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History Repeats Itself . . . with Precision!
Townhall.com ^ | September 22, 2013 | Michael Youssef

Posted on 09/22/2013 6:57:08 AM PDT by Kaslin

It has been said a million times (and now a million and one) that those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it. And now, just like sixty years ago, the United States has allowed Russia to claim a great victory and become the real power player in the Middle East.

Today, the blame for that can be confidently laid at the feet of American politicians and their myopic understanding of the region’s new dynamics.

Those politicians are led by the Obama Administration, plus two Republicans, Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham. Their obsession with achieving “democracy” in the Middle East, even through fraudulent elections, has led them to fumble the ball—allowing the Russians to recover the ball and run it into the end zone.

That has happened before. In the 1950s, two similarly obsessed political officials fumbled the same ball. They were brothers—Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, considered to be “the vicar” of American foreign policy, and Allen Dulles, the head of the CIA.

In 1956, Egyptian President Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal. When President Eisenhower refused to support the British/French invasion of Egypt to reclaim the canal, it garnered Eisenhower and America a great deal of respect—not only from the Egyptian populous, but from the young revolutionary Nasser himself.

When Nasser had earlier overthrown the British, he believed he was emulating what the Americas had done some 180 years before. So, when Eisenhower opposed the British/French invasion, that cemented the belief among the young Egyptian army officers that America would be a good friend and ally.

With the country’s new enthusiasm and love for America, President Nasser then turned to the Americans for support of a central part of his economic policy—namely the building of a large dam to ensure electrical self-sufficiency for the country (as well as other benefits).

But John Foster Dulles snubbed Nasser and his country by rejecting the plan. Today’s younger generation of Egyptians can only imagine the anger and injured national pride that Dulles caused.

That mishap in American foreign policy sent Nasser reluctantly into the arms of the Soviets, who were all-too-ready to embrace him with every ounce of communist hypocrisy.

Now fast-forward to 2011 to find the Obama Administration endorsing the Muslim Brotherhood instead of the true forces of secular democracy. What a devastating blow to the Egyptian people!

What our American government officials failed to realize was that the Islamic doctrine of “taqiyya” compels Islamists to lie with vigor to infidels. So, in effect, all the Islamists sweet talk to the Americans (McCain, Lindsey, Clinton, et al) about democracy and keeping peace with Israel amounted to nothing but lies.

Our government’s first unforgivable sin in the eyes of today’s Egyptians is that we believed them.

Then two years later, Egypt’s military leaders acted in solidarity with the country’s 33 million freedom-loving citizens by isolating the Muslim Brotherhood cabal. But America, yet again, acted foolishly by not supporting the protestors. When Senators McCain and Lindsey went to Egypt and called the populist revolution a “coup,” it became clear that America was repeating its blunder of the 1950s.

Just like John Foster Dulles, they snubbed the wrong people and insulted the national pride.

In doing so, they committed the second unforgivable sin: siding with the Islamists and not the democracy-advocating masses. Once again, we surrendered Egypt and chased them straight into the waiting arms of the Russians.

History repeating itself? You betcha!


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Russia
KEYWORDS: history; islamists; middleeast; syria

1 posted on 09/22/2013 6:57:08 AM PDT by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin
Wait a minute. Dulles was Eisenhower's Secretary of State yet Dulles takes the heat for not agreeing to Nasser's economic plans?

Did Eisenhower not have a say in that at all?

2 posted on 09/22/2013 7:03:29 AM PDT by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all -- Texas Eagle)
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To: Kaslin

It has also been said that if there is one thing we learn from history it’s that we don’t learn from history.


3 posted on 09/22/2013 7:04:21 AM PDT by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all -- Texas Eagle)
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To: Texas Eagle

“Nescire autem quid antequam natus sis acciderit, id est semper esse puerum.”
(To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child.)
~Marcus Tullius Cicero
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“Those who don’t know history are destined to repeat it.”
~Edmund Burke
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“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
~George Santayana


4 posted on 09/22/2013 7:10:43 AM PDT by Repeal The 17th (We have met the enemy and he is us.)
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To: Kaslin
From Rudyard Kipling, nearly a century ago:

As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began.
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!


5 posted on 09/22/2013 7:53:21 AM PDT by DuncanWaring (The Lord uses the good ones; the bad ones use the Lord.)
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To: Texas Eagle

Ike had the final say of course, the author needs to buy a clue.

Nasser was already in bed with the Soviets when we declined to help fund his dam. Dulles tried to play nice but Nasser kept playing both sides.


6 posted on 09/23/2013 2:15:23 AM PDT by Impy (RED=COMMUNIST, NOT REPUBLICAN)
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Rand Slams Congress for Funding Egypt’s Generals:
‘How Does Your Conscience Feel Now?’
Foreign Policy | 15 Aug 2013 | John Hudson
Posted on 08/15/2013 5:44:10 PM PDT by Hoodat
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3055253/posts

Sen. Rand Paul is hammering his fellow senators for keeping billions in financial aid flowing to Egypt’s military — even as Cairo’s security forces massacre anti-government activists.

[by “anti-government activists” is meant church-burning jihadists]


7 posted on 09/25/2013 1:04:20 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (It's no coincidence that some "conservatives" echo the hard left.)
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Here's the passage at issue:
In the 1980s, the war caucus in Congress armed bin Laden and the mujaheddin in their fight with the Soviet Union. In fact, it was the official position of the State Department to support radical jihad against the Soviets. We all know how well that worked out.
Let's leave aside for now the insulting, utterly asinine, sickening, inexcusable use of the phrase "war caucus" to describe those (including Reagan!) who supported the mujaheddin against the Soviets. That word choice alone is almost entirely disqualifying for its purveyor to ever be president.

Instead, let's just look at a little history here -- because the ignorance evident in this paragraph is truly astonishing. One would be hard pressed to find even a single historian, whether right, left, or center, who would argue anything other than that the Soviet failure in Afghanistan was not just a huge factor, but probably an essential one, in the Soviets' ultimate loss of the Cold War.
[Rand Paul’s Really Ignorant Paragraph | 7 Feb 2013]

8 posted on 09/25/2013 1:04:31 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (It's no coincidence that some "conservatives" echo the hard left.)
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To: Impy; AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Berosus; bigheadfred; Bockscar; cardinal4; ColdOne; ...

Exactly. The UK and France wanted the canal back, and Nasser had abrogated a treaty in seizing it. The US hadn’t been informed of the intervention in advance, and the UK and France accidentally-on-purpose delayed their entry into the melee to allow Israel to take the fall for a planned joint action. The Soviets were rolling tank treads all over the Hungarians, but that didn’t stop them from yelling about aggression (sound familiar?) and threatening (sound familiar?) Europe with nuclear bombing over the Suez intervention.


9 posted on 09/25/2013 1:13:55 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (It's no coincidence that some "conservatives" echo the hard left.)
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