You asked for a chart of who’s who. BBC gives one. Is this shallow?
The BBC one contains no single oligarch. That’s a significant decision.
Sergej Aksjonow who’s the premier of Crimea and who declared that he commands the fleet, police and the interior ministry that’s stationed on Crimea doesn’t make it into the BBC’s list of major players.
From a propaganda standpoint framing the major players that way makes sense. Western powers don’t want that the democratically elected premier of Crimea has power.
If you read the CFR reporting you find talk about how the US thinks Europe wasn’t investing enough effort into funding protestors of the old Ukranian regime. That’s useful information for understanding the who’s who. The CIA was more interested in getting rid of the old Ukranian regime than European actors.
It’s the kind of information that the audience of the Western foreign policy community who reads CFR to inform themselves of the conflict needs. The CFR wants to inform the Western foreign policy community to have them make decisions in the interests of the Western foreign policy community and that means that they actually have to communicate the who’s who more accurately.
What is your assessment of what happened in Egypt?
The military has the power in Egypt. In contrast to a country like the US the Egyptian military controls large parts of the Egyptian economy. Certain policies of opening up Egypt to international investors and making life for international investors easier go against the business interests of the Egyptian military. They see themselves as nationalists.
When the revolution came around they allowed Mubarak to fall and didn’t shoot and protesters because they didn’t like Mubarak.
When it turned out that the brotherhood government wasn’t what they wanted the military took power themselves and did shoot at protesters. That surprised people who believed the narrative that Western media told, but it shouldn’t have surprised anyone who paid attention.
The BBC one contains no single oligarch. That’s a significant decision.
Sergej Aksjonow who’s the premier of Crimea and who declared that he commands the fleet, police and the interior ministry that’s stationed on Crimea doesn’t make it into the BBC’s list of major players.
From a propaganda standpoint framing the major players that way makes sense. Western powers don’t want that the democratically elected premier of Crimea has power.
If you read the CFR reporting you find talk about how the US thinks Europe wasn’t investing enough effort into funding protestors of the old Ukranian regime. That’s useful information for understanding the who’s who. The CIA was more interested in getting rid of the old Ukranian regime than European actors.
It’s the kind of information that the audience of the Western foreign policy community who reads CFR to inform themselves of the conflict needs. The CFR wants to inform the Western foreign policy community to have them make decisions in the interests of the Western foreign policy community and that means that they actually have to communicate the who’s who more accurately.
The military has the power in Egypt. In contrast to a country like the US the Egyptian military controls large parts of the Egyptian economy. Certain policies of opening up Egypt to international investors and making life for international investors easier go against the business interests of the Egyptian military. They see themselves as nationalists.
When the revolution came around they allowed Mubarak to fall and didn’t shoot and protesters because they didn’t like Mubarak.
When it turned out that the brotherhood government wasn’t what they wanted the military took power themselves and did shoot at protesters. That surprised people who believed the narrative that Western media told, but it shouldn’t have surprised anyone who paid attention.