America is Preparing to Reap the "Arabic Harvest"

The situation surrounding the movie “Innocence of Muslims” shows that no matter how much America has flirted with the Islamic world, the slightest spark is enough to manifest that world’s true attitude toward America. Judging from the trailer uploaded onto YouTube, this low-budget film, without any artistic effort, tells the story of the Prophet Muhammad. All of the characters’ traits are figuratively written on their foreheads and highlighted by make-up. They don’t even have to open their mouths for the audience to understand who is bad and who is good. In each frame, the background clearly looks like it’s either painted on a canvas or made from very modest decorations in some pavilion. Lubok, as it were.* It’s blatant anti-Islamic agitation.

By itself, this film cannot be considered a totally trifling reason for Muslim unrest, but it is not major either. Evidently, the movie’s creators have gone beyond the bounds of good and evil when depicting the prophet, but religious believers have done the same while expressing their outrage. Both sides were wrong, but it was the protesters’ actions that created casualties.

The media is full of ironic wordplay on the pretentious term Arab Spring, which was uttered by Barack Obama over a year ago when the Arab unrest began. The U.S. itself inspired the uprisings against the ancient political regimes, so ancient that they themselves could not remember their age.

First, the media talked about an Arab Autumn, alluding to reaping crops sown during the Arab Spring. Now, the trendy term is Arab Winter, which threatens to freeze, or even exacerbate, the rapidly deteriorating Muslim attitude toward Americans.

In response, the U.S. is going to use the military to strengthen its overseas offices. In a Foreign Policy magazine interview, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta acknowledged that currently the option of sending troops to a number of countries where new outbreaks of anti-American protests may occur is being considered. According to Panetta, there are 17 to 18 countries to which they are now “playing [sic] particular attention.”

Panetta, however, is still optimistic and does not believe that the struggle for democracy in these countries is lost. Demonstrations by a handful of disaffected people do not reflect the mood of the entire society, he says.

The list of countries that the U.S. is getting ready to “make happy” with their troops, as well as the number of troops, has not been mentioned. Nonetheless, it’s clear that we are talking about the Arab countries of the Middle East and North Africa. Groups of 50 Navy SEALs have already landed in the capitals of Libya and Yemen last week. Regarding the decision to send Special Forces, Panetta said, “We have to be prepared in the event that these demonstrations get out of control.”

Recall that the first anti-American demonstration happened in Cairo, where the crowd broke into the U.S. embassy, tore off the U.S. national flag and tried to raise the black al-Qaida flag. Then, the U.S. consulate in Benghazi was attacked, and as a result, the ambassador and three other employees of the diplomatic mission were killed.

Then the protests snowballed into an avalanche. A few hundred to a few thousand people attacked the U.S. Embassy in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa. Then, it was Sudan, Tunisia, Lebanon, Afghanistan and India’s turn. Protests were also held in several countries in Europe, Australia, Morocco, Pakistan, Qatar, Jordan and Indonesia.

Although the filming of “Innocence of Muslims” was a private matter, the government is being blamed. At first glance, the situation is absurd; but after taking a second look — not really. Shooting this film in Russia would be impossible, because there are incitement laws. Since the movie was created in the U.S., it can only be assumed that the U.S. does not have such laws. This is naturally the government’s fault, because it did not take the time to create them.

I also think that the movies “Borat” and “The Dictator,” featuring the famous comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, have laid some groundwork for “Innocence of Muslims.” The movie “Borat,” which quite mockingly derided the eponymous Kazakh TV reporter who came to America, was banned in Russia in the context of national mentality. Remember how the democratic media wondered about this: Why was it banned, if it was widely released in Kazakhstan? Because we do not have a tradition of stubbornly and crudely (not to say — boorishly) mocking representatives of individual nations onscreen, and “Borat” might have started one. Then, in the spring of this year, Cohen mocked an Eastern despot, in a movie that turned out to be even meaner than “Borat.” Then, quite naturally, “Innocence of Muslims” came out.

It should also be noted that the movie has greatly complicated Barack Obama’s electoral prospects. It gave Republicans a reason to criticize the current U.S. administration’s foreign policy and accuse the president of being indecisive. Michael Rubin — Middle East scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a former Bush administration official — told The New York Times, “After Obama’s success in killing Osama bin Laden, in killing Gadhafi and in not blowing up Iraq, I think Obama and his aides figured, “We’ve got this box pretty well taken care of …. Now […] we’re talking about Obama as the second coming of Jimmy Carter …”

Why Carter? Because in 1979, while he was in office, employees of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran were taken hostage, and they were not released for over a year. Carter was not able to get them released. Only the next president, Ronald Reagan, managed to make progress.

However, Obama’s Republican rival Mitt Romney also failed to get any political benefits from this situation. After the death of the U.S. ambassador to Libya, he said that the U.S. administration had not acted correctly: Instead of strongly condemning the attack, he spoke about the offensive content of the “Innocence of Muslims” movie. However, this position did not find support. He was even condemned by some of his fellow party members, and the press wondered: How can he talk about politics when people have died?

After all, Sukhov from the movie “White Sun of the Desert” was right when he said, “The East is a delicate matter.” It seems that they did not have the faintest idea about this in America.

*Editor’s note: Lubok is a popular type of Russian print with low artistic quality.