The case for Bonapartism

I’ve mentioned this to several people already, so I thought I’d take the time to explain myself online.

Basically, the prevailing “Democratic Peace” theory holds that Democracies tend not to go to war, and don’t ever go to war with each other. This theory may or may not still hold, depending on how “democratic” Serbia was when we bombed them in the 1990s or whether or not Russia and Georgia count as democracies. I tend to think the theory is at least partially true, as democracies at least tend to evaluate their own interests similarly. But even if you don’t think there’s a current example, it’s at least possible to imagine two democracies going at it – most wars have popular support when they’re started, after all.

In contrast to the prevailing theory, these guys argue that young democracies are actually more likely to go to war than other states. If you ignore the mythologizing about democracy, it makes sense. When a country goes democratic the rulers change, and the new government is likely to perceive the interests and global order of the country differently than the previous state. Ideological re-alignment brings instability to stable regions and can therefore easily lead to wars. This probably applies to the shift to any new governing order as well (think of Communist Russia’s survival war after the Russian Civil War, Mao picking a fight with Russia, et cetera, et cetera).

The textbook case for this is, of course, Revolutionary France. Following the extinction of the French monarchy most of Europe declared war on France, which started a spiral of events that eventually led to Emperor Napoleon conquering most of Europe and cheerfully extinguishing monarchies all over the place. Napoleon was able to do this because spreading France’s revolutionary ideals was tremendously popular in France – France was the first nation to be able to fully mobilize for war. Killing kings is fun, apparently.

Egypt is a big country – 80 million people – twice as large as the next largest Arab country. Its politics and culture dominate the Arab world. In short, it occupies the same place in Arab culture as France held in European culture in 1800. Its military is big, modern, American armed, and American trained. Israel is basically the only country in the region that could hope to beat it. It has the capability to be an army of Arab liberation.

Egypt’s culture has been pan-Arabic for as long as it has been independent. They merged with Syria for a couple of years, invaded Libya, and supported a democratic uprising in Yemen. This is not likely to change. What is changing however, is that they are likely to be led by a revolutionary government soon.

Egypt is about to be a big country with a modern army ruled by people who view all Arabs as brothers and democracy as a birthright of humankind. Where is Lt. Bonaparte?

The only thing lacking in this scenario is the triggering event to send Egypt’s army on the march. For Revolutionary France, it was other European countries declaring war on the young republic.

The United Nations just declared Libya a no-fly zone. While it looks like France, Britain, and America will enforce the no-fly zone, they’ve basically ruled out sending in ground troops. Eventually ground troops will, in fact, be necessary (the alternative is portioning Libya). Neither Obama nor Sarkozy nor Cameron have any interest in sending in ground troops, the memory of Iraq is still fresh enough to prevent that – which leaves a “volunteer” “arab” force. Which means next-door Egypt.

And a week later the Arab world finally gets the hero this revolution needs – the great liberator of Benghazi. Where does he stop? Don’t the people of Yemen deserve freedom? Doesn’t the house of Saud pollute the holy land? Aren’t the Sudanese really just “Upper Egyptians”?

Some people think Egypt will become a member of the great democracy club. Other people worry about the Muslim Brotherhood turning it into the next Iran. No one seems to be worrying about an Egyptian Bonaparte, but they should be. I'm not saying it's the most likely possibility, but it's certainly a possibility.