01-30-2011, 12:49 AM
[url="http://www.kforcegov.com/Services/IS/NightWatch/NightWatch_11000022.aspx"] NightWatch[/url]
Quote:Egypt: Today was the Day of Rage and so it has been. Roughly an hour after Friday prayers, the demonstrations began in Cairo, Suez and Alexandria, then spread and continued into the night. Buildings were set alight; curfews ignored and the Army moved in. The night closed with President Mubarak's mildly concessional speech which promises to incite the protestors, more than placate them. Expect more confrontations on 29 January.
Special comment: Background. Research and analysis of more than 50 internal instability episodes since 1980, NightWatch has tracked order in what appears to be chaotic security situations. Once internal discontent metamorphoses into a breakdown of public order, the government begins searching for a set of responses that will halt the decline in its fortunes. A government will follow a three-phase cycle in applying different ideas and resources alternately to placate or crush an insurrection or to buy time to try to find "a line it can hold." That phrase refers to a set of actions over an expanse of national territory that will stabilize internal conditions.
If the government finds a set of responses that match the protestors' grievances, the downward cycle can be halted. If not, it will continue until the government falls or is changed, usually by the Army, the ultimate guardians of the state.
The cycle begins with an under reaction phase of more or less tolerant behavior. This phase almost always begins quietly with increased police presence, but no extraordinary force deployments. In most instances, the anti-government protestors are prone to misinterpret tolerance as weakness or indecision and will escalate demands and attract more protestors and usually looters.
When efforts at conciliation fail, the government has not choice but to escalate the security response. Unless the response is well-planned, swift and overwhelming, this overreaction will incite more demonstrations. At that point the government has not choice but to offer concessions so as to gain time for regrouping. The first concession is always people, rather than policies or practices.
Concessions always convey the perception that the demonstrators are winning and invariably provoke more demonstrations. In fact, concessions always start out as sops for the protestors. They do not mean that the government has fallen or that a revolution has succeeded.
Once a cycle is complete without improving the situation, the next cycles accelerate and power transfers from the government to the protestors heading towards power-sharing or bypassing power sharing and [color="#FF0000"]heading towards revolution[/color].
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In Egypt, the dynamics of the action have been much different. The unrest began in Cairo, the center of power and the center of the government's strength. That is so unusual and such an anomaly that that fact alone is a red flag for skullduggery.
There is no spontaneity in the heart of the government. No body starts a revolution in the center unless he has cover and high level backing. The government was fully aware of the emerging unrest after the first day. The whole world knew for that matter, but the unrest grew for two days unchecked.
The Egyptian security services are highly competent in internal security. They routinely crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood, for example, if members identify themselves in public, but not this time.
The second major anomaly is that kinetics of the movement. The unrest spread outwards from Cairo to Suez, then Alexandria and other towns, according to press reports. This is centrifugal movement, precisely the opposite direction of spontaneous unrest. Thus having drawn security attention away from Cairo, the day of rage occurred in Cairo and other cities, almost simultaneously. This is shaped, organized behavior.
The third anomaly is an inept response despite extensive preparations. Earliest news reports from Egypt confirm that the government had gone to considerable lengths to prepare for today's demonstrations. The disruption of the internet and social networking systems began hours before Friday prayers. Even without the internet and social networking, large demonstrations in the thousands managed to get organized, coordinate and stage simultaneously.
The fourth anomaly, which also occurred in Tunisia, is the opposition has no guns, no means of coercion. That is always the signature that the opposition is being manipulated, if not supported, by disaffected factions in the existing leadership. That is certainly what happened in Tunisia and appears to be the case in Egypt.
The paramilitary police and Army armored units were sighted in Cairo hours before unrest surged into the streets. The forces were ready, but did not act effectively or apparently cohesively. This looks contrived. Plus the Army was cheered when it finally moved into the streets of Cairo, Alexandria and Suez.
The demonstrators attacked the same set of targets in every city; police stations and local chapters of the government party. Museums and other symbols of the state were actually protected from looters by the demonstrators. That is not what happened in Kyrgyzstan last year, for example. There is an underlying order to what is taking place in Egypt.
News commentators have worked hard to try to explain the anomalies without success. [color="#FF0000"]The NightWatch hypothesis is that Egypt is not experiencing a revolution so much as a transition to a new leadership. That transition is not complete.[/color]
Some inside group that has been loyal to Mubarak has abetted this popular uprising. One expert suggested that it has been staged to prevent Mubarak from investing his son Gamal as his successor, in an Egyptian caricature of North Korean dynastic succession.
The group with the motive, intention and the means is the Army, according to that expert. Indirect evidence supports that hypothesis. The implications are that Readers should expect more street clashes that justify Army intervention, but are surprisingly not bloody. Mubarak will step down after a decent, brief interval.
The tradition of military-backed government that Nasser began and Sadat and Mubarak perpetuated will be handed on to a new generation of officers. Prices will be lowered, but there are no jobs.