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Why Does Washington Still Think it Can Control What Happens in Egypt?

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The primary reason for Egypt's current travails has much more to do with the choices Egyptians have made and the circumstances those choices have created than the policies of the Obama administration, let alone any sins of omission and commission, writes Aaron David Miller in Foreign Policy.

Here we go again. It has been barely a week since the Egyptian military removed Mohamed Morsy from power, and Washington is already knee-deep in the blame game over who's responsible for the current mess and what America must do to fix it.

The question of "Who lost [insert country here]?" goes back at least to the communist takeover of China in 1949, when American conservatives accused Harry Truman's administration of abandoning Chiang Kai-shek and his Nationalist forces. But the "Who lost" formulation has resurfaced with increasing frequency in the last few years -- over Iraq, over Syria, and now over Egypt, as the United States struggles to adapt to the rapidly shifting political situation there.

Most fingers are pointing at Barack Obama's administration. The U.S. president was either too soft on the Muslim Brotherhood and/or not tough enough on the generals. Indeed, right now we have an amen chorus urging a cutoff of assistance to Egypt until the generals turn into democrats or get out of the way and allow others to. No surprise here. Just another example of Obama's abdication of American leadership and leading from behind, right? Or, if Obama is not a juicy-enough target, you can also fault the U.S. ambassador's ill-timed remarks about the value of elections over street demonstrations, or Secretary of State John Kerry's July 4 aquatic adventures in Nantucket.

Some of this is just U.S. domestic politics. But much has to do with the belief that more American leadership is always better than less and the U.S. need to seek clear solutions in situations where, more often than not, only confused outcomes are available.

The primary reason for Egypt's current travails has much more to do with the choices Egyptians have made and the circumstances those choices have created than the policies of the Obama administration, let alone any sins of omission and commission.

Read the full article on ForeignPolicy.com.

About the Author

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Aaron David Miller

Global Fellow
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Middle East Program

The Wilson Center’s Middle East Program serves as a crucial resource for the policymaking community and beyond, providing analyses and research that helps inform US foreign policymaking, stimulates public debate, and expands knowledge about issues in the wider Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.  Read more