the road to the. street looking. for you watching r t the headlines around american on drugs are in action over libya coalition turns up the heat on colonel gadhafi spoke in the months since operation started but with the allied forces entrenched menacingly close the campaign in the way. moscow has warned the coalition that sending military advisers to meet me was risky breaks the u.n. resolution or these is in moscow to discuss the situation in the arab world for the russian leadership. almost twenty five years off which

a lot more nuclear catastrophe altie is going to screw severe access to another secret very deep in the exclusion zone it's there that sent military facility which is one of the three. and it's not a horse debate on cross-talk people have elses guests if double standards are at work in the treatment of libya by western governments compared to bahrain but the royal family remains in control. wealthy british style. markets weiner scandal. find out what's really happening to the global economy comes a report on our key. can. follow

him welcome to crossfire and i'm peter lavelle we're told libby is khadafi must go but the royal family of the rain must stay this is a double standard is freedom allowed for some while others are not worthy of the same and will the west later regret its differing approaches to the arab awakening . can. cross talk different reactions towards the arab awakening i'm joined by hussein in pensacola he's the director of americans for democracy and human rights in bahrain in san francisco we crossed the steven zoom this he's a professor of politics and international studies at the university of san francisco and in new york we have matthew schaffer he is a writer for the national review online all right gentlemen this is cross talk that means you can jump in anytime you want but before we start our discussion here

let's take a look at some of the issues and reactions to the arab awakening. what is this state. all security interests revolutionaries sandstones have brought to the streets across the arab world. so the western bank there was in egypt and tunisia meanwhile incrementally seeing crain ruled by sunni minority. usually silence and the so to truth intervened some points in all of this double standards home to the us feed sleeve and saudis neighbor grain striving toward soldiers in my nation here's an acceptable as a transponder for the interests of the west while in libya democracy is seen as a priority and backed by nato military emperors and a un mandate under the un mandate we have an obligation to protect civilians from

potential atrocities and we have succeeded if that doesn't lessen news so intervention in defiance of the rebels manifestly bullied and double standard that a critic rights of citizens and for greater political freedoms are supported in countries like egypt tunisia and libya with serious second dri in buckley oh yeah and well western military and security interests are at stake syria is just in the other example not immune to the revolutionary demonstrations can see where it crosses a country and the u.s. state department is there are quick to condemn the violence as airwaves and can see is one who hosts weight national interests all the rights of the people themselves that international law crosstalk artsy. ok stephen and i to go to you first here mr obama the u.s.

president said that the united states is going to intervene or some form of intervention into libya because of. the need to protect civilians and he said innocent people were carpeted for killing hospitals and ambulances were attacked journalists were arrested and today is the day we're doing a program here the independent wrote about bahrain one doctor an intensive care specialist. was held after she photographed weeping over a good protester. and another arrested and they feed her room while an operation on operation on a patient was going on i mean i seems like that's a very blatant double standard there and it's only going to get worse so if i start out by asking what we're going to be great are different reactions to what is fundamentally the same phenomena. i think very much so the united states has a clear double standard when it comes to human rights abuses by autocratic regimes we don't like autocratic regimes that are considered allies we seem to be willing

to give them a free pass the repression in bahrain has increased over the. past couple months it is becoming increasingly brutal police state and yet the united states stands by the monarchy united states has refused to condemn the intervention by the neighboring family dictatorships to suppress what is at least as a legitimate a pro-democracy movement as you've seen in other arab states and matthew where you think about that in new york. i think that we've heard the phrase double standard thrown around i think that what we're actually seeing is a relatively consistent set of standards applied to wildly differing circumstances in libya there was an urgent call to action the arab league asked us to intervene forces were moving towards benghazi and moammar gadhafi promised to raise the city and killed citizens in bahrain there are these abuses in their tragic and they're

awful and they're evil there is not something that we can do we can stop a motorcade from going to particular city because these forces are in the same city they're both women are much. so there's just not the same urgent call for a response and so what do you think about that i mean there are different enough to have different reactions because fundamentally is the message of the united states supposedly supports democracy the right to protest in all other things that we would consider normal and in a civil society you see that the reactions are different and they are a double standard. but it is a clear there will a standard i think the u.s. policy toward iran is short and it's going to fire back on the united states and it's going to hurt the american interest in the region because basically it's going to radicalize the pro-democracy movement in the country because the people in bahrain think there's a green light from the united states to saudi arabia and the government of bahrain to crack down on peaceful protesters you know you cannot support peaceful

