The Failures of US Policy

With regard to foreign policy, Obama’s first term was a pleasant surprise. Supported by Hillary Clinton, we stopped seeing the interventionist and monopolistic tendencies that marked the Bush era. But it would seem that the course has changed. The first official trip outside the country for John Kerry, the new secretary of state, appears to indicate that the traditional American outlook on the world is back.

This journey through Europe and the Middle East included visits to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Turkey. One of the most controversial of these meetings took place in Cairo on March 3 with President Morsi in which John Kerry reiterated the availability of the United States to provide Egypt with economic assistance, appealing to the unity of all Egyptians so that the country can project an image of credibility to private investors.* Several opposition leaders refused to meet with the new secretary of state; in the streets the number of protests and confrontations with police multiplied.

On the eve of Egypt’s parliamentary election, the Observatory for Human Rights in Egypt denounced cases of media censorship, persecution and imprisonment of journalists, newspapers being shut down daily, civilians facing military trials and continual abuse from police forces, not to mention the famous constitution that violates human rights and the decrees that give President Morsi the power of a resurrected pharaoh. This calls the U.S.’ actions into question; a year ago there was talk of Obama’s support of a democratic Egypt, free from dictatorship, but evidently that only applied to Mubarak’s.

This episode is reminiscent of the bygone year of 2005, when Bush’s then secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, who was giving a speech at the American University in Cairo on the eve of yet another Egyptian election, said: “Egypt’s elections, including the parliamentary elections, must meet objective standards that define every free election.” It should not be forgotten that in these parliamentary elections, Muslim Brotherhood candidates won 88 seats but were barred from carrying out their mandate, for reasons both numerous and imaginary, without any sort of U.S. rebuke.

After Obama issued a mea culpa for the years of U.S. support for Mubarak, it is hard to believe that the U.S., which was so committed to bringing democracy to Egypt, has gone back to its old ways and now supports Morsi’s dictatorial government. The reasons for this support can be “explained.” First, because of the Muslim Brotherhood and its political weight in the Middle East; secondly, because they are protected and financed by Qatar, which is where the U.S. center of military operations in the Middle East is located; and lastly, because they’re members of the same political family as Prime Minister Erdogan of Turkey, the only NATO member in the region.

Time will tell if this strategic alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood will backfire on the U.S. Consider, for example, Afghanistan’s case. The Americans trained and supported the mujahedeen during the Soviet-Afghan war and then allowed them to turn the country into a Islamic fundamentalist state. When they realized their mistake, they took measures that were as desperate as they were naive. They provided the Taliban with financial aid so that opium cultivation could cease, but not only did the Taliban use the money to buy weapons, they kept growing and selling drugs. In 2001, the Americans invaded the country to drive out the Taliban and capture bin Laden. Twelve years later, the Taliban remain in Afghanistan, the former head of al-Qaida was only killed in 2011 and Hamid Karzai has already hinted, repeatedly, that the center of global terrorism is, or rather, continues to be in neighboring Pakistan.

Seeing as Obama no longer has an election to win, it’s hard to believe we’ve returned to the old days. Won’t Americans ever learn?

*Translator’s note: The original article used quotation marks to denote paraphrased statements from the original speech.