by
Paul J. Balles
“
The military was greeted warmly on the streets of Cairo. Crowds roared
with approval as one soldier was carried through Tahrir Square today
holding a flower in his hand,” reports Democracy Now! senior producer
Sharif Abdel Kouddous. He speaks of "a great sense of pride that this is a leaderless movement
organized by the people. A genuine popular revolt. It was not organized
by opposition movements, though they have now joined the protesters in
Tahrir."
According to Abdel Kouddous, "The Muslim Brotherhood was out in full
force today. At one point they began chanting “Allah Akbar” only to be
drowned out by much louder chants of “Muslim, Christian, we are all
Egyptian.”
What he describes, reflected in the TV coverage, is truly a “people’s
revolution”. Will it play out that way? So far, the main concern of the
protesters has been to get rid of Hosni Mubarak, Egypt’s
“president”-cum-dictator for the past 30 years.
The US has kept Mubarak in power, giving his regime 1.5 billion dollars
in aid last year – mainly because he supported America’s pro-Israel
policies, especially by helping Israel to maintain its stranglehold on
Gaza.
Egypt has been the number-two recipient (after Israel) of US foreign
aid. In both 2009 and 2010, the economic aid amounted to 250 million
dollars while military aid reached 1.3 billion dollars.
US military aid to Egypt has been spent primarily on strengthening the
regime’s “domestic security” and its ability to confront popular
movements.
In a report for the Carnegie Foundation on US aid to Egypt, Ahmad
al-Sayed El-Naggar asks: "Why don’t Egyptians notice the role of
American aid to their country? The simple answer is that US economic aid
to Egypt, which amounted to 455 million dollars in 2007, translated to
only 6 dollars per capita.”
|
“The US has no reason to begrudge the amounts of military aid
to Egypt. Much of it goes back to American defence contractors.” | |
It was even less in 2010 when the total economic aid of 200 million
dollars could provide less than 3 dollars per capita income. The people
have suffered poverty while Mubarak supported his army and the US
military-industrial complex.
The US has no reason to begrudge the amounts of military aid to Egypt.
Much of it goes back to American defence contractors. Lockheed Martin
received a 213 million contract for 20 new F-16s for Egypt in March
2010, boasted the company on its website.
BAE Systems, General Dynamics, General Electric, Raytheon and Lockheed
Martin have all done business with the Egyptian government, selling
tanks, fighter jets, howitzers and radar arrays to its military.
Meanwhile, half the people of Egypt live on less than 2 dollars a day.
Is it any wonder that they have taken to the streets in protest?
When the tanks rolled into Cairo, some protesters climbed on them to a
friendly reception by the soldiers. A couple of noisy fighter jets
swooped threateningly overhead, but the protesters and the army remained
friendly. Throughout the day people chanted: “The people, the army: one
hand.”
That wasn’t the case when the police and the security forces threw tear
gas canisters with labels “Made in America” into the crowds. The
security police have represented much of what the Egyptian people have
come to hate about Mubarak.
Meanwhile, the US administration has been waffling when asked whether they support the Egyptian public or Mubarak.
Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State, stressed that Egypt's future
lies in the hands of its people, hewing to the administration line of
refusing to take sides publicly.
However, the administration has a growing fear that a government
hostile to the US could gain control of such a large and important Arab
nation.
The unspoken fear is that American arms manufacturers will lose a reliable customer.
