Alan W. Dowd: Bush Should Get Some Credit for the Arab Spring

Alan W. Dowd is a senior Fellow, defence and security research, the Fraser Institute.

Adm. Eric Olson, former commander of the U.S. Special Operations Command, recently noted that “al-Qