The Arab Spring is now long gone. The blossoms are off the trees, the buds and tender shoots of the desert spring were all stillborn. The landscape itself is all but lifeless, a desert sand, bereft of life-giving irrigation. All that remain are a few deep-rooted, little-valued weeds, holding on in Tahrir Square.
Six months after popular unrest, supported by Western intervention, began spreading across North Africa and into the Gulf, only two autocratic leaders have been toppled – both former allies of the West – in Egypt and Tunisia. Serious questions remain concerning who will wield power in both countries – and none of the likely suspects show signs of wanting an alliance with the West. In the meantime, uprisings in Syria and Bahrain have been brutally repressed – with no intervention by the West – and Nato military action in Libya has proved incapable of removing a tinpot dictator who would have been rubbed out within three days by a General Patton and his U.S. tank-cavalry.
Those who continue to occupy Egypt’s Tahrir Square suggest indeed that the corrupt, property-endowed elite military junta has cut a deal with the Islamic Brotherhood in order to retain its own pre-revolutionary loot while sharing any additional revolutionary spoils with Islamic militants:
“the outburst against the generals is partly fuelled by suspicion of a secret deal with the Brotherhood intended to deliver political influence to the Islamists in exchange for guarantees for the generals.” Roula Khalaf, ‘Transition to democracy suffers painful birth pangs’, Financial Times, July 28, 2011
Any initial democratic gains of the Arab Spring have been overwhelmed by sectarian strife, struggling increasingly socialistic economies, and counter-revolutions. So warned British Foreign Minister, William Hague, on July 27, 2011. Fledgling democracies produced by waves of people power might well prove too weak to deal with the deep-rooted problems that they now confront, the Foreign Minister told The London Times. ‘There are a lot of problems and even convulsions to come in the region’, he suggests. Worse still, he warns of bloodshed across the Middle East and the Maghreb as religious groups turn against each other: ‘One of the risks in the Arab Spring is the unleashing of sectarian divisions.’ Progress is bound to be uncertain, and will take up to 30 years to unfold. ‘We are going to be working at this for the rest of our lives.’
Well, I have a response to these words by William Hague – a response that I suspect is shared by many Westerners:
’You may choose to work at this for the rest of your years, Mr. Foreign Minister. But we shall not stand shoulder to shoulder with you. If the Arab Spring should fail – as fail it already has – that is a problem for the Middle East, and not for us. We in the West now fully understand that the more we try to help, the more we flagellate ourselves, like President Obama, for the sins of our ancestors, the more we are hated and despised by those who receive our aid and shrug off our apologies. So, let us awaken to realities and seek to help ourselves and to leave others free to follow suit.’
Tags: Arab Spring, birth pangs, Egyptian military becomes a corrupt junta, Islamic Brotherhood, Islamic Brotherhood on the march, Middle East in chaos, Nato failure in Libya, Nato military action
July 28, 2011 at 10:07 pm |
I’m not surprised by any of this. After the initial surge of hope and enthusiasm for the birth of democracy after the collapse of the USSR, our post-Soviet countries became bogged down in a quagmire of corruption, hatred for the West, passionate anti-Americanism, and obsessive jingoism.
And now the “Arab Spring” is going the same way.
August 1, 2011 at 12:39 am |
Ah Charles, it is a reasonable analysis, but would General Patton have fared any better in Libya?
Have you forgotten about the Rats of Tobruk? The country is a harsh one. It is only a part of the reason why they have not managed to topple the really big rat of Tripoli.
One reason that he has managed to escape is that he has an underground labyrinth and he has bunkers under hospitals and childrens playgrounds. Gadhafi is a really horrible person.
Your analysis on Egypt in particular is correct, and perhaps Tunisia, is correct. This is because the Muslim Brotherhood have a lot of members. However, even the MB is divided, and there are Salafists within the ranks but there are others with more moderate views, yet they are anti-West.
The last time I saw something concrete on Tunisia I discovered that the people were not all that happy about the rise of the Islamists. It was an article pointing out that the brutality had begun prior to them gaining electoral strength… if you know what I mean. There will be an even greater repression in Tunisia if the Islamists get into power.
Libya, on the other hand… despite the assassination of General Younis, who was seen as a traitor by many in the “rebel” movement… it has the opportunity to show the West what can happen if democracy is allowed to be established. The problem with Libya, though, is the tribal nature of the country. Anything could happen if the tribes who want to get rid of Gadhafi start spitting the dummy and then split. So many over there, especially in Misrata have proved their worth in lots of ways, and yes they are really good inventors in Libya. However, there is an element of Islamists. They are not in the majority, but minorities have a way of making life miserable for the majority (Australia is a prime example of what happens when minorities inflict themselves in politics… ugh carbon tax,… a rip off that does nothing)