protesters in libya or egypt or any other places and then just stand up blind blind eye toward be legitimate grievances and i think is going to basically turn the people away from the legitimate causes and maybe radicalize them and that will hurt the american interest and bahrain you know stephen if i go back you know i think it's really interesting if we look at the arab awakening starting in tunisia going all the way to today and my read of it is you know i don't see a fundamental american anti-americanism element in it at all you see people striving for the right things i think we were on this program would agree for agree to but. the more the different reactions are so stark don't you think the region is going to say and looking at the younger generation saying it's just the west looking to find their new man in these new countries that have thrown off all

dictators that were friends of the west. and. it's unfortunate because united states has been quite fortunate for the very reason you mention that there has not been a strong anti american orientation of these pro-democracy movements least so far as long as the united states is seen to support the bahraini regime it's really going to hurt us now i don't think anybody is advocating military intervention in bahrain and i'm ambivalent about the military intervention and yet in libya but the least we can call for more forcefully born into the repression we can sever. our cities or ties so to that autocratic regime the release threatens to weaken in the security assistance so that regime we can make it very clear that back on the repression is illegitimate we really need to be on the right

side of history here in the history is moving more and more towards democracy and as long as the united states is seen to be on the wrong side or least the wrong side in some cases it's going to really hurt our image and is going through encourage more extremist elements that may not be that interested in the marcy you know imagine if i go to you saudi arabia on the right side of history. no certainly not. but just because somebody is wrong that doesn't mean it was not something that we can do to make them perfect again so i mean talking about for example you talk about how the protesters haven't sort of shown a strong anti-american element of course they haven't shown it i mean they they want american intervention they want american help so there could be anti-american elements we haven't identified yet but more importantly first of all the us has strongly called for an end to the violence and human rights abuses president obama has been totally clear about that but in terms of going farther than that you know

we have the fifth fleet station in bahrain saudi arabia is very powerful america's military is already stretched some of our geo political relations are already strained i don't think there's anything we can feasibly do to oust the khalifa is that they are sods. that is actually within our power right now and so condemn them intervene in libya to send a message but we can't go much further than that ok you say no i mean security is always brought up in these discussions here and looking at the right side of history you give me your prognosis i mean if the crackdown continues continues in bahrain and it's seventy percent of the population that is they treated as a second class citizen here the longer this goes on them how much more disillusioned are they going to become and i'm talking about these oppressed people with the west a prickly with the united states and given the scheme of history and we never know how these things are turned around i think we've all learned out of the last few months just how safe are the fifth fleet be there if things turn radically against

the royal family will be the first weeks they'll be welcome there. the administration not even listening to their own congress there are several members of congress yesterday issued statements and letters to the obama administration to immediately intervene and pain through diplomatic pressure. there were few senators in the united states senate also issued such statement calling on the president and the state department to condemn the violence toward protesters i mean yes there is a general statement that we are against human rights violations but when it comes to the brain hillary clinton made it clear that the al khalifa regime is strategic allies are important to our interests another way. other way the message was to the people of iran that basically we. want the government and what that is going to do to people of ohio right now looking for an ally they're looking toward the united states for help and what kind of help we're not advocating here military help we're

basically advocating for political help to mediate into the situation to resolve it but if the united states is not helping the states is going to. be blind then they're going to look into some other ally and there will be guys who iran because the majority of the people in bahrain are shiite and when they look into iran iran is going to play this shoe ation and it's going to be very much difficult for the united states to maintain a secure base in the country where they are ignoring the majority of the people and the legitimate grievances of the country ok stephen can i go to you real quickly before the break i want to talk about iran on now and in the second part of the program is this opening the door to around. the for the martyrs the movement is not opening the door to iran but they continued u.s. support for the regime and the ongoing repression i think very well could a muslim very upsetting as there are some people in a ministration who are exaggerating the iranian influence in the pro-democracy

struggle as a rationalization for continued backing of the here let me show you all right i'm going to jump in here and i'll let you finish when we come back from the break and after the break we'll continue our discussion on western policy in the arab world stay with are going. to continue. to something has been to the chill ya been screeching for the longest secret of thomas steel has been discovered. now archie goes east of lake by calm for the longest russian railway line runs. for the sunday desert lies among cyclery and mansions that's where people follow the same routes as hundreds of years ago. welcome to the transport costs russia close up on parts he.

