Chomsky -The State-Corporate Complex & the Arab revolts

The demonstration in Egypt -- Tahrir Square, the January 25th movement -- was initiated by a group of young people -- tech savvy young people who call themselves the "April 6th movement". Why the April 6th movement? The reason is that on April 6th, 2008 there was a major labour action planned at the biggest industrial conglomerate in Egypt along with solidarity actions, and it was all crushed by force by the very brutal security system.

What that reflects is that there have been substantial labour struggles, labour militancy against the dictatorship -- trying to gain elementary rights and some elements of democracy. It kind of blew up on January 25th but it's been going on a long time. And the same in the other countries: if you look there's been protests, repressions, violence, torture, more protests. This wave, it actually got started in Western Sahara, but that was crushed very quickly by Morocco. Then it went to Tunisia. There, it succeeded in overthrowing the dictatorship, lit a spark, and then it spread all over the region.

The United States and the West are really concerned about: namely the ones that have oil and that have loyal dictators. If a country has plenty of oil and a loyal dictator, the West is going to back the dictator to the hilt, and that's what happened in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Bahrain -- which is kind of like an offshoot of Saudi Arabia.

In Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, the repression was so severe that people could barely even appear for the demonstrations, and there's no criticism of that in the West because their dictators are fine. In Egypt, the US and the West followed what is, in fact, a familiar gameplan when you can't hang on to a favoured dictator. What you do is you hold on as long as possible. When it's impossible, typically when the army turns against him, which is what happened in Egypt, then [you] shelve him and try to restore as much as you can of the old order, and that's in fact what's happening in Egypt and Tunisia.

A different case is Libya -- plenty of oil but not a loyal dictator, so the West would be happy to get rid of him, even though they've supported him right to the end.

Gaddafi -- he's a brutal, vicious dictator. He's been in for a long time, '69. There's been plenty of protest, mostly repressed. He has plenty of support too, you can tell that from the reports, but there's a strong popular opposition to the dictatorship, as there is throughout the entire region… Dictators are not popular. Sometimes they're powerful enough and strongly enough supported by the West so they can crush opposition -- as, for example, in Saudi Arabia. And Gaddafi's done that for a long time, with plenty of Western support, incidentally. But this time, it broke through and the West would be quite happy to get rid of him. That's why the Western powers are intervening in support of the rebellion.

The State-Corporate Complex has been in the US forever. The state [and the] interaction between state power and concentrations of private power goes back hundreds of years. It takes different forms at different times. It started with financialization of the economy and export of production that led to heavy concentration of profit in financial capital, that translated itself into political power. Political power then enhanced it by introduction of a whole range of policies, ranging from tax policies to deregulation, which further enhanced corporate power, increasingly financial power.

Deregulation set in, and the big corporations are just paid off by the taxpayer […] they're rescued. Then they're richer than ever and set up for the next crisis. It almost crashed the economy and the next time around it'll be worse. Quite apart from the fact that it almost utterly undermines any democratic functioning of the state -- and it's pretty similar in other countries -- the United States happens to be extreme.

Backing of Libyan rebels apparently aims to clean up West's image across the Arab world

Spreading goodwill, avoiding oil price spikes

So what’s motivating the Western powers into projecting their power into Libya? And why is the West not intervening in Bahrain or Saudi Arabia or Yemen?

The potential benefit of successfully backing the rebels will be an increase in goodwill across the Arab world directed at the West. It is not clear if that is a realistic expectation, but it is one appears to motivate Western leaders.

Meanwhile, the cost of attacking Gaddafi and his mercenaries in a limited way, and supplying the rebels with arms is relatively low. It is not clear if the cost is actually low, but it’s likely that it is perceived that way since the intervention is already underway.

In Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, the opposite is true. The American president Barack Obama will seek reelection, so it is in his interest to prevent the global economy from stagnating then shrinking.

A successful revolution in Bahrain may destabilise Saudi Arabia which would drive the price of oil up which could cause the US economy to stall. It is just not a risk worth taking for him.

Probably, fears of an insurgent Iran – legitimate or not – play into his calculations as well. That’s because most Bahrainis are Shias.

Likewise, Yemen permits the Americans to pursue Al Qaeda affiliates in that country. That goes directly to Obama’s security credentials.

If Yemen lapses, Obama will be accused, rightly or wrongly, of permitting terrorist sympathizers to take control in yet another Middle Eastern country. And the 2012 election campaign is already underway.

Intervention in Libya could turn out badly in a many different and unforeseen ways. And imperialism and neoliberal “reforms” – which are a problem in that country – did not arrive with the revolution; they preceded it.