Source: CNN
PARKER: Well, it turns out that, in fact, the crisis was not a complete surprise. A bipartisan group of Middle East policy experts had sent explicit and detailed warnings about what might happen in Egypt.
PARKER: Almost a year ago the group began urging Hillary Clinton, among others, to push for basic democratic reforms. They did not get the strong response they were looking for.
Here to say "I told you so" are two members of working group on Egypt who join us from Washington, D.C. Michele Dunne is a professor of Arab studies at Georgetown University and Robert Kagan is a columnist for "The Washington Post" and was a State Department official under President Reagan.
Welcome to you both.
Michele, let me begin with you. Here's the critical question I just got to ask you. Did you see things that the government didn't see or did you see things the government didn't want to see because our government was so thrilled with the deal that it had going with Mubarak for the past 30 years? It got stability and it didn't care about his repressive regime.
MICHELE DUNNE, ARAB STUDIES PROFESSOR, GEORGETOWN UNIV.: I think we saw things that the government was aware of but didn't know what to do about. You know, the reason we really organized this group was that we saw that there were elections coming in Egypt, parliamentary elections that were held in November of 2010, and a presidential election coming up in 2011.
We could see there was just a great deal of dissatisfaction among the Egyptian public with this situation and that they -- you know and we were concerned there were going to be fraudulent elections held and the United States wasn't going to do anything and we were just trying to draw the attention of U.S. officials to this.
And I think what we heard from them is that, yes, yes, we realize things are bad but what can we really do about it?
PARKER: Well, Robert, I guess the obvious question is, if you were assistant secretary of state and you were responsible for Egypt, what would you have done to better manage the situation?
ROBERT KAGAN, WASHINGTON POST COLUMNIST: Well, first of all, let me just say despite the lead-in I'm not here to say, I told you so. It doesn't matter anymore. You know, and these things are difficult for all U.S. administrations. You know, it's not easy to shove out or put pressure on a longtime ally.
And as assistant secretary of state I would be -- I would be torn because as they said to us many times and it's certainly true, the United States does a lot of business with President Mubarak on the peace process, vis-a-vis Iran, security, any number of issues. The problem was we were arguing that -- are actually seeking stability in Egypt and maybe even avoiding crises down the road, that's why you have to press Mubarak.
And I think if Mubarak had been convinced to take some fairly marginal but nevertheless symbolically significant steps for these last parliamentary elections in November and shown that he was willing to undertake reforms, we might not be having this explosion right now.
And that was really the argument we were making. We can forestall a crisis later by pressing for some relatively modest but nevertheless significant steps now.
SPITZER: Well, let me direct this to Michele. It seems to me we had a 30-year mortgage here. We got a 30-year deal that finally got paid off by both sides. We got stability, we got cooperation with the peace agreement. Mubarak got a free hand in terms of repression.
When in your letters do you persuadably argued to the government lift the martial law, lift the emergency powers that you, Mubarak, are using? When the White House and Secretary Clinton didn't respond to that, did you go back at them and say you are going to create the very unrest that you are fearful of?
DUNNE: Well, look, we had conversations with members of the administration, with members of Congress and so forth. You know, what we were trying to argue was the United States cannot be neutral here. The United States has this very long and deep relationship with Egypt and it's not credible for the United States just to stand by. And for political repression and rigged elections and human rights abuses to be going on and the United States acts as though kind of it has no opinion about this.
That, you know, the United States should make clear where it stands on this issue. Understanding that the United States could not force the government of Egypt to bring about changes. But that this would be -- you know, the United States should make clear where it stood and should make clear to the government of Egypt that it would make a difference in the U.S./Egyptian relationship, how the Egyptian government treated its own people.
PARKER: Well, Robert, now that things have erupted and the Obama administration continues to evolve its policy, how do you think they're doing at this point?
KAGAN: Well, I think that they're doing pretty well right now. I mean they had a kind of shaky moment over the weekend when this -- the envoy Frank Wisner told a conference in Germany that Mubarak was critical, that he stay at this point which I think was not quite where the president is.
Yesterday they put out a statement about a phone call that Vice President Biden made with Omar Suleiman and laid down some very clear points. For instance, that the Egyptian government must lift the emergency law immediately, that President Mubarak must begin to delegate authority and somehow step away from leadership in that country.
These steps really -- and some other things, as well. These steps really are essential if we're to move forward and what we see out on the streets in Cairo and elsewhere in Egypt today is a force that I think is ultimately unstoppable unless the government is really willing to wreak incredible havoc and bloodshed on the Egyptian people, I actually do believe that this people power in Egypt is going to succeed, especially if the United States takes the right position.
SPITZER: You know, Robert, I think virtually everybody watching agrees with your assessment about how powerful this movement is and certainly on the outcome we desire. But it's interesting that the Egyptian government's response today was to push back pretty hard at the U.S. government, basically saying, stay out of our business.
And it's interesting that when the United States government said we might cut off the military aid and the other aid surrounding Arab nations said we will match it. If they take it away from you, we will match it. So how does the U.S. government respond to that?
KAGAN: Well, that's a bluff in my opinion. I think that no one can replace the United States. The United States provides over a billion dollars in military assistance to the Egyptian government and the tie between the United States and Egypt has been very important to the Egyptian military in particular.
I don't think we should be deterred by the fact that there are other very nervous dictators in the region. I think that we need to -- for our own interests, we need to move forward and get to a significant transition that can produce a legitimate and democratic and, therefore, stable Egypt which is critical to our interests.
SPITZER: You know, Michele, it has been observed by some that there would be a very sort of unfortunate irony if the United States, although I certainly believe would be the correct thing to do, if the United States went to Mubarak and said, you must lift martial law and we came down very hard on an ally of 30 years, when he was continuing to be repressive. When we in fact stepped back and did virtually nothing when there was the Green Revolution in Iran last year.
Would that send a very bizarre mixed message to our friends and allies around the world?
DUNNE: Well, I don't think so. I mean I do think that the Obama administration could have and should have done more to encourage, you know, those seeking, you know, freedom in Iran. But in the case of Egypt, I mean, why get this one wrong?
I mean, this is a nation of 85 million people. It's the largest Arab country. This is a pro-democracy uprising. This is not an Islamist uprising. This is not an anti-U.S. uprising. There is every reason to encourage this and there are risks going forward. In any kind of democratic transition there are a lot of political and economic risks, but I think people should also see there are risks on the other side.
If I think that -- if the Egyptian authorities put down a democratic uprising with force and particularly if the United States is seen as complicit in having put this thing down with force, you know, I don't think this is the end of it. We're going to see more instability in Egypt. We're eventually going to see another uprising and probably of a far more radical and not necessarily pro-democracy character.
PARKER: Well, Michele, before you leave that topic, you all -- your bipartisan group saw this one coming. Are there other crises coming along that you've already got your eye on?
DUNNE: Well, I think there are a lot of other countries in the region in which the grievances that set off the Tunisian uprising and now the Egyptian uprising are shared. This youth bulge, youth unemployment, corruption, lack of political participation, leaders who stay in office not years but decades.
This characterizes, you know, a number of other states in the region and it might not be too late in those places for those governments to carry out serious reforms and really start undoing human rights abuses and opening up political participation.
That's what the United States should be urging in those places now in a far more serious way than it has before.
PARKER: Well, let's hope that's what happens.
All right, Michele Dunne and Robert Kagan, thanks so much for joining us.
KAGAN: Thank you.
DUNNE: Welcome.