spoke first for. the first fifty. just for. welcome back to crossfire computable about to remind you we're talking about the arab revolution. ok. ok stephen if i go back to you in san francisco before we went to the break we were talking about the iranian angle here i mean they must be very amused watching how the united states is trickling all over itself with former allies in the region

here when iran for all intensive purposes been pretty consistent if you like it or not consistent. words was very disappointing to hear dennis ross speak at a conference i was advised had spoken out on the previous panel in washington d.c. where ross who. has an important position in the administration as a. special advisor on the greater middle east for the abound in stray ssion he was going on and on about how iran was manipulating the the. the crisis in bahrain etc etc not one word criticizing the repression they remind me so much of the cold war when whenever any kind of leftwing pro-democracy movement challenging right when you take a shit was somehow this conspiracy that came from the survey union in cuba but you know this president kennedy reminded us of those who make peaceful evolution

impossible make violent revolution inevitable and that by supporting the continued repression it very well could drive some elements of the opposition into more around tickle hands so far that was very nationalistic not for raining at all but this could change of the pro-democracy struggle cesar ran as their ally not the united states and the west is it really just the case is that completely ok hussein and pensacola chargin go ahead with this stephen i completely agree with stephen look the only political association that's their member were not that they were fuck their leadership highly said in mine as stated yesterday that they cannot control the street and these you with them to have any who are seen their parents their brothers their sisters it and i listed eventually they going to have to become. violent they eventually have to face violence with violence and that's will

be that will not serve anyone especially will not serve the united states and system by the way you know matthew it's interesting is it really distorting is about saudi arabia and what it wants in every sense of mubarak was overthrown in egypt the saudis probably feel pretty scared of me because it was a mubarak and the saudi royal family were the two pillars there and the saudis are are not going to budge i mean it seems like this marriage of tribal feudalism and modern capitalism is really beginning to fall apart it's breaking here why doesn't the united states really make that clear to the saudis say we've really got to how can you have a new kind of relationship because the current regime that you have in the in the region is untenable. i'll borrow one of our president's favorite quotes to say the arc of history is long but it bends towards justice i mean we've seen that there are calls for a little democracy in the middle east i believe that the al assad on the wrong side of history and saudi arabia will be

a democracy sometime in the future but if the u.s. like takes an aggressive posture will promote alienation and backlash but i just want to go back to one thing that stephen said and say that when he said that essentially the u.s. has a sort of hypocritical response because you know we're just supporting any dictatorship that will help us out i want to just sort of draw a parallel to the repression in belarus we're seeing certain similar things go on in belarus and we're not refusing to intervene because we like the dictator look at shanker and belarus we're not intervening we're not doing anything because we don't we simply don't have the capability so i really want to press stephen and hussein were on board you know supply the army isn't going to do is like any means of supporting the director ship or not to support the taters i think it's condemned the violence we've made an example of khadafi but we just simply don't have the ability to affect all the good we would like to see even jump in. here intervention i'm talking about stopping to stopping these security assistance to the regime providing them you know with the weapons of the instruments of

repression and making very clear that we're going to sever these kinds of. you know economic and strategic ties or they continue doing this kind of thing i mean we we put sanctions on syria and libya appropriately. against their against their will. for bargaining is misstating the. thing that. i think that the fact is we are supporting the train they get the cancer that are used against the peaceful protesters in bahrain made in the united states there are weapons sold. on yearly basis to brain aid from us every year equal to twenty million dollars we pay them aid and who will run to run their base so saying that we're not we don't have influence or we can change the situation on our hands are tied i think it's accurate because we have a lot of say so and we have

