Peter Beinart takes an optimistic view on the upheaval in the Middle East:
Truman and his successors made terrible mistakes in the Cold War, but America’s ultimate success stemmed from this basic insight: that as an economically vibrant democracy facing an economically destitute tyranny, the U.S. could afford to wait. And because America did wait, the Cold War ended without catastrophe.
Now we may be witnessing the end of the “war on terror” as well. The rise of democratically elected Arab regimes that are less beholden to the United States represents Osama bin Laden’s and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s worst nightmare. The only source of their appeal was their opposition to American foreign policy at a time when other Middle Eastern leaders looked like corrupt flunkies for the U.S. and Israel.
Spencer Ackerman adds that “patience isn’t the same as disengagement.” The bottom line though, is depending on how events in the Middle East play out, this could be the end of al-Qaeda and like-minded groups who are opposed to democracy and have argued that only violence can bring freedom to the Muslim world. The administration, for its part, is keenly aware of this. America’s job at this point isn’t to take ownership of these revolutions, but to do what it can to facilitate their successful conclusion through non-counterproductive means. Sometimes, that’s going to mean mostly getting out of the way.
