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2011-01-30 Africa North
What we get for $2 billion a year in aid to Egypt
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Posted by Steve White 2011-01-30 10:27|| E-Mail|| Front Page|| [11136 views ]  Top

#1 Ah, more from the "it's all America's fault" brigade.

We get peace between Israel and Egypt for our $2 billion. Everyone remember that was Carter's solution to Middle East peace, a gigantic bribe? Of course, we had to bribe Israel, too, for some unknown reason.
Posted by gromky 2011-01-30 10:35||   2011-01-30 10:35|| Front Page Top

#2 No, it's not 'blame America' -- you're being a mite sensitive.

It does point out that long-term support of a thug generally doesn't turn out well for American foreign policy. We all liked the Shah better than the Mad Mullahs, but it would have been smarter for us to find an alternative to both.

Likewise in Egypt, Hosni is preferable to the Muslim Brotherhood, but the people there are both suffering and seriously pissed off -- it would have been much better for us if we had 'option #3' ready to roll out.

Let's hope Egypt doesn't turn seriously anti-American. I think there's a part of Egypt that won't -- we've had some long-term cultural contacts that will help us (tourism, etc). But the Muslim Brotherhood, IF they can seize and consolidate power, is going to be a real problem for us.
Posted by Steve White 2011-01-30 10:52||   2011-01-30 10:52|| Front Page Top

#3 it would have been much better for us if we had 'option #3' ready to roll out

We did.

But apparently the "Salvador Allende Method" never really caught on.
Posted by Pappy 2011-01-30 12:08||   2011-01-30 12:08|| Front Page Top

#4 It does point out that long-term support of a thug generally doesn't turn out well for American foreign policy. As long as he's 'our thug' we're OK. When he's 'their thug' it's something else. The population of Thugberg is huge and growing.
Posted by Anguper Hupomosing9418 2011-01-30 13:15||   2011-01-30 13:15|| Front Page Top

#5 The reality is that the problems in Arab countries are structural rather than political at base. Large young and rapidly growing populations for which there are no suitable economic paths to increased middle class prosperity. It's certainly true that Mubarak has been oppressive in many ways. The alternatives are likely to have included either Islamicism of the Taliban sort or constant chaos and instability, neither of which truly address that structural problem satisfactorily.

Note that the Ba'athist platform to which Mubarak was heir included socialism along with Arab nationalism. Wherever it was embraced, however, it seems to have led to strongman rule - Iraq, Syria, Egypt etc.

The PJM Tattler quoted a young Egyptian woman saying she just wanted 'justice' and that it didn't matter whether the new govt was secular or Islamicist. This demonstrates that the emotions contributing to mass protests need not be grounded in a coherent political philosophy - nor in much awareness of the facts of life.

What we got in response to aid to Egypt included years of Mubarak pressuring Hamas and the PLO from the other size of the Gaza strip.

Posted by lotp 2011-01-30 13:28||   2011-01-30 13:28|| Front Page Top

#6 Hosni is preferable to the Muslim Brotherhood

The dirty little secret is that Hosni and the Muslim Brotherhood are in cahoots. Mubarak uses the Muslim brotherhood to scare the West, and then makes sure no other oposition is allowed except the Muslim Brotherhood.

In the run up to the 2005 elections, Mubarak had Ayman Noor (the pro democracy candidate) arrested, tortured and convicted of a bogus crime. This disqualified him from being a candidate ever again.

Mubarak also disqualified non-MB candidates. If anybody wanted to vote against Mubarak, the only choice available was the Muslim Brotherhood.

IT gets worse. Mubarak also arranged beforehand with the MB how the legislature was going to be divided. Whenever the West complains about democracy, the MB's share goes up.
Posted by Frozen Al 2011-01-30 13:59||   2011-01-30 13:59|| Front Page Top

#7 The thing is the US supported dictatorships in South Korea, Tiawan and Greece and they all shifted towards Democracy when they became wealthier. It was worth the investment and temporary overlooking our ideals.