a lot of influence on the regime there because we basically for them they are in power because we are supporting them matthew one of the things i find very interesting is that the united states and many of you could say the united states waffles from country to country and is it just because the united states wants to make sure there's an outcome that it can live without actually having a new ally with a more democratic face or a new article attempt to reform real or imagined i mean that's what the waffling is all about because united states can say in principle we are going to move forward in this direction and we're going to support protestors and democracy why can't we do that because we won't because we are looking after our interests first and foremost right. i think yes we are looking after our interests are also looking after geo political stability i mean if you want to talk about death repression horrible things i mean those things are as likely or more likely to result from war than they are from every oppressive regime so i mean will you do

something to massively destabilize the middle east make the al assad feel so threatened that they had to act out when i mean it is a dying ruling family that did it you know cause a lot more death and destruction and repression on a short term basis then maintaining geo political stability and promoting democracy with soft power what do you think about that stephen i mean i think that was a pretty clear statement stephen first go ahead i read. we're talking about soft power we're talking about using the leverage the enormous leverage the united states has on countries like oh bahrain in terms of the security assistance and and economic relationship and that kind of thing but i thing is is that you know you put a you put a lid on a boiling pot that's where the danger comes from that's where the explosion happens that it's i see no no contradiction between america's security interest and

supporting democracy in that part of the world because democracies are much more stable in the long term than dictatorships so when you have dictatorships that's when you get the most highly of much greater likelihood of war instability and the like so i there's no contradiction and we really do need even putting aside the moral and legal questions our own national security interests we need to support democracy and stop supporting dictatorships are you saying you want to jump in there. yes look or whoever is advising obama on. policy toward iran or the persian gulf countries i think is doing a big disservice because the policy toward iran i mean and rather we're somehow supporting dictators to their ship and bahrain or and d.c. countries serve our interests i think is going to backfire is going to hurt american interests and it's going to cause these really cause these nations these

people to turn into someone else that probably will not be an ally to us probably was going to hurt our existence in the region so it's in the best interest of the obama administration and the united states of america to find new allies in these movements because these are genes these are autocratic regimes that been ruling these countries for over two hundred years not going to sustain in their current status matthew looked like you were going there for a second to hand go ahead. yeah i mean steven hussein have both clarified that that what they want to stop i mean first of all it might have still be a double standard relative to what we're doing in libya so that's the talking point here. but more importantly i mean i'm not sure exactly is going on inside the administration what i would guess though is is sort of nirvana iteration is sort of holding those cards things are bad in bahrain they're bad in saudi arabia but they could get a lot worse and so maybe the obama administration wants to maintain the ability to exercise that soft power in the future and i hate once again to be sort of the like

the cynical skunk here but i mean democratic movements haven't worked out for the u.s. or for liberalism in iran in one thousand nine hundred eighty nine in the gaza strip for example so i'm not sure i do think it's kind of naive to say democracy always furthers liberalism and u.s. interests particularly in the middle east see even go right ahead but those are those are those just toast various analogies hamas won elections in iran introductions and palestine as a reaction to the israeli occupation and to the corruption and autocratic rule of thoughts of. similarly iran the the the mullahs the reactionaries and of hijacking that revolution in part because the u.s. backed the shah for so many years he was able to crush in marginalize the more democratic and moderate elements of the revolution so the ayatollah was rooted able to fill in the political vacuum and you know the longer we support the bahraini

regime the more likely could end up in that scenario but the difference in bahrain for one thing about raney's i don't traditionally follow how you told those like you find in iran does that do much follow more the more quietest you know i that all those people who like to sign me and those and in that tradition so again i don't think it's anything that. the idea of bahrain is somehow going to turn into this fundamentalist islamist. state i think it shows a real ignorance of bahraini politics i should quickly add there are divisions within the administration on this issue i know for a fact because there's been a real battle in fact about where well u.s. policy should be in bahrain and thus far the more hawkish elements secretary of state clinton's are going to defense a gates have ended up winning but i think this could change the american people as we did in terms of u.s. support for all salvador and u.s. support for indonesia very high the repression in those countries doing enough

people raise enough of a fuss and this is reflected in capitol hill i think there is a chance of changing u.s. policy so i really really i so i really think there's a hope in this administration for more and the right and the right you know i'm afraid we have to gentlemen to hear from people would run out of time many thanks to my leslie san francisco new york and pensacola and thanks to our viewers for watching us here at r.t. see you next time and remember crosstalk rules. can. still. be.

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