By John Ballard
At the moment the situation in Egypt is getting ugly. I'm reminded of a line in CSI rerun a few days ago.
Forensics examiner (holding a bullet just dug from a body) Who brings a gun to a knife fight?
Grissom: The winner.
As I write I'm listening to the Al Jazeera audio feed. A female reporter on the scene in Tahrir Square, speaking in a stressed, panic-stricken voice, describing the violence now breaking out between hard-core protesters and pro-government supporters who have been mobilized and set loose by the authorities. What happens next is not going to be pretty. And it's not going to be over any time soon. Rather than submit to a voyeuristic urge to watch the political equivalent of a dog-fight, I am turning my gaze to other matters.
The best assessment of what's happening comes from a tweet -- The "Stockholm Syndrome" where ppl stop having +ve feelings about their captors. lack of abuse becomes seen as kindness.
Mubarak's speech last night, together with a coordinated message and restrained response from the military, the restoration of Internet service and officially orchestrated pro-Mubarak, pro-government demonstrations are having the desired effect.
In a stroke of military genius tactics, pro-Mubarak supporters include camels, horses and donkeys. The live pictures coming in are dramatic. And the narrative is not easy to stop listening to.
But I'm afraid the end result is a foregone conclusion.
My next assignment is coming up and I must stop blogging now.
Here are a few links for the curious reader.
?Flickr album with many images
?The Second Arab Revolt: Winners and Losers by Immanuel Wallerstein, a sober overview of the last several years. This is required reading for anyone claiming to be informed about the Middle East.
The great loser of the second Arab Revolt is clearly the United States. One can see it by the incredible vacillation of the U.S. government in the present moment. The United States (like every other major power in the world) places one criterion before all others � regimes friendly to it. Washington wants to be on the side of the winner, provided the winner is not hostile. What to do then in a situation like that of Egypt, which presently is a virtual client-state of the United States? The United States is reduced to calling publicly for more �democracy,� no violence, and negotiations. Behind the scenes, they seem to have told the Egyptian army not to embarrass the United States by shooting too many people. But can Mubarak survive without shooting a lot of people?The second Arab Revolt is occurring amidst a worldwide chaotic situation in which three features are dominant � a declining standard of living for at least two-thirds of the world�s populations; outrageous increases in the current income of relatively small upper strata; and a serious decline in the effective power of the so-called superpower, the United States. The second Arab Revolt, however it turns out, will further erode U.S. power, especially in the Arab world, precisely because the one sure base for political popularity in these countries today is opposition to the intrusion of the United States in their affairs. Even those who normally want and depend on U.S. involvement are finding it politically dangerous to continue to do so.
No comments:
Post a Comment