because to go around the world from central moscow you're watching the r.t.e. international news channel faced with this our top stories russia says the unity between hamas and fatah is key to hammering out a future palestinian state but recently reconciled parties managed to further bridge their differences that are meeting here in moscow and. protesters in georgia claim a revolution has started threatening to oust president saakashvili shortly the opposition accuses the leader of every day terror against people and pledges to fight on until he steps down. with greece's debts climbing fast the e.u.

takes a hard line of a nation rising tensions are causing speculation the country may eventually leave for a year of. war stories online and out c dot com just ahead tonight a debate show cross talk and in this edition host people evolve as guests discuss whether the revolution we drive in the arab world is losing momentum. hungry for the full story we've got. the biggest issues get a human voice face to face with the news makers. can. follow and welcome to cross talk i'm peter lavelle the arab awakening is often referred to as revolutions in the arab middle east there can be no doubt something important is occurring in this region but should we be using the word revolution

victorio regimes remain intact in foreign influences continue to prevail. take. the cost of what is happening in the arab middle east today i'm joined by michael monger in durham he is a professor at duke university in new york we have a loan ben my year he's a professor at new york university and in boston across the daniel pipes he's an author and director of the middle east forum all right gentlemen this is cross talk and there's only one rule you can jump in anytime you want i to go to michael in durham first do you feel comfortable with this term revolutions occurring in the arab world because there are so many different examples where you go all the way from tunisia to yemen to bahrain egypt we can go on and on if you like to term revolution for anything that's going on in that region right now. one of the things political scientists debate is actually what constitutes a revolution and in a way

a revolution is just a successful change of regime it needn't be violent they can be peaceful it's not clear that what's actually going on here is revolutions what we have is a lot of violence by organized military and government it's not clear that these are going to be revolutions in the in the sense that there's a regime change and the optimism that many people early on felt that these would not be just revolutions but democratic revolutions i think has not yet been borne out by daniel thanks to you in boston it's very interesting here because if we take it we take the examples to two popular examples right now of the tunisia egypt the a.p. they ok you need dictator is gone but the military has taken their place and we still see the reports that came out in the last few hours that torture can in remains in egypt so i mean so i well i couldn't see that is a revolution there i mean it just reached its least that the regime change at the

top it's gone that's all go ahead right you are i just slightly i'm not which is sort of the military took over in february from the barfield has been in charge since nine hundred fifty two that in five military leaders now negated so out of barak and transfer that we've moved from the bar to turn sour and i would emphasize regime continuity here. so tunisia and egypt i would say are could hit us by the security military apparatus but in five other places you've got potential revolution in. the iman in libya and bahrain and syria and iran so no revolution so far but there might be some to come along ben meyer new york what do you think about that i mean and should be thinking about revolution in a positive sense ok i mean we can talk about that too will they be democratic. well what we are really witnessing today in the middle east is what i call

a revolutionary changes that is revolutionary changes by definition is whether or not the status quo ante will be restored i do not believe that the status quo ante will be restored so in that there are revolutionary changes whether the military remains in egypt or in tunisia and elsewhere the changes will have to be to have to take place and i think all of our government will no exception in one form or another will have to introduce some kind of reform in order to meet the expectations of the hopes and aspirations of the people in that sense these are revolutionary changes or the arab world had never experienced before and these changes are going to continue for some time to come because the wave of instability or wish a change is going to continue for for a while and no other country is going to follow the same pattern each country is

going to adopt different kind of approaches ok michael trying to back you and i mean is the military in the arab world a good midwife to bring stable democratic societies in your opinion or we don't have enough information here. i would go farther than to say that the military is not a very good midwife i actually think the mock receive may not be a very good midwife the united states in urging countries to have elections before they really have the other institutions that make elections possible i think maybe making a mistake if i close my eyes and think what is it that makes the western system of government actually work what allows people self-determination it's not the ballot box it's an independent judiciary and the rule of law so i'm worried that if we urge countries to have elections before they have any kind of institutions that are ready to do so it will be won the election undone and so you're saying daniel i mean how do we marriage if you because people are actually people are looking for

