Blogs For Victory

Bryan Preston takes Ron Paul to task over Mubarak, Egypt and the general run of US foreign policy since the end of World War II:

During his speech at CPAC Friday, Rep. Ron Paul declared that the US “propped up” Egyptian president Mubarak and, essentially, blamed the United States for his dictatorship. I’d like to put the question to Dr. Paul, what should the United States have done during the Cold War? That is when our alliance with Egypt developed, and it developed largely in response to the threat posed by the USSR…

Preston then goes through the whole litany of a realistic US policy – Egypt controls one of the most strategic points on the globe (the Suez Canal) and was playing both sides of the street; we needed to get her on our side. By playing up to first Sadat and then Mubarak we kept the Soviets out and got an Egypt-Israeli peace treaty. Muabarak’s regime kept a lid on Islamism. All of this has the great benefit of being true – but does that also mean it was good US policy? In the end, after decades of doing this, is the US in a good position now and likely to retain that position for the future? I’d have to say, no.

Yes, dealing with the tyrants kept the USSR out and the Islamists down – but now that the USSR is gone, what advantage accrues to us for having kept it out? And by keeping the Islamists down all these years, what did we get other than the Islamists looking good in Egyptian public opinion simply because (a) they were martyred by the regime and (b) are not responsible either for the regime’s crimes, nor the crimes of other Islamsits around the world? The Islamists are at least unpopular in Iran by now – only ruthless repression keeps them in power there and they may fall at any time…but Egypt has no experience of them. Rather than dealing with communist apparatchiks in a Soviet-dominated Egypt during the Cold War, we might be dealing with an insane, messianic regime of Islamists during the War on Terrorism.

Furthermore, about that peace treaty – what did it really amount to? Egypt started war after unjust war against Israel and got soundly beaten each time. Even in their greatest effort – the Yom Kippur War – where they came within an ace of victory, they still ended up crushed. People who start wars and lose them are supposed to cede territory and pay an indemnity to the victors. Instead, Egypt was given back everything they lost in war and could never regain by fighting and rather than indemnify Israel for the wars, Egypt actually got us handing them about $60 billion over the years. And now if an Islamist regime comes to power in Egypt, we might find the peace treaty denounced and all that “aid” down the toilet. And, of course, the prospect of an actual shooting war with Israel at some point. The problem with peace treaty, ultimately, was that the provisions were dependent upon the regime in Egypt, not the interests of the Egyptian people. No regime, no peace treaty. Perhaps it would have been better if we had let the Israelis capture the whole Suez (they very nearly had at the end of Yom Kippur) and then annex it…without Suez, Egypt is as strategic as a cabbage, and thus of no concern to anyone except Egyptians.

And, finally, by backing Mubarak all these years we have built up a reservoir of distrust, if not hatred, on the part of the Egyptian people for the United States. While they suffered poverty and oppression, they saw American leaders in a steady stream coming to glad hand and speak highly of the man who was their bane. This doesn’t mean we can’t gain the trust of the Egyptian people, but it will be a long, hard road – and a road we would not have to travel if, over the past 30 years, all Egypt’s government got from us was demands for liberty. A realistic foreign policy (so called) has been a complete failure for the United States – what we need, instead, is an American foreign policy.

And this is where Ron Paul actually gets it wrong, as most Libertarians do. The United States cannot retreat from the world – we must be engaged on all levels and everywhere in order to ensure that at least some peace and freedom survive. There is simply no other nation on earth – or even group of nations – which can fill the gap if America withdraws. We must be there with our words and our might in order to provide a balance against those who would disturb the peace. Naturally, some things can be done to modify US policy – we don’t need troops in a lot of places we have them and we must be wary of using our power…but Paul and those like him would surrender the world to barbarism and tyranny and eventually force America, alone and at bay, to face a host of enemies gathered to kill the last bastion of civilization.

A balance must be struck – a balance between the need for engagement and the need to keep America free from entanglements with unsavory regimes. What has been termed a “real” US foreign policy has produced disaster. Time, then, to get a bit “unreal”. As long time readers know, I already have a set of policy proposals in place for this:

1. Freedom Trade – rather than freely trading with everyone, including our most deadly enemies (and thus building them to be ever larger threats), we should only engage in economic relations with other free nations around the world. If you’re living in liberty, you can freely trade with the United States…if you’re living in tyranny, you can’t so much as sell us a button. This will ensure we are never economically tied to enemy States, as well as helping other free people to grow in power and prosperity.

2. Build a Union of Democratic States – ditch the corrupt UN where tyrants are absurdly permitted to rub shoulders with free men, replace it with an organization of free nations who will be bound to come to the defense of any free State attacked by a tyrannical regime.

3. Prohibit the deployment of US ground forces outside the territory of the United States except under a declared state of war. No more setting US troops up as hostages to enemy foreign policy. By keeping our boots off the ground except after a declaration of war, we’ll retain our diplomatic and military freedom of action – only having to engage in a fight (other than smaller scale naval and aerial campaigns, at need) when we really feel it necessary.

A proper US foreign policy must be geared towards the way Americans are, and the ideals Americans hold. That is the reality – and a realistic US policy must be something Americans can understand and fully back regardless of how difficult it is. We are a good people, and deserve a foreign policy which reflects our intense hatred of tyranny and our firm desire for justice for all. Doing anything else just makes a mess – as we now see in Egypt.