I Told You So (Egyptian Edition)

A few weeks ago, I posted a piece warning anti-Morsi protestors that egging on the military to overthrow a democratically-elected government, however bad, would rebound spectacularly.

the people of Egypt are deluded if they see an army coup as a necessary stage in the pursuit of democracy. Morsi was a bad president but he wasn't a dictator. The demonstrators should sup with a very long spoon: supporting a coup against someone you don't like tacitly authorises the next coup, which might be against someone you do like. 

Ask yourself this: how many times have military coups lead to democratic governments?

It's not, of course, a simple matter. The Morsi government was elected democratically, but it was hardly governing in that spirit. Democracy is more than installing an dictatorship with a mandate for a fixed period of time and letting them get on with it (though this is of course the British system: the current coalition is behaving as though it has an enormous mandate for radical change). 

One of my friends, a leading Socialist Workers' Party thinker, had a chat with me about this. He thinks I called it wrong and that the strength of popular feeling on the Egyptian street indicated a brighter future than I thought.

But now hundreds of people are being murdered every week by the military in the name of security and the people who overthrew Mubarak are loudly cheering them on.

But what's this? President Morsi has been charged with criminal offences against Mubarak's military dictatorship (imagine the West German state trying postwar politicians for resisting the Nazi regime?) and Mubarak is being released by the military government. If I were an Egyptian democrat, I'd be looking from the pigs to the men and finding very little difference indeed. And then I'd be packing my bags and quietly heading towards the exit.

It's all over for Mubarak

OK, he says he's carrying on for a few more months to give him time to loot the country and instal his torturing cronies, but there's been a decisive intervention:

Tony Blair described him as "immensely courageous and a force for good"

Well, it takes one autocratic war criminal and torture-enable to know one. Poor old Saddam: the only dictator Blair ever disliked. What are the odds, eh?

Mubarak 'not a dictator' says US Vice-President

You and I may think that being 'elected' by banning all other candidates in 4 out of 5 votes (the fifth was rigged and the only opposition candidate was sent to prison), running the country under 'Emergency Law' since 1967 - extended police powers, constitution suspended, censorship imposed, freedom of assembly banned, political parties banned, habeas corpus suspended, 30,000 political prisoners, parliamentary elections banned - might constitute dictatorship.

The Vice-President of the USA begs to differ. He thinks that the man to whom the US gives $1.2bn in military aid is a cuddly chap, mostly because he's friendly to Israel:

 "Mubarak has been an ally of ours in a number of things. And he's been very responsible on, relative to geopolitical interest in the region, the Middle East peace efforts; the actions Egypt has taken relative to normalizing relationship with - with Israel. ... I would not refer to him as a dictator..."

Got it, protestors? Your rights aren't important: it's the US's geopolitical interests which will determine whether you get a new government.

What does the US Ambassador to Egypt say about her hosts? Well, according to a Wikileaked cable, it's not a very cuddly government:

Torture and police brutality in Egypt are endemic and widespread. The police use brutal methods mostly against common criminals to extract confessions, but also against demonstrators, certain political prisoners and unfortunate bystanders. One human rights lawyer told us there is evidence of torture in Egypt dating back to the times of the Pharaohs.