THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume XIII, Issue # 258, November 8, 2011
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
FRIENDLESS IN THE MIDDLE EAST
By Dr. Daniel Pipes
WHY THE ARAB UPHEAVALS OF 2011 HAVE INSPIRED WILDLY INCONSISTENT WESTERN RESPONSES: THE DIFFICULTY
OF THE U.S.A. & OTHER WESTERN POWERS DEVISING A CONSTRUCTIVE POLICY TOWARD THE ARAB MIDDLE EAST, A
REGION WHERE POPULATIONS ARE PREDOMINANTLY HOSTILE TO THE WEST -- HOW ARAB DEMOCRACY TRANSLATES
INTO ISLAMIST POLITICAL REGIMES IN ARAB STATES -- ARAB DEMOCRACY AS A THREAT TO WESTERN CIVILIZATION, AS
WELL AS THE WEST'S SECURITY -- MIDDLE EAST POLICY GUIDELINES FOR WESTERN STATES
FULL STORY:
The Arab upheavals of 2011 have inspired wildly inconsistent Western responses. How, for example, can one justify
abiding the suppression of dissidents in Bahrain, while celebrating dissidents in Egypt? Or protect Libyan rebels from
government attacks, but not their Syrian counterparts? Oppose Islamists taking over in Yemen, but not in Tunisia?
Such ad hockery reflects something deeper than incompetence: the difficulty of devising a constructive policy toward a
region where, other than in a few outliers (Cyprus, Israel, and Iran), populations are predominantly hostile to the West.
Friends are few, powerless, and with dim prospects of taking control. Democracy therefore translates into hostile relations
with unfriendly governments.
Both the first wave of elections in 2005 and the second wave, just begun in Tunisia, confirm that, given a free choice, a
majority of Middle Easterners vote for Islamists. Dynamic, culturally authentic and ostensibly democratic, these forward a
body of uniquely vibrant political ideas and constitute the only Muslim political movement of consequence.
But Islamism (Radical Islam, or Militant Islam) is the third totalitarian ideology (following Fascism/Nazism and
Communism/Authoritarian State Socialism). Islamism preposterously proposes a medieval code to deal with the
challenges of modern life. Retrograde and aggressive, it denigrates non-Muslims, oppresses women, and justifies force to
spread Muslim rule. Middle Eastern democracy threatens not just the West's security, but also its civilization.
That explains why Western leaders (with the brief exception of George W. Bush) shy away from promoting democracy in
the Muslim Middle East.
In contrast, the region's unelected presidents, kings, and emirs pose a lesser threat to the West. With Mu'ammar
al-Qaddafi long ago chastened by American power and Saddam Hussein removed by American-led forces, the egomaniacs
were gone by 2003 and surviving strongmen largely accepted the status quo. They asked for little more than to be allowed
quietly to repress their populations and noisily to enjoy their privileges.
A year ago, Western policymakers could survey the region and note with satisfaction that they enjoyed reasonable
working relations with all the governments of Arabic-speaking countries, excepting Syria. The picture was not pretty, but
functional: Cold War dangers had been thwarted, Islamist ones mostly held off.
Greedy and cruel tyrants, however, present two problems to the West. By focusing on personal priorities to the detriment
of national interests, they lay the groundwork for further problems, from terrorism to separatism to revolution; and by
repressing their subjects, they offend the sensibilities of Westerners. How can those who promote freedom, individualism,
and the rule of law condone oppression?
In the Middle East, full tyranny has dominated since about 1970, when rulers learned how to insulate themselves against
the prior generation's coups d'état. Hafez al-Assad, Ali Abdullah Saleh, Husni Mubarak, and the Algerian regime
demonstrated, with rare flamboyance, the nature of full-blown stasis.
Then, last December, a butterfly flapped its wings in the small Tunisian town of Sidi Bouzid (population: 40,000), when a
policewoman slapped a fruit vendor. The response toppled three tyrants in eleven months, with two more in serious
jeopardy.
