The ancient Greeks were reputed to have guessed that matter
was made of fire, wind and whatever; perhaps even of small particles called
atoms. As well, the early Christians guessed that we and all living things were
made of dust because they saw that everything that dies and does not get
buried, becomes dust.
Given the methods of observation that the ancients had, it
is remarkable they made those deductions. The difference between their science
and modern science is that we now have microscopes and other methods with which
to observe and learn how matter is structured. The result is that we know about
the elementary particles and the forces that bind them together, and many of
the things that make up the universe in which we live. And we can produce
telephones and television sets; travel at the speed of sound, go to the moon
and study the distant planets.
Believe it or not, our knowledge of the elementary precepts
by which we determine the way that things develop politically, are not much
different from what the ancients believed they were seeing; and what we now
hold to be scientific truths. Read an article that was written by Eric Trager,
and you'll see him describe a situation that's not different from the science
that was available to the Greeks and the early Christians. After you've done
this, read history through the lens of those who understand it and you'll know
you're like a modern scientist that's equipped with an electron microscope and
an atom smasher.
Eric Trager wrote: “Sisi's Domesticated Foreign Policy,” an
article that was published on March 8, 2017 on the website of the Washington
Institute for Near East Policy. This piece of work is ahead of many others in
that the writer relies on his own observations to make the deductions that he
does. Consider this to be progress when compared to those who pluck from the
air one echo here and one echo there, and repeat them to create a monster
that's half fish and half fowl yet can neither swim nor fly.
On the other hand, Trager has come up with a construct that
is only as advanced as the understanding that the ancient Greeks and early
Christians had of what the universe was made of. To do better and develop an
understanding as advanced as that of modern science, we need to go deep into
history and study the elementary precepts as well as the forces that animate
the various players on the world stage. Let's try.
History being a vast ocean of knowledge, it can be discussed
only in general terms in an article such as this. What we need to know for now
is that there are two kinds of Arab countries. There are those like Egypt , the nations of Northwest Africa, and
those of the Levant which started as sedentary
societies that farmed the land, and then moved to industry. And there are those
who started as nomadic tribes roaming the Arabian Peninsula or West Africa , and lived on trade and commerce. A few lucky
ones then discovered petroleum, and saw their lives change fundamentally.
Until Sykes-Picot materialized apparently out of nowhere and
changed the course of history, Egypt
was slated to remain ahead of the UK in terms of the industrial
progress it was scoring. The steam engine, food processing and textile being
the foundations upon which the Industrial Age saw its first rapid expansion,
Egypt had them all at a time when the UK could only claim to have used the
steam engine before Egypt. But even then, Britain 's
railway system was confined to the small island that it is, whereas Egypt 's system was designed to open all of Africa . In addition, when it came to cotton for making
textile, and food to be processed, Egypt
remained light years ahead of the UK .
But then something happened that planted in the heads of the
French and the Brits that because they possessed the firearms that nobody else
had, they could subjugate the whole world, and divide it among them. This
became the scheme upon which history unfolded beyond Sykes-Picot. Now, a
century later, the sedentary Arab nations that were trampled on by that
agreement, cannot forget the past. They maintain that despite the setbacks they
have suffered, they can still reclaim their rightful place under the sun. And
they are determined to do just that.
On the other hand, the tribes of the Arabian Peninsula that
were spared the Western colonial onslaught because they had nothing to offer,
submitted willingly to become “protectorates” of the UK and then the US when
petroleum was discovered under their barren deserts. Lacking the history or the
culture around which people in Egypt
– for example – rally in difficult times, the tribal leaders of the Peninsula are able to maintain cohesion among their
people only by appealing to the shared religion that binds their people
together.
Thus, while Sisi is motivated by the ambition to leapfrog
ahead of Europe, the Gulf Arabs hold on to their religion while hiding behind
the skirt of mamma UK, and the coattail of papa US. This is why friction flares
up from time to time between the sedentary societies and the Gulf tribes.