When Armies Decide A Protesters Fate

02-20-2011 • NYtimes.com

Egypt’s military leadership came to the same conclusion that South Korea’s did in the 1980s and Indonesia’s did in the 1990s: The country’s top leader had suddenly changed from an asset to a liability. The military, with its business enterprises, to say nothing of its American aid and high-tech arms, required a transition that would let it retain power while allowing Washington to herald gradual, substantive reform. In Bahrain, on the other hand, the military seems to have concluded that adapting to change would do them no good — that the protesters were far too great a threat to their very command of society. So the country that acts as host to America’s Fifth Fleet decided to ignore President Obama’s advice, which it regarded as assisted suicide.