History of Lebanon and Middle East Autocracies

I haven't commented on the recent government changes in Lebanon because I don't know much about the country and don't really know what has been happening. Juan Cole has provided a really interesting overview of the relevant history there.

One thing that especially jumped out at me is the source of the dictatorships in Iran, Iraq and Lebanon. Based on what Juan Cole states, all three were the direct results of CIA manipulations in the 1950's as responses to the Cold War.

It is common knowledge that the CIA set up a coup in Iran that replaced the elected government of Mossadeq in 1952 - 1953 with the dictatorship under the Shah. It is similalry wellknown that the Baath Party was installed in Iraq with the assistance of the CIA in the middle 1960's, again as part of the anti-Communist efforts in the Cold War. (A Google Search on this is found at the link.)

Now Juan Cole states that the CIA manipulated the Lebanonese Parliament to change the constitution and allow President Camille Chamoun (1952-1958) to succeed himself. Cole states that this change was successful because of actions by the CIA to engineer the election. This resulted in a small civil war that threatened to overthrow Chamoun, so in 1958 Eisenhower sent the US Marines in to keep him in office.

Juan Cole concludes: "Thereafter the Maronites erected a police state, with much power in the Dueuxieme Bureau or secret police. Since Washington had already overthrown the democratically elected government of Iran in 1953, and is said to have helped install the Baath in power in Iraq, it may well be that the Illiberal Age in the Middle East of the second half of the 20th century was in important part the doing of Washington and was for Cold War purposes."

In other words, many of the autocratic governments that President Bush now claims he wants to see replaced by democracies were themselves created out of democracies by American interventions in the 50's and 60's.

If I were a person in the Middle East, that would make me extremely leery of any American activities there.