The US supported dictatorships we support in other parts have not gotten wealthy. We need to be realistic and un PC and figure out why that is so and figure out if we can change it.
Posted by rjschwarz 2011-01-30 16:36||   2011-01-30 16:36|| Front Page Top

#8 Turning a nation of 79 million into raging anti-Americans?

Priceless.

Turning? The population has been anti-American since at least 1948. And generically anti-kuffar since Muhammad. Neither Sadat nor Mubarak was kept in power by American aid. It's just that American aid was the price of a Cold Peace with Israel. I think we will find that if we cancel the aid, Egypt will not dissolve into anarchy. The price of canceling the aid, however, will be ceaseless low-level Egyptian attacks on Israel, as existed prior to the Camp David Accords.

I fully understand the logic of the aid. The point was to prevent an uncontrollable escalation into total war* involving the entire Middle East in the event that Egypt's limited attacks spun out of control with Egypt and Israel continuing to ante up. The $2b was cheaper than hundreds of billions of dollars in the event that the US was compelled to come to Israel's rescue with troops and occupation forces for neighboring Arab countries.

* A war that Israel cannot win short of genocide involving tens of millions.
Posted by Zhang Fei 2011-01-30 17:04||   2011-01-30 17:04|| Front Page Top

#9 I think there's this mistaken notion that Muslims are slavish followers of temporal authority - that if their governments simply suggested that Jews and Americans were the salt of the earth, that Muslim public opinion would magically follow. In reality, Islamists assassinated Sadat, and have made six attempts on Mubarak's life. The fact is that the Muslim zeitgeist is not any leader's plaything. A Muslim leader who ignores this inconvenient fact by being too friendly with the West is likely to have a very short reign - his anti-Jewish and anti-American propaganda is created to counter rebel propaganda that he is overly pro-semitic and pro-American (i.e. the regime is guilty of treason).
Posted by Zhang Fei 2011-01-30 17:26||   2011-01-30 17:26|| Front Page Top

#10 Note that handing American weaponry to Egypt is a feature, not a bug. Modern military equipment requires constant spare parts replenishment - in 1973, Israel would have fallen without the massive logistical effort ordered by Nixon. If the Egyptians had bought Russian weaponry, they could have counted on Russian replenishment in wartime. As it is, only Uncle Sam can replenish Egyptian stocks, meaning that if Egypt does anything the US doesn't like (such as an invasion of Israel), that invasion will be stopped in its tracks due to wear and tear, because we can deny them the parts they need. The (accurate, I think) perception that the US denies resupply for political reasons is why selling US weaponry to India has proven to be an uphill battle.
Posted by Zhang Fei 2011-01-30 17:38||   2011-01-30 17:38|| Front Page Top

#11 For $2 billion per year we got 40 years of peace on Israel's southern border. I think that will seem cheap after what we pay in the next 5 years, if things go as badly as I expect.
Posted by Nimble Spemble 2011-01-30 17:47||   2011-01-30 17:47|| Front Page Top

#12 The dirty little secret is that Hosni and the Muslim Brotherhood are in cahoots. Mubarak uses the Muslim brotherhood to scare the West, and then makes sure no other oposition is allowed except the Muslim Brotherhood.

They're not in cahoots. Mubarak has a Cold Peace with the Islamists because he can't completely finish them off, given that their support is grounded in the existence of a substantial like-minded chunk of the population (and members of the security apparatus). The more he turns up the heat on them, greater the likelihood of additional assassination attempts on him. To survive, he has to ward off every assassination attempt. To kill him, they only have to be successful once.
Posted by Zhang Fei 2011-01-30 18:04||   2011-01-30 18:04|| Front Page Top

#13 Note that the Muslim Brotherhood killed Sadat. They've supposedly renounced violence, but that's more of PR maneuver. I'd be surprised if this was anything but a reshuffling of filing cabinets. Does anyone really think that Sinn Fein and the IRA are separate entities? I'm sure the Ikhwan still has its own private army, renamed as something else, not to mention infiltrators or recruits at all levels of the Egyptian security forces (some of whom killed Sadat).
Posted by Zhang Fei 2011-01-30 18:10||   2011-01-30 18:10|| Front Page Top

#14 * A war that Israel cannot win short of genocide involving tens of millions.

Of course Israel can win it, all they have to do is let the birds fly. Boom! Killing millions in self defense isn't genocide. And we had damn well better internalize that fact, because our own survival might just require us to let our birds fly.

It doesn't matter from what angle you look at the state of the world today, or how you game it out. Really bad stuff is coming down the line. And things just ain't going to be the same after the festivities.
Posted by Secret Asian Man 2011-01-30 18:22||   2011-01-30 18:22|| Front Page Top

#15 Of course Israel can win it, all they have to do is let the birds fly. Boom! Killing millions in self defense isn't genocide. And we had damn well better internalize that fact, because our own survival might just require us to let our birds fly.

Then we have the problem of the deaths of tens of millions of consumers, and a likely total Muslim embargo on American goods, not to mention continuous Muslim attacks on American commercial shipping. Think Somali piracy on a global scale, but with financial and material backing from every Muslim government in the world. Bottom line is that $2b is a small price to pay for a Cold Peace in the Middle East. Because we don't want to end up at war with the entire ummah.
Posted by Zhang Fei 2011-01-30 18:45||   2011-01-30 18:45|| Front Page Top

#16 We may not want to end up at war with the entire ummah, but it's not at all clear that a large portion of the ummah doesn't want to end up at war with us. And that's why we'll have to go on receiving attacks of increasing ferocity and effectiveness until the ummah changes its mind or we do. This globe ain't big enough for the two of us.
Posted by Nimble Spemble 2011-01-30 19:25||   2011-01-30 19:25|| Front Page Top

#17 We may not want to end up at war with the entire ummah, but it's not at all clear that a large portion of the ummah doesn't want to end up at war with us. And that's why we'll have to go on receiving attacks of increasing ferocity and effectiveness until the ummah changes its mind or we do. This globe ain't big enough for the two of us.

We're not at war with the ummah. We do get occasional outbreaks of individual or small groups of zealots engaging in pickup jihad against us, but that's nothing compared to what systematic program of state-sponsored attacks against us could do. There are a lot of disgruntled Muslims on the planet, but they're disgruntled, not at war with us. The ummah's combined nominal GDP is about $5T. If it spent even 0.1% of this fighting Uncle Sam (or drafting individuals for a jihad) in Iraq or Afghanistan, we'd be up to our asses in alligators.
Posted by Zhang Fei 2011-01-30 19:52||   2011-01-30 19:52|| Front Page Top

#18 This globe ain't big enough for the two of us.

This coming from Mr. "Out of Afghanistan Now"....
Posted by Pappy 2011-01-30 20:53||   2011-01-30 20:53|| Front Page Top

#19 The front page of news.com.au clearly illustrates how the media just doesn't understand what is happening.

It's a large photo of a man with a dark mark on his forehead. The mark of a devout muslim gets from praying alot.

'Justice' is code for islamic rule.

I will be delighted if Egypt goes to the local mad mullahs, which will probably send the whole of North Africa islamic.

It will force the Euros to police their own backyard and if they don't then its their problem.

And no more of the Camp David type of 'even handedness'.
Posted by phil_b 2011-01-30 20:57||   2011-01-30 20:57|| Front Page Top

#20 Further, a constant theme of mine is that risk isn't properly priced.

The oil supply risk could well come home to roost very soon. But that is in the longer term wholly a good thing. No more imported oil dependency and the Arabs go back to being camel herders that people care as much about as they do Zaire or Khirgistan.

And as for piracy that is a risk/cost to international trade that has been borne by the British and Americans for 200 years. Enough already.
Posted by phil_b 2011-01-30 21:06||   2011-01-30 21:06|| Front Page Top

#21 Afghanistan is a sink, quicksand, not an opportunity for victory.
Posted by Nimble Spemble 2011-01-30 21:51||   2011-01-30 21:51|| Front Page Top

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