changes ok and the west well i guess their knee jerk response is elections maybe elections are not going to really start solving a lot of these problems right here i got to you daniel on that one first i go i go further than professor monger and so not only is it will of law but it's all the other aspects of civil society it is freedom of speech freedom of movement and loyal opposition and the zero all this very subtle concepts which we in the west which we exactly which we in the west or a sense born with are very alien much of the world and so it's a long process of developing civil society and then topping it off with the markets and by the way democracy should begin with voting for dog catcher voting for misspoke councils and then building up towards voting for the head of head of government it's a long slow process and you can't jump start it alone the a new york you want to jump in there's a head case of the i need sensors you know i know absolutely you know i think i

think the the notion that you can introduce democratic reform that with such a speed it's a terribly mistaken one in the arab world is not the prepared the united states has been pushing programmer crytek reform and is that going to work and is the other institution exactly what my kids. that is absolutely true either institutions are developed but in particular i would say. economic development for example if you take egypt you can introduce all the political reform you want when you have fifty p. million people under the poverty line this is election are not going to provide what the people one people want jobs and opportunity wants to feed their people want education this is the kind of institution you have to create concurrently as you move towards some kind of political reform but they would have to be rather gradual reform but moving fairly as explain this is the an economic development specifically sustainable development to empower the people from the buy them up do you want to jump in there i would disagree with yeah the economics as mr with the

england developed the first of marcos extolling the magna carta what eight hundred years ago they were not rich by today's standards and there are plenty of countries such as sri lanka which have a civil society without being rich and the party of rich countries saudi arabia the civil society so they're really quite different when one is not necessary for the other materials tenuous point is right it would mean a i say i didn't do you know my glycerin had first thought it. it may not be well here you have. economic development but the thing is that egypt may actually have another revolution just over the price of weak they don't have a middle class developing the middle class is a strong counterbalance to the centralized power of government as long as so many people are dependent for their daily bread literally in egypt for because of the price of wheat it's when it is very difficult so certainly gania was right but we

need it would be it would be helpful to have some kind of independent middle class the absence of a middle class makes the development of rule of law much more difficult ok like i had. you want to jump in go ahead no no but you know. there's no question listen when you go to egypt and you see the poverty there and you talk to these people as i have and so many different occasions and they will tell you openly and clearly we do not necessarily want to avoid we are not interested as a matter of fact when you look at the further demonstration in egypt today what you see there demanding job they want the opportunities they want education they want healthcare they want housing they are there this have even our asking to really reverse back and put their emergency laws back in place because today it's chaotic situation is emerging in egypt so what we're talking about here economic development from the guy that i mean is basically you need to provide the people with basic means so that they can they will be able to feed the kids they be able

to send their children to school this is what is needed i am not suggesting you have you should know either take no political reform but they said that both will have to go and in it has the united state is also running as it should and many other countries significant economic aid to egypt without which political pull or from no matter how well meant will not it will not really resolve the egyptian problems do you want to respond go in there go ahead i take exception to your i take exception to press upon my years formulation six very good people. in effect need to be given food and jobs. that's the problem it's this mentality of subservience and dependence what needs to develop in egypt and some of the other countries but egypt a particular country i look at for three years by the way. is a sense of entrepreneurship and independence and ironically it was hosni mubarak son gamal

a banker. who had experience in britain and elsewhere who was looking towards developing it should be troops economy in this free market and the military which is now fully back in. in this in the saddle is very socialist minded and very good handed with its vast economic enterprises under its control and i suspect that we will see more of the state socialism that has been in place for sixty years and the kind of entrepreneurship it's necessary to create jobs and have create wealth is not going to happen in the foreseeable future mike michael thank you and you can even write i had i had a long go ahead reply. you know you're really easy you can create jobs somebody top the bottom what i'm talking about in the main and we've tried that in morocco is sustainable development project that is you go to villages thousands of them you get a group such as five six villagers together and they decide on the kind of project

they want any kind of project that's going to create jobs empower their people and that is what you're going to need in egypt where they have millions and millions of people are under the poverty line so you are not going to we're not suggesting i think it's for the government not to have economic development projects but you're going to have to start from the bottom up i sustainable development in these type of countries is essential in my view to lifting him up in the future so that they can become. eventually you know some gentlemen let me jump in here is we're going to go to a short range after the break we'll continue our discussion of the so-called revolutions in the air for a state of. the. system. and.

twenty years ago these are just countries. certificate. how did you come. to teach began a journey. where did it take. for . the international peace which great if you knew me by the sun from funds to treasure its. stuff. team dot com.

can. welcome back to prosecute remind you we're talking about changes in the arab middle east. and. michael if i can go to you it says change gears here let's look at geopolitics how much is the west really interested were they saying all these changes here and i think we will get a good job in the first part of the program as it is pretty hard to define depending on what's going on to the depending on what area we're looking at civil society democracy reform the military is really very very varied right now but let's look at the region from the outside looking in how much does the united

states for example want to see the military in tunisia and in egypt stay in power more or less as they are great they will honor agreements like with for israel and they still have a good ally they that's what they want they don't they don't never really shown to be have any interest with the people on the ground they just want to country a leader they can count on. the problem is that there's no such thing as the united states when it comes to foreign policy what there is is an administration and i honestly don't know what this administration wants a lot of the democracy activists in egypt were frankly much more happy with george w. bush because there was a consistent push they didn't agree with everything he did they didn't agree with iraq but there was a consistent push in favor of saying no we're in favor of self-determination by the people of these countries the obama administration appears to just want to be on the side of whoever is winning we've recently as recently as january vice president

biden was singing the praises of the libyan regime yes and now it turns out no no libya is no good and it's always been bad so we just want to be on the side that's winning and i think people see through that the united states needs to choose some kind of consistent policy and articulate it and recognize that this takes place in the context of our only actual iowa in the region which is israel being happy having to work together ok. mayor you were nodding your head and we should talk about bahrain as well do it in new york go to new york. you know what i think i think mike is to some extent is correct but i think the united states'. position are to be and it is. this what obama has been articulated three three central point one some reform will have to take place to that no violence should be used against peaceful demonstrators and see that the united states will reward those countries

that follow the first two rules but we have to also remember the united states does not have the same interest in every single country for example if you take the gulf state the united states is going to have to take an entirely different approach because of our interest because our concern about iran hence our policy and relation with it with back grain it's somewhat different so we are much easier going with the grain and we doing so safer in libya or in syria destroy that is we have to distinguish here between american national interests in various arab countries and there's no question about it that our conduct and our reaction to each country is depending on the level of interest in each of these countries and their i wonder one other point i want to mention when it comes for example to the gulf regardless of the baron has a majority of shiite the majority of population in the gulf is sunni and they are terrified for example of what iran is up to has the united states doesn't have a choice but to support the current regime throughout the gulf so we have to

distinguish between american interests the interests of the local government and it's in a very tough job to try to draw any kind of a template and say all arab states are going to follow the same result that's not going to happen ok daniel you want to jump in there i could see that you wanted to you had great head first likely correct which you sort of introducing a united states has not had a consistent policy professor monger pointed out under george w. bush there was a dramatic break and two thousand and three saying for sixty years we've worked with a tyrant now we're not going through stability used to be our goal down some markers . it's a dramatic break but by two thousand and six or so if you're not on that so many bombs continue giving up and we're back more or less was pretty fast for we had a very american troop for three years second for it was there was no way to reach eighty degree change i mean you could say a change in policy but anything change on the ground mubarak was still there which you still see to be still there and wait there were. to give you one example one

last one in the passing authority of many many effects of iraq here in the us a lot of markers essentially lot about history there was no head and democracy brought the people we don't want true although you don't want a second point of view that i'm not so sure i don't want. most westerners the one most muslims don't want. but the. the second point is that i don't know if we have to have a consistent policy i mean in theory yes one wants to be this have a policy that works everywhere but i think will be very hard to thread this. through various different countries i think there's some accountability any of the no no we've gotten into a look at it's a very interesting point so the u.s. should just say in in the in the european union should say in nato should just say we're just there for a national interest and nothing more we're not going to we're not to talk about democracy when i could hold out models here for you know what i mean is exactly why we can't be here knocker site we likewise when we get to the park you see all the

time night when i go ahead go ahead in new york go ahead oh well you know you know this let's let's let's call a spade a spade the united states and the e.u. have a specific interest in the middle is no question about it they also now we have going revolutions or uprising throughout the region demanding certain changes certain reforms political reforms better a better way to way of better life better education so that this is that doesn't mean that we cannot reconcile between our national interests and the interests of. with the general public in this region there must be a formula but what i'm saying it's not a simple formula and it's not applicable equally to every single arab nation because our interests differ and the interests of these arab states also differ in connection with their neighbors very as i said before you cannot deal with bahrain in the same manner as you dealt with libya because of iran and because of our naval bases there and so we're going to have to do

a difference has there is no economy around a policy is ok michael i want to go to you beginning right on with the first mail is the the for the from the family is dictated by the our national interest as well while considering the interests of the law of the nations and. as i said like the gulf and so you cannot really separate the two in itis it cannot go totally against the interests of the gulf north can focus only on its own there ok might go to hell you know michael and i have to find that i like him because our country how do you mean regime how do we get married how do you marry the two what's the formula. i can see it it's quite right to say that we're not going to have the same policy for every country there are cultural differences there's about many differences what i guess i'm looking for is some consistent principle of a way of saying this is what the united states is trying to accomplish the problem that i see i guess you could call it hypocrisy or contradiction is that we have seen the results of this with jimmy carter jimmy carter's foreign policy mostly

consisted of scolding countries that he thought didn't live up to the standards that the united states actually really didn't support itself because there were a bunch of puppet regimes around the world that we supported to try to prevent the countries from going communist now rescored countries for not having elections but we also propped up the ugliest dictators in the hopes that they will not become islamic democracies well the who we have to have some more consistent principle it seems to me then you want to jump in there which would be your formula i'm not sure . i coined the term during the soviet era friendly tyrants. i guess a self-explanatory we have now from the tyrants again and i'm not a lot of private i sure wish everyone were to come across but i think it is in our interests and a very interests that there be a stability and that they move slowly and carefully towards as we talked about

earlier towards democracy and not rush things and not have revolution not have islamism not have iranian takeovers and so forth so i'm ok with with different policies in different countries call to talk with him call it a consistency but that's the reality of making foreign policy especially for gricar ok you want to see we've seen the result jimmy jimmy carter i think at jimmy carter and somebody brought us the the islamic revolution in iran that's very interesting let's go back if you're a it was democratic. a lot of people say if you go to new york. and then he had the idea is absolutely right on this point that is we don't we cannot therefore no no should we have necessarily the same exact policy toward every single arab country that is not going to happen again because of the reason i mentioned earlier what we need to do how are we idea to two or three principles i did we should be supporting reforms as the general rule we should be insisting that the nonuse of

violence against peaceful demonstrators and we should also say that we will be rewarding those nations those countries that are going to follow the two of these two principles consistencies in that regard is absolutely necessary the president of america articulated that in a very strong my goal i got my way if you want to speak you use the stick use it if i may just try you have to use a stick some time when they're going to adhere to as we have done with it with it with libya as we go into we need to do now in syria and elsewhere that is when they deal with it when these government do not adhere to due to two basic initial two requirements then we're going to have to use a stick if it becomes necessary and i think some time we had some time too late in using the stakes as we are doing say as a program to with syria michael franco to you what about these are military these humanitarian interventions this is setting an example good example of what can happen if if tyrants don't go reforms don't happen because you know there syria on the on the agenda there and this is sending messages through the entire region that

if you you know the stick can come out but does that make does that fix things or make things better. well what it seems to have happened in libya is were we there's going to be a long term stalemate and the people are worse off than they would be if there were stability and if there were. maybe even missed some cases if there were a dick a dictator so the principle of nonviolence the principle of moving toward self-determination having us reward those i understand i'm skeptical that we know enough about which side to support we may end up supporting a group that ends up if they win will just become an islamic dictatorship ok danny let me give you the last word on this program to you daniel the last word let me end it. let me end on a humorous note answer malcolm recently noted non-essential times because you've got nothing to worry about if

a bomb not threatens you as in iran or. syria you've got a lot for about if he doesn't say a word as in the case of libya or. so it's a strange it's actually true that when. u.s. president is shot which out it means you're ok all right gentlemen thank you very much many thanks my guest today in boston and in new york and thanks to our viewers for watching us here on our t.v. see you next time and remember crossed couples. can. you believe just in science. from. the future.

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