Tunisia's president called out the police in Sidi Bouzid in December 2010, but to no avail.
Summing up the West's policy dilemma vis-ŕ-vis the Middle East:
Democracy pleases us but brings hostile elements to power.
Tyranny betrays our principles, but leaves pliable rulers in power.
As interest conflicts with principle, consistency goes out the window. Policy wavers between Scylla and Charybdis.
Western chanceries focus on sui generis concerns: security interests (the U.S. Fifth Fleet stationed in Bahrain), commercial
interests (oil in Saudi Arabia), geography (Libya is ideal for Europe-based air sorties), the neighbors (the Turkish role in
Syria), or staving off disaster (a prospect in Yemen). Little wonder policy is a mess.
Policy guidelines are needed; here follows my suggested triad:
Aim to improve the behavior of tyrants whose lack of ideology or ambition makes them pliable. They will take the easiest
road, so join together to pressure them to open up.
Always oppose Islamists, whether Al-Qa'ida types as in Yemen or the suave and "moderate" ones in Tunisia. They
represent the enemy. When tempted otherwise, ask yourself whether cooperation with "moderate" Nazis in the 1930s
would have been a good idea.
Help the liberal, secular, and modern elements, those who in the first place stirred up the upheavals of 2011. Assist them
eventually to come to power, so that they can salvage the politically sick Middle East from its predicament and move it in
a constitutional, democratic, and free direction.
© 2011 Daniel Pipes. All Rights Reserves.
Originally Published in National Review Online, November 8, 2011
Republished with the Permission of Daniel Pipes
Reprinted from the Daniel Pipes Mailing List, November 8, 2011
URL: http://www.danielpipes.org/10312/friendless-in-the-middle-east
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Islamism & Jihadism -- The Threat of Radical Islam
Page Three
Page Two
Page One
Middle East -- Arabs, Arab States,
& Their Middle Eastern Neighbors
American Foreign Policy -- The Middle East
International Politics & World Disorder:
War, Peace, & Geopolitics in the Real World:
Foreign Affairs & U.S. National Security
Page Two
Page One
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
Counterterrorism & U.S. National Security
U.S. National Security Strategy
Dr. Daniel Pipes, a Ph.D. in Islamic History (Harvard University, 1978), is Founder and President of the Middle East Forum,
Publisher of Middle East Quarterly,
Founder of Campus Watch, Taube Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University, a
signatory of the Project for the New American Century, a former board member of the U.S. Institute of Peace, a former
adjunct scholar at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a Golden Circle supporter of the U.S. Committee for a Free
Lebanon, a former member of the U.S. Department of Defense Special Task Force on Terrorism and Technology, and a
former lecturer at the U.S. Naval War College, Harvard University, the University of Chicago, and the University of
Pennsylvania. Dr. Pipes was the Director of the Foreign Policy Research Institute from 1986 to 1993.
Author or co-author of eighteen books, Dr. Pipes is a regular columnist for National Review Online, Front Page
Magazine, the New York Sun, and the Jerusalem Post. His analyses of world trends and of forces and
developments in the Middle East have appeared in numerous North American newspapers, including the Washington
Post, the New York Times, and the Wall Street Journal. He frequently appears on American network
television, as well as at universities and think tanks, to discuss the Middle East, Islam, and the Islamist threat to the
U.S.A. and the West. He also has appeared on BBC and Al Jazeera, and has lectured in approximately
twenty-five countries.
Dr. Pipes is a Polish-American Jew whose parents fled Poland in 1939, immigrated to the U.S.A., and assimilated well into
American society and culture. His father is Richard Pipes, an American historian specializing in Russian and Soviet history
and serving as Professor of History at Harvard University from 1950 until his retirement in 1996. During the Cold War, the
worldview of Richard Pipes was strongly anti-Soviet and anti-Communist.
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