The Egyptian Army is in America's Best Interest

For almost three years now, the news coming out of Egypt has been “turbulent” – to say the least. After Hosni Mubarak was deposed in February 2011, Mohammed Morsi became the leader in a seemingly fair election. Millions of Egyptians then rose up against Morsi, and on July 3, 2013 he was deposed and imprisoned by the Egyptian Army.

After Morsi’s victory, the United States of America continued its decades-old policy of providing military and financial aid to Egypt. However, this latest power shuffle seems to have befuddled the Obama Administration. After all, Morsi rose to power legitimately, but the army’s ascent was very undemocratic… and brutal. Should the U.S. “play ball” with governments that attain power this way?

Egyptian Army armored vehicles closes roads in Cairo ahead of planned Islamists protests. Photo Credit: Gianluigi Guercia/AFP/Getty Images

To illustrate the administration’s current attitude, on Aug. 20, 2013, USA Today reported: “White House officials said they are evaluating aid to Egypt on a ‘day-by-day’ and ‘case-by-case’ basis, as the Egyptian military government continued a bloody crackdown on the group that previously ran the nation … ‘Our aid and assistance relationship with Egypt is under a review, but it has not been cut off,’ said White House spokesman Josh Earnest…The State Department has announced that the U.S. government still has not delivered some $585 million in Egyptian aid, about half the total package for the fiscal year that ends Sept. 30.Some actions have already been taken against the interim government in Egypt. Obama canceled U.S.-Egyptian military exercises that had been set for next month, and the Pentagon has held up the transfer of F-16 fighter jets to Egypt.”

I respectfully dispute the administration’s grasp of these events. First of all, it is not true that the U.S. policy is to only support “good guys” in Egypt like Morsi. Mubarak was a very brutal despot, and yet the U.S. happily sent him aid for 30 years.

Furthermore, Morsi is not a “good guy” – not by any stretch of the imagination. Although he was elected democratically, so too was Adolph Hitler. Hitler won an election, but soon thereafter, he dismantled Germany’s democracy and became its supreme ruler. Morsi was in the midst of acting almost identically when he was finally ousted; he had already legally become Egypt’s dictator for life, and he was busy neutering the judiciary and legislature. Accordingly, if Mubarak and Morsi were supported unhesitatingly, the same should apply to the present Egyptian Army.

There is also another and far more compelling argument to consider. It is in the U.S.’s self-interest to fully support Egypt’s current rulers – both as far as our morality and safety.

What is the fundamental difference between Mubarak and the army on one hand and Morsi on the other? They are all brutal. Mubarak and the army are mostly secular, while Morsi is a radical Islamist whose party, the Muslim Brotherhood, is tied to Al Qaeda and its hideous pursuit of religion through murder. Morsi demonstrated this “approach” when, during his reign, he chose to serve Allah by orchestrating bloody violence against Egypt’s Christians and their churches. Many innocent lives and houses of worship were deliberately destroyed. At present, the news reports that Morsi’s followers are still killing and torturing Christians and burning churches. The Egyptian Army does not act this way.

As a predominantly Christian land, the U.S. should unabashedly condemn the anti-Christian violence perpetrated by Morsi and his goons and throw its support behind the Egyptian Army. The U.S. should, in effect, be stating: “Because our wonderful country is based on a Judeo-Christian heritage, it upholds ‘liberty and justice for all.’ We take pride in our humanism and advocate on its behalf. Morality therefore obligates us to support the army whose government protects our ideological and religious brethren in Egypt.”

As for protecting the safety of the U.S., my recently released book “Uncommon Sense” discusses the obvious notion that a primary role of government is the protection of its own citizens. At present, one of America’s most dedicated enemies is Al Qaeda, the unrepentant murderers of 3,000 innocent civilians in the 9/11 attacks. To prevent further killing by Al Qaeda and other like-minded savages, the U.S. spends fortunes of money on security, and American citizens lose fortunes in productivity because they must spend time waiting in airport security lines. Just recently, 19 U.S. embassies and consulates were temporarily closed for fear of being attacked by Al Qaeda.

Morsi’s political party, the Muslim Brotherhood, is formally affiliated with Al Qaeda. Why is it a sin for America to act in its own self-interest? In order to protect the American Nation, the U.S. should have immediately desisted from funding Morsi, but it should now be supporting the rule of the pro-U.S. Egyptian Army (instead of the other way around). If it adopted this just policy, the American government would be pursuing one of its primary duties – protecting the United States.