Friday, February 18, 2011

Obama ordered a secret study of possible riots in Egypt

Washington. .- Criticism of the government Barack Obama as "sorpendido" which saw protests in Egypt might not be as successful: the U.S. president ordered his aides last August a "secret survey" of possible unrest in the region, reveals The New York Times today. According to the newspaper, quoting unidentified government sources, the classified report, 18 pages, concluded that, in the absence of "broad political changes, countries from Bahrain to Yemen" was ripe for a popular revolt.

" The presidential report identified potential "hot spots volatile", especially in Egypt, and called for "proposals" on how the U.S. government would "press for political changes in countries with autocratic leaders that the pair are important allies in Washington. Obama even pressured its advisers to explore "popular uprisings in Latin America, Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia" to determine what worked and what did not, "the Times.

According to sources, Obama's support for the demonstrators in Tahrir Square in Cairo "despite some mixed signals" from their government, "reflected his conviction that there were more risks if they are not pressed for changes, because then Arab leaders would have to resort to even more brutal methods to keep stifling dissent.

" The president also was concerned that intense U.S. efforts against al Qaeda operations in Yemen were ignoring a "political crisis in the making," continues the newspaper. "Whether in Yemen or elsewhere in the region, saw a number of trends: a youthful population, educational systems depleted, stagnant economies and new technologies of social networks like Facebook and Twitter that they were a real recipe for problems," told the "Times" one of the sources.

The newspaper explains that the Obama report kept secret for fear that, if leaked, "Arab allies could pressure the White House, as was said, after the start of the protests in Cairo that ended the resignation of President for nearly three decades Hosni Mubarak. Even so, says the report "has helped shape other posts" of the U.S.

administration, like the speech he gave in Qatar in January, Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, which criticized the Arab leaders to resist change . The existence of this report suggests that the White House was not due to surprise both the riots that began in Tunisia this year and now have moved to countries like Bahrain after causing substantial changes in Egypt.

Even so, especially the intelligence agencies have been criticized for not anticipating it more accurately, while its top officials have repeatedly stressed in recent days that it is almost impossible to predict where and when you can produce this kind of uprising. "We're not clairvoyant," said the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, during a hearing at the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday.

Specific triggers on when and how instability could lead to the collapse of the regimes "can not always known or anticipated," he added.

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