EGYPT AND MILITARY TYRANTS...WE SHOULD WORRY

"Instead of subjecting the military to the civil power, [a tyrant will make] the civil subordinate to the military. But can [he] thus put down all law under his feet? Can he erect a power superior to that which erected himself? He [can do] it indeed by force, but let him remember that force cannot give right." --Thomas Jefferson: Rights of British America, 1774.(*) ME 1:209, Papers 1:134

In an earlier blog ( see below) I outlined the foreign and domestic political situation Egypt's first democratically elected president, Mohammad Morsi, had to deal with with when he was elected a year ago. In summary his problems were: the Hosni Mubarak old-guard entrenched and barricaded by decades in power remained a powerful force, while the military and the secret service, the real power in the nation, worked to undermine the new president. From abroad Morsi also faced opposition from the White House which had decided that this PhD from the University of California steeped in ideas of "democracy" was too independent and unlikely to be a pliable and complacent "partner". Washington quietly gave the green light to others in the region that he should go. Closer to his home, across the narrow Red Sea, Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah was unhappy with a democratic Egypt on its western border. It feared its own suppressed Moslem Brotherhood and worried that the very concept of the Egyptian revolution might be "exported" to Saudi Arabia. Saudi money found its way into Egypt to stir up massive demonstrations.

But Morsi faced other just as intractable problems at home in the form of a faltering economy, falling gold reserves, rising unemployment, a fragile political coalition, and a powerful, outsized military establishment with potentially traitorous ties abroad.

The Egyptian economy is long burdened by many "give aways" in the form of food, and fuel subsidies. These were instituted under Mubarak to keep the populous quiet, but which weakened the economy. In the end it turned out to be the heavily subsidized military which was Morsi's greatest threat.

The Egyptian military, the largest subsidized component of the economy, is underwritten by a powerful foreign nation. Each year the generals pocket a hefty $1.3 billion dollars in "welfare" from the USA. These funds, totaling over $70 billion dollars over the years, are a form of insurance-payment designed to keep the army's leadership in line with US interests, and, as well, to help maintain the military as a controlling element of the the Egyptian state. If the US is spending $1.3 billion per year, it wants to be sure it's paying the "top guy", and is getting its money's worth by making sure the top guy stays on top. These US funds were also a handy lever to insure that the Egyptians keep the peace with Israel, and maintain the critical sea-lane through the Suez Canal. Those seventy billions of dollars were well-used in Egypt to pamper the generals, who buy spiffy gold-encrusted uniforms, up-to-date US military hardware (but not too up to date!), and get to go on expensive jaunts abroad to US military installations, war-colleges, and camps where they are duly indoctrinated. The funds are, as well, a boon to the US arms industry, since the money can only be used to purchase American military hardware. In this way it supports and comforts burgeoning militarism on two continents. But money is fungible, and over the long decades the dollars were sidelined by entrepreneurial generals into private industry. Large amounts accrued to the Egyptian Army as investment funds for their own private businesses. It is now claimed that the military "owns" about 40% of the nation's economy. Thus, the continued flow of US funds are a significant investment in propping up elements in the Egyptian economy antithetical to democracy. The result is a weakened general economy, hindered job formation and unfair competition with independent companies which must bump shoulders with the heavily subsidized military which produces all manner of products for the market from water bottles to laptop computers.

In the end, after many unfortunate faux pas by the inexperienced Morsi and company, the powerful, entrenched military and their allies finally took down Morsi, their legitimately elected President. General Abdul Al Sissi called to give Morsi 48 hours to resign, give up all real power and accept a "nominal" presidency in which all real power resided with the generals, or they would arrest him. This was the shameful "deal" which the US Ambassador, Security Advisor Rice and President Barack Obama favored and encouraged Morsi to accept. It was a deal which would give Obama cover but turn Egypt back to despotism. Morsi decided to take a courageous stand, he gave Obama and the generals a one finger salute, forcing a take-over which all the world would see revealed as a crude power play by the powerful...a military coup. The result is that Morsi is now behind bars in a barracks near Tahrir Square. His chief aids have been rounded up as so many criminals. The generals are scouring the City with trumped-up warrants for the arrest of 300 members of Morsi's political Freedom and Justice Party. The new military despots then shut down newspapers they did not like, closed political organizations they found offensive and even arrested journalists from Al Jazeera whom they considered too "pro Morsi". Today, July 8, 2013, our US press has widely reported that the Army and Egyptian Police have "massacred" scores of peaceful sit-in pro-Morsi demonstrators, most of whom were shot in the head at close range.

The US and the rest of the free world wring their hands at the the slaughter and decry what is a clear military coup d'état. The White House has remained silent, unwilling to call the coup "a coup". Western government leaders who were complicitous with the US in helping to out Morsi are now frustrated and unhappy, having their facile ability to talk up "democracy" for third world countries turn too obviously into so much empty hypocritcal rhetoric. Here in the US, supposed leader of the "free world", we continue to conspire against "inconvienient" democracies we do not like and continue to support militarism at home and abroad....at our peril and the peril of the rest of the world. The situation in Egypt and its apparent descent into further chaos is a clear picture of what happens when we unleash the military from its civilian control. Tyranny is the result. We can not let this coup stand! We can not continue to support the despotic generals. As Thomas Jefferson so aptly stated, "....tyrants (will) make the civil, subordinate to the military. (They can do it) indeed by force, but let (them)remember that force cannot give right".

What we should remember as well, something that our own pliant press will not or can not state, is our own nation's complicity in this tragedy. We have supported the militarization of Egypt for decades. We are well-aware of how our funding has crippled their economy. We have supported the tyranny of Mubarak, and now we have underhandedly helped engineer the fall of the first democratically elected president of that nation. Our President hypocritically wrings his hands in public false despair and in private finds ways to support tyranny. We are in good part responsible for the tragedy in that region. Can we not somehow learn to be a more benign super power? Can we not somehow become a force for good in the world as our Founders certainly imagined was to be our nation's course? And too, seeing the chaos in Egypt, should we also worry that our own powerful standing army and the huge military industries which are in league with it are a danger to our own freedoms?

Get the picture?

rjk