On Affairs in Egypt

The United States has called Hosni Mubarak a friend for thirty years under the postulate that his presidency was the lone bulwark preventing Islamist control of one of the strategically pivotal countries in the region.

Perhaps this was correct. Perhaps it was either Mubarak as he has always been or the Muslim Brotherhood. Perhaps we were never able to utilize Mubarak as a stopgap while simultaneously taking steps to encourage the development of Egyptian civil society – the precondition to a sustainable system of representative government. There are, after all, real limits to the influence of the most powerful superpower the world has ever known.

Regardless, Egypt, the Middle East and the United States are in the moment they are in now because of the choice we made to sustain Mubarak since the assassination of his predecessor. He has always ruled absolutely over his country and by the same means that he repressed violent Islamist elements he repressed any and every viable democratic element.

That combined with the eruption of popular disgust leads to a dynamic where he stands on the precipice of being driven from power, leaving a gaping void in his wake. Because he has spent his time in power quashing democratic development there is no such component that can step in and fill that vacuum when he is gone, leaving the very real and terrifying possibility that the Muslim Brotherhood or whatever name radical Islam calls itself will be able to assume control without challenge. (Mubarak repressed both Islamists and democrats, but as the sword of Mohammed has a head start of a few centuries and so better organization than democracy in the broader Middle East it is exponentially better prepared to seize the opportunity when it presents itself.)

The American decision to prop up Mubarak might have prevented an Islamist takeover of Egypt for thirty years – perhaps this was our only choice, the least-worst choice – but it has left us in a particular vexing bind now. Mubarak's tenure has been a bulwark heretofore but has conversely decimated the one societal element that can permanently prevent the Islamist takeover long feared. Now we are left, seemingly helplessly, watching the one entity (Mubarak) that we needed to prevent another entity (Islamists) from taking control lose power after he has spent decades decimating the only other entity (democracy) that can prevent the second entity (Islamists) from taking power now that his sclerotic regime is crumbling.

All our eggs have been put in one basket and that basket is about to be crushed.