19 June 2012
By Jacob G. Hornberger The Egyptian people are learning firsthand why
America's Founding Fathers were so opposed to standing
armies. Our ancestors understood that standing armies
are a grave threat to the freedom and well-being of
the citizenry. Thus, it's no surprise that the U.S.
Constitution failed to grant to the federal government
the power to establish a standing army. Over the weekend, the Egyptian people elected a new
president. The two contenders in the presidential
runoff were Ahmed Shafik and Mohamed Morsi. Shafik is a former air force general who served as
Hosni Mubarak's last prime minister. He pledged to
restore "order and stability" to Egypt, which, of
course, would mean the same type of military police
state under which the Egyptian people have suffered
for decades. Morsi is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, a
powerful religious group that was outlawed by the
Mubarak dictatorship. Morsi ended up winning the election. Not that it matters though because a couple of days
before the election, Egypt's military dictatorship's
supreme court ordered the dissolution of Parliament.
The military then declared martial law, which entitles
the military to take people into custody without
judicially issued warrants, cart them away to
concentration camps and military dungeons, torture
them, and execute them perhaps after some sort of
kangaroo tribunal (i.e., the same types of "emergency"
powers now wielded by the U.S military and the CIA).
But that's not the end of it. Prior to the
announcement that Morsi had won the election, the
military issued an "interim constitution." Now, mind you, the purpose of a constitution is to
establish the government and to enumerate the powers
of the government. Yet, here we have a component of
the government — the military — issuing the
constitution and, even worse, a constitution that
establishes that the military shall remain in charge
of the country. According to the New York Times, the
interim charter "gives them control of all laws and
the national budget, immunity from any oversight and
the power to veto a declaration of war." What about a permanent constitution? Well, it was
supposed to be drafted by a panel selected by the
Parliament. But that plan is obviously out the window
given that the military has now dissolved the
Parliament. The military has appointed a 100-member
panel to draft it. It's still not clear how many army
generals, colonels, or retired military personnel
compose the military's new 100-person constitution
panel. One thing is for sure though: The Egyptian military
is not about to relinquish its power over the Egyptian
people. The Egyptian national-security state considers
itself the foundation of Egyptian society. Having
thrived off tax revenues and military-owned commercial
enterprises, the military considers itself the
permanent, privileged, sacrosanct foundation of
society. As far as the military is concerned,
everything else is subordinate to its exalted,
controlling position in society. After all, their reasoning is that the military
(including the national intelligence force) is
absolutely essential to Egypt's "national security."
Thus, the military is not about to permit a government
to come into existence that has the power to dismantle
or even reduce its role in Egyptian life. In the
military mind, if Egypt were to dismantle or even
subordinate the power of the military, national
security would be gravely threatened. The country
would almost surely fall to the communists, the
terrorists, the drug dealers, invaders, or other such
forces. That is what so many Egyptians have yet to come to
grips with. The problem was never Mubarak. The problem
was Egypt's military dictatorship. Where will all this end? One possibility is that the Egyptian people will
simply submit to military rule. If that's the case,
they can kiss away any hope of ever achieving a free
society. No matter how much people might convince
themselves otherwise, there is no way that a people
can be considered free who live under a military
dictatorship, especially one that considers itself the
permanent, controlling, exalted force in society. Another option is violent revolution, one intended
to oust the military dictatorship from power and
install a government that subordinates or even
dismantles Egypt's national-security state or at least
relegates it to a subordinate role. Another possibility, of course, is peaceful civil
disobedience, but my hunch is the military
dictatorship will either ignore it or come down hard
on such resistance, which would end up placing the
citizenry in the same quandary: whether to submit or
violently revolt. A fascinating aspect of all this is where the U.S.
government and especially the U.S. national security
state will come down. Historically, the U.S.
government has loved Egypt's military dictatorship, a
love that has been manifested over the decades with
billions of dollars in U.S. foreign aid. Moreover,
over the years the Pentagon and the CIA have
established loving relationships with their
counterparts in Egypt's national-security state. Why,
the Egyptian national-security state was even chosen
to be one of the U.S. national-security state's
rendition-torture partners in the "war on terrorism."
Thus, there's little doubt that the Egyptian
military's actions in the past few days to maintain
its control and to maintain "order and stability"
within the country have encountered enthusiastic
approval, even if somewhat subdued, within friendly
elements of the U.S. government. But given the U.S. government's vocal opposition to
the Syrian dictatorship's oppression of the Syrian
people, it will be fascinating to see how the U.S.
government reconciles that position with a support of
the Egyptian military dictatorship's oppression of the
Egyptian people, especially if the Egyptian people
begin violently resisting the tyranny under which they
are suffering. Hopefully, what is happening in Egypt will
encourage the Egyptian people to ponder why America's
Founding Fathers opposed standing armies. Perhaps it
will cause the American people to do the same. Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of the
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