on the right so far nobody talks about raising wages by increasing the power of labor, as they realized was necessary in the '30s. The focus should be on the low wages of labor and not how much the wealthy make. Otherwise it is easy for the right to portray the issue as envy instead of self-interest and survival.

[M]

Other Sunni dominated Muslim polities include Malaysia and Indonesia.

[Babak Makkinejad]

Yes you are right; I had to be more precise.

Let us discount the Persian Gulf Arab states - oil-wells with flags for now.

But the most populous Muslim states fall into my pattern: Indonesia, Bangladesh, Turkey, Pakistan, Syria, Algeria, Egypt.

Morocco, Jordan, (Kingdom of) Afghanistan were unitary in the person of the King.

That leaves Somalia, Tunisia, Libya, and Mauritania as exceptions.

Of these, 3 are tribalistic polities and only one - Tunisia - does not fall within my pattern.

About Ba’athist Iraq, we have to disagree.

Thank you for bringing up the former Muslim Republic so the Soviet Union.

Kazakhstan is only half-Muslim; the other half is Christian Ukrainian and Russian. I would exclude it.

That leaves Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kirgizstan, and Tajikistan; all of them tribal and all of them with no coherent state structure dating to longer than 25 years. I think whether they will fall within this pattern or not is yet to be seen.

Which brings me to the question that you raised about the Southern Persian Gulf states and some of the other states like them.

Are these even really states – or are they administrative units – created to conveniently ship oil & gas - that are protected by other states but are as ethereal as the sands of their deserts?