I just finished rereading Seymour Hersh's article from 2007 called the Redirection.
If you care about what is going on the Middle East right now, this is a wonderful read. In fact, if you want to know what killed the Arab Spring, this is a must read. Because you will find that all the B.S. our politicians say is just that, B.S.
A quick synopsis. Despite people with actual knowledge of the region say the Shi'ites in Iraq would align themselves with Iran, and strengthen Iran, if Saddam was removed, Bush removed Saddam. Then he had to scramble to come up with a policy to counter the now strengthened Iran. So he turned to Saudi Arabia. Who then turned to their great Salafists buds in the region.
So, what does it look like today?
The most brutal result is out backing of the Salafists and Muslim Brotherhood actors in Syria. All the while, our government and compliant media ignores their behavior and solely focuses on the regime. It's quite funny reading a crappy Washington Post article talking about the FSA as if it was some George Washington outfit, only to read the comments from people who actually don't rely on on the Washington Post to mock the article to death.
But this isn't just about Syria.
In fact, for March 30th it is about Egypt.
Among the numerous parties in the opposition coalition were: the Constitution Party, the Egyptian Popular Current, the Egyptian Social Democratic Party, the Socialist Popular Alliance Party, the Wafd Party, the Free Egyptians Party, the Tagammu Party, the Egyptian Communist Party, the Egyptian Socialist Party, the Democratic Front Party, the Unified Nasserist Party, the Justice and Freedom Youth, the Rebel campaign, the Alliance of Revolutionary Forces, the Second Revolution of Rage Movement, the Front for Peaceful Change, the April 6 Youth Movement, the April 6 Democratic Front Movement, the Mina Daniel Movement, the Lotus Revolution Coalition, the Workers and Farmers Party, the Kifaya Movement, the Socialist Youth Union, the National Front for Justice and Democracy, the Revolutionary Youth Union and the Children of Egypt Coalition. Egyptians can hardly complain about a lack of choice.
link
The recent killings of Shi'itesin Egypt actually has a lot to do with it.
That Mursi would allow people to call for 'Jihad' against Syria already angered a lot of Egyptians (The U.S. was quiet of course. Despite Bill Maher's constant hatred of Islam, Islam is not what is shown in the U.S.). They had already seen Copts attacked, now they are seeing Shi'ites attacked. And the government's rhetoric doesn't help.
So on Sunday you will see the Egyptians rise up not only against Mursi, but the U.S. that supported him. It will be framed as a psychos against an 'elected' leader. It is not.
Don't know how many people saw Jon Stewart on Barnamag al Banramag, but one of things Basam Yousef joked about was the new governor of Luxor. Mursi appointed someone from Al Gama'at Al Islamiyah to be the governor. A few years ago, this same group was committing brutal terrorist acts against tourists.
So, enough of how the our Islamic extremists friends are destroying Egypt (which hopefully will change this Sunday, though I see reports the U.S. might be sending to troops for 'stability' (read: keep our puppet in power)).
Now on to Lebanon.
Back in 2006, the administration and Israel thought they could bomb the Lebanese into not liking Hizballah. This idiotic thought makes since in the Washington bubble, but in Lebanon, not so much. Seven years later, Hizballah is just as strong as it was, actually did quite well in an election, and continues to be a thorn in our ass. Especially given the large amount of natural gas off the coast of Lebanon that our oil companies want.
So Israel failed. Then in 2008, the Saudis funded some Sunni extremists in Lebanon that thought they could take Hizballah on. That lasted minutes.
But recently, there was a kook Sunni extremist in Sidon that kept harassing the hell out of Hizballah. What he said would sound sane in the U.S., but in Lebanon, it actually was kookie. Hizballah never took the bait. He kept pushing his people, and pushing. Finally, they attacked the army and that is when all the Saudi funding for this kook went down the drain. The army went after him with full force and even his supporters had to distance themselves from him.
The rise and fall of Sheikh Assir
If you read Seymour Hersh's article, you will find how we tolerate some of the nutcases, and attack others. The U.S. did not give a damn that Saudi was funding this kook to undermine stability in Lebanon. I want you to remember that the next time we accuse Iran of 'undermining stability in Lebanon'. The same with the Sunni extremists in KFC, Hardees attacked.
What you won't find in that article is that these are our allies in Lebanon. They are Sa'd Hariri supporters.
Libya
Libya is currently not a state. We use militias for security, which strengthen them, but this same mechanism keeps them stronger than the state. Eastern Libya has large armed militants that want to run their own affairs despite what the majority wants (they have more of the oil, the armed militias are very Islamic) and Tripoli wants a more moderns state. There is no consensus yet on even what direction the state will take. As long as oil is flowing, we don't care.
So in light of this, and our seven year policy of looking to Saudi and more specifically Prince Bandar, to run our foreign policy, I ask in the name of transparency who the hell is Ben Rhodes. For someone that is setting our Middle East foreign policy, it would be nice to know who put him in charge, what is he looking for, etc.
Mostly, because I see a lot of anger in the Arab world at our policy. Our 'leaders' make the mistake of thinking that the Arab leaders give a damn about their people. They care about as much as the latest CPI index.
I'm really hoping the Arab world turns out to be a lot less racist than what we had hoped they would be for the last seven years. And they finally tell us to fuck off.