David Brooks, "Defending the Coup": After Obama's Foreign Policy Fiasco in Egypt, Is Turkey Next?

I am often critical of New York Times op-eds. Today, however, David Brooks has written a splendid opinion piece concerning the upheaval in Egypt.

In "Defending the Coup" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/05/opinion/brooks-defending-the-coup.html?_r=0), Brooks reflects upon the debate between "those who emphasize process," i.e. those backing freely elected extremist parties, and "those who emphasize substance," i.e. those who welcome the departure - even by a coup - of parties seeking to subvert the democratic processes by which they came to power.

Brooks comes down firmly on the side of substance:

"World events of the past few months have vindicated those who take the substance side of the argument. It has become clear — in Egypt, Turkey, Iran, Gaza and elsewhere — that radical Islamists are incapable of running a modern government. Many have absolutist, apocalyptic mind-sets. They have a strange fascination with a culture of death.

. . . .

Islamists might be determined enough to run effective opposition movements and committed enough to provide street-level social services. But they lack the mental equipment to govern. Once in office, they are always going to centralize power and undermine the democracy that elevated them.

. . . .

Once elected, the Brotherhood subverted judicial review, cracked down on civil society, arrested opposition activists, perverted the constitution-writing process, concentrated power and made democratic deliberations impossible.

. . . .

This week’s military coup may merely bring Egypt back to where it was: a bloated and dysfunctional superstate controlled by a self-serving military elite. But at least radical Islam, the main threat to global peace, has been partially discredited and removed from office."

Regarding Obama's role in this American foreign policy catastrophe, Brooks writes:

"The Obama administration has not handled this situation particularly well. It has shown undue deference to a self-negating democratic process. The American ambassador to Cairo, Anne Patterson, has done what ambassadors tend to do: She tried to build relationships with whoever is in power. This created the appearance that she is subservient to the Brotherhood. It alienated the Egyptian masses. It meant that the United States looked unprepared for and hostile to the popular movement that has now arisen."

Not handled "particularly well"? The names of Obama and Patterson have become intertwined with that of Morsi in the minds of tens of millions of Egyptians, and it will take years to undo the damage.

Brooks's conclusion:

"It’s not that Egypt doesn’t have a recipe for a democratic transition. It seems to lack even the basic mental ingredients."

Allow me to be politically incorrect and far more blunt than Brooks: Egypt, which is characterized by intolerance (84% of Egyptian Muslims believe that those who abandon Islam should be excuted, see: http://www.pewglobal.org/2010/12/02/muslims-around-the-world-divided-on-hamas-and-hezbollah/), abuse of women (some 90% of Egyptian women have undergone female genital mutilation, see: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/evelyn-leopold/female-circumcism----90-p_b_822283.html) and widespread adult illiteracy (some 28%, see: http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/egypt_statistics.html), is nowhere near ready for democracy.

And then there is the "small" matter of Egypt's shipwreck economy (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2013/07/new-york-times-editorial-crisis-in.html), which could lead to widespread hunger (see: http://www.cnbc.com/id/100863687). Starving people don't give a damn about democracy.

But more to the point, is Turkey next?

In May of this year, Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan and President Obama held a joint press conference at the White House. Inasmuch as the Obama administration was already engulfed in domestic scandal, Erdogan was pretty much ignored during the question and answer session. A pity, however, that American reporters didn't ask why Turkey is considered the world's worst jailer of journalists by the Committee to Protect Journalists (http://cpj.org/2013/02/attacks-on-the-press-in-2012-turkey.php).

The White House press corps might also have asked why more than 30 million Kurds in the Middle East, some 55% percent of whom live in and are oppressed by Turkey, are not entitled to their own state.

In addition, they might have asked Obama about his pre-election promise to recognize the Armenian Genocide by Turkey.

But heck, Erdogan is one of Obama's best overseas friends (see: http://english.alarabiya.net/en/views/news/world/2013/05/16/Erdogan-and-Obama-Best-friends-no-more.html), and the journalists decided not to embarrass this pompous potentate in the presence of America's Procrastinator-in-Chief.

Obama got too close to Morsi, and he has also gotten too close to his dear Islamist friend Erdogan, who appears intent upon reviving the sultanate in Turkey.

We haven't seen the end of the recent rioting in Turkey (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2013/06/thomas-friedman-postcard-from-turkey.html), and the question looms whether the military in Turkey will take heart from events in Egypt and also act to overthrow an increasingly authoritarian regime in Ankara, as was done on more than one occasion in the past (see: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/12/us-turkey-protests-military-analysis-idUSBRE95B0XK20130612).

Of course, Erdogan is aware of this threat, and one-in-five Turkish generals (see: http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2012/05/14/one-in-five-turkish-generals-now-in-prison/) and more than half of the country's admirals (see: http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21571147-once-all-powerful-turkish-armed-forces-are-cowed-if-not-quite-impotent-erdogan-and-his) are now sitting in prison.

One thing, however, is certain: We will see more mud in America's face as a result of Obama's shortsighted courtship of Islamic oppressors.

New York Times Editorial, "Crisis in Egypt": A Failed Attempt at Democracy, an Obama Foreign Policy Fiasco, and More Flatulence from the Times

Where to even begin?

In a New York Times article entitled "Ambassador Becomes Focus of Egyptians’ Mistrust of U.S." (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/world/middleeast/ambassador-becomes-focus-of-egyptians-mistrust-of-us.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0), Mark Landler writes of US ambassador to Egypt, Anne Patterson:

"Her image has been plastered on banners in Tahrir Square, crossed out with a blood-red X or distorted and smeared with insults. She is too cozy with Egypt's deposed president and the Muslim Brotherhood, the signs say, and should leave the country."

Although she is not to blame, Patterson is in danger, and she should leave the country post-haste. The US Department of State apparently has learned little from Ambassador Stevens's tragic death in Benghazi. But then US Secretary of State John Kerry is preoccupied with meaningless efforts at attempting to restart Palestinian/Israeli negotiations and is blind to the fires that are burning out of control elsewhere in the Middle East.

Okay, Patterson is not to blame. But then who is to blame? Jonathan Tobin provides an accurate assessment in a Commentary item entitled "The End of Obama's Brotherhood Crush" (http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2013/07/03/the-end-of-obamas-brotherhood-crush-egypt-morsi/#more-828567):

"It should be specified that events in Egypt could never be controlled from Washington. But the Obama administration bears a heavy share of the blame for a chain of decisions that first undermined an authoritarian ally in Mubarak and then paved the way for the rise of an equally authoritarian and far more hostile government led by Morsi and the Brotherhood. The identification of the United States with the Brotherhood over the last year was an unforced error on the part of Obama, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her successor John Kerry. The willingness of the administration to buy into the myth that regimes like that of the Brotherhood and their increasingly despotic Islamic allies in Turkey are good allies made a mockery of American values as well as hindering its ability to protect U.S. interests."

Obama got too close to Morsi (he has also gotten too close to his dear Islamist friend Erdogan in Turkey), and the US will be paying the price for years to come.

In an editorial entitled "Crisis in Egypt" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/opinion/crisis-in-egypt.html), The New York Times writes:

"Despite his failings, and there were plenty, President Mohamed Morsi was Egypt’s first democratically elected leader, and his overthrow by the military on Wednesday was unquestionably a coup. It would be tragic if Egyptians allowed the 2011 revolution that overthrew the dictator Hosni Mubarak to end with this rejection of democracy."

Indeed, Morsi was the first democratically elected leader, but he did all in his power to impose the Muslim Brotherhood's radical Islamist ideology upon Egypt and brought Egypt to the brink of bankruptcy.

In an excellent USA Today piece entitled "Egypt's ailing economy is at the heart of the unrest" (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/07/02/egypt-morsi-economy/2482971/), Oren Dorell writes:

"Egypt's economic disaster is a result of Morsi's preoccupation with establishing political control rather then fixing the poor economy, says Marina Ottaway, says Marina Ottaway, a Middle East analyst at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

'Economic issues have not been an issue,' Ottaway says. 'The issue has been who should be in control of the country.'

. . . .

With government debt rising, cash reserves melting away and unemployment and inflation on the rise, the regime's solution has been to seek more loans to cover expenses that include subsidies on food and fuel that help millions of Egyptians.

The government's debt to foreign and domestic debtors has grown from $30 billion before the revolution that ousted Hosni Mubarak in February 2011 to $40 billion now.

Foreign nations have propped up the regime with loans -- at least $3 billion each from Qatar and Saudi Arabia, $1 billion from Turkey, $2 billion from Libya – and the Egyptian public has bought government bonds. But the growing debt has failed to prevent the government from spending its cash reserves, which declined from $34 billion before the revolution to about $16 billion in May.

In a country of 80 million people, the cash crunch puts the government at risk of being unable to import enough food and gas for its populace, and machinery to maintain the electrical grid, [Georgetown Professor Paul] Sullivan says.

Debt payments have grown from $5 billion to $8 billion a year, while inflation is up from 3% before the revolution to 13% to 18% now, depending on the sector. The country, which should be a natural gas exporter, has had fuel shortages made worse by fuel subsidies that artificially drive up demand, while investment in new refining or production capacity has been non-existent."

As further observed by Matt Egan in a FoxBusiness article entitled "Lingering Crisis in Cairo Dims Egypt's Economic Outlook,"concerning the decimation of Egypt's critical tourism industry:

"Meanwhile, the political uncertainty threatens to weigh on Egypt’s crucial tourism sector, which accounts for about 11% of GDP and approximately 2.8 million jobs.

. . . .

According to a March 2013 report by the World Economic Forum, Egypt’s travel and tourism business already ranked behind dangerous countries like Pakistan, Yemen and Chad in terms of security and safety."

"World War Z"? No, I don't believe in zombies; however, Egypt without tourism has indeed become a walking corpse.

Of more interest is whether the military in Turkey will study events in Egypt and also ultimately act to overthrow an increasingly authoritarian regime in Ankara, as was done on more than one occasion in the past (see: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/12/us-turkey-protests-military-analysis-idUSBRE95B0XK20130612).

[Note that in today's Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/obamas-claim-that-aid-to-egypt-was-based-on-adherence-to-democratic-procedures/2013/07/03/5568586e-e430-11e2-a11e-c2ea876a8f30_blog.html?hpid=z3), Glen Kessler awards three "Pinocchios" to "Obama’s claim that aid to Egypt was based on adherence to ‘democratic procedures’." Keep up the good work, Mr. President . . .]