Not surprisingly, Egypt has deteriorated into chaos and violence once again. Last week, hundreds were killed and thousands injured as the post-coup Egyptian government mauled thousands of Muslim Brotherhood supporters in Cairo.
Usually when something like this happens anywhere in the world, the United States is either looked to for leadership, blamed for the bloodshed, or both. We’ve spent decades intervening in international affairs and attempting to extend our influence to every corner of the globe. The average leader in Washington seems to think that more influence, more intervention, and more arbitration will somehow do the trick and finally bring peace and harmony to the world.
Egypt is living proof of the failure of that ideology. Interventionism as an approach to U.S. foreign policy has been seriously unsuccessful, and the disastrous outcomes in Egypt are examples of such failure.
For decades, the U.S. government supported Mubarak’s dictatorial rule as he persecuted religious minorities. Washington continued to support Mubarak even as Egyptians rose up in the so-called “Arab Spring.”
When President Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood took power, we acknowledged his rule but advised him to respect democracy and govern fairly. He responded by breaking almost every democratic principle, passing laws without due consent and packing a constitutional committee with Islamists while tanking the Egyptian economy and allowing violence against Christians and Muslim minorities.
When the Egyptian military (which has received over $40 billion from the United States) prepared to stage a coup, we urged them instead to respect the rule of law and win at the ballot box. They responded with a military takeover.
When the military took power, we urged them not to persecute the Muslim Brotherhood or the former government. They responded by arresting President Morsi and his top officials, arresting journalists, closing television stations, and shooting protestors.
Meanwhile, we’ve managed to make both sides hate us: the military sees us as pro-Muslim Brotherhood for urging their inaction and the Brotherhood sees us on the side of tyranny and despotism for failing to condemn the recent murders and continuing to pump money into the military government. And if the region’s history has taught us anything, it’s that there is no “good guy vs. bad guy” dichotomy in Egypt; there are only “bad” guys. While we support one supposed ally, we create two enemies.
Unfortunately, Secretary of State John Kerry refuses to call the military overthrow a “coup.” Instead, he says the military’s behavior — imprisoning former government officials, silencing the media, and killing protestors — is simply “restoring democracy.” He does this because admitting the existence of a coup would require the United States, by law, to cut off foreign aid to Egypt, which our leaders see as an unwise policy (as evidenced by the 86-13 Senate vote against Rand Paul’s bill to cut off Egyptian aid).
But what influence, exactly, is the aid buying us? The United States has already pumped some $70 billion into Egypt, and continues to pump $1.3 billion per year. Meanwhile, Egyptian leaders from both sides ignore our advice and, because of our attempts at involvement, blame us for the country’s problems. Some see Egypt as a necessary ally for its strategic position, control of the Suez Canal, and importance in the Israeli-Arab peace process, and justify foreign aid under such terms. But our meddling attempts to influence the Egyptian government has only weakened our relationship and further destabilized the region, compromising those necessary diplomatic achievements. The United States would have been much better off had our administrations refrained from involvement in Egypt. We could have saved $70 billion, and we wouldn’t have created more enemies or demonstrated our weakness and incompetence.
The libertarian approach to foreign policy — military non-intervention and positive relationships through free trade — is perhaps criticized the most, labeled as a radical form of isolationism unfit for the challenges of a global 21st century. But as Egypt shows, the only thing that’s radical is doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results. And the mess in Egypt isn’t an isolated example. Such disaster has become the normal outcome of U.S. interventionism, and the situation all over the Middle East is living proof.
Perhaps a libertarian approach to foreign policy isn’t so radical. After all, it heeds the simple and sage advice of our founding fathers. In his farewell address, George Washington warned: “The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is, in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible.” Similarly, Thomas Jefferson championed “peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, but entangling alliances with none.” Conveniently, there’s also no part of the Constitution that justifies foreign aid or military interventionism, a point that seems to have been completely lost in Washington.
So as our leaders continue to evaluate the ongoing situation in Egypt, perhaps they’ll see that a different approach is necessary. Chris Preble, Vice President for Defense and Foreign Policy Studies at the Cato Institute, probably said it best: “We are, once again, damned, no matter what we do. [This] seems like a pretty good argument for doing less.”
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The author’s name was removed from this article retroactively at their request.