Revolutions in Retrospect

The Arab Spring is a Revolution. Sadly, the term revolution is sorely overused. Revolutions can be anything today from a revolution in social media to a revolution in pottery manufacturing. A real revolution is something like the American Revolution or the French Revolution. In that way the Arab Spring should be judged among its peers.

Before we get to the judging let me point out several stories that could depress a man as fast as possible in this dreary world of ours. The first story (click here) is by Glenn Greenwald, a perfectly good columnist at the Guardian who shows the holes in the "perfect victory" we've had in Libya. The second story (click here) is by Max Boot, a neoconservative who accurately points out the administration's failure to act on the Syrian Crisis, the other side of the proverbial coin, which has led to a leader slaughtering his own people. Not a happy start to any event.

It seems that the world has gone to pieces and the rosy colored picture I had of the Arab Spring a few months ago was all roses and daisies. Luckily that's not the case and history shall be our guide. Let's look at a few revolutions in perspective:

American Revolution: while we look back on this one with pride you have to remember that it was a long, bloody, eight year war that was fought in a bitter partisan and conventional manner. After the war local leaders held large amounts of power, the region seemed to be breaking into separate entities. Arab Spring is looking better.

French Revolution: the French, after beheading their king, started a European-wide war that killed thousands. Power was centralized in the hands of a mad, short, brilliant dictator  who crowned himself Emperor for life. Arab Spring looks better.

Bolshevik Revolution: Massive continent-wide civil war. Killed millions and led to several madmen who killed millions more. Arab Spring looks better.

These are a few common examples and all of them seem worse off than the Arab Spring. When one looks more closely at the stories one would find that Assad is not looking stable and the conflict will not last for a decade. Libya, despite recent events has a strong pro-America movement (click here). It seems we are in the midst of one of the most peaceful (historically speaking) revolutions of our age. Hope it goes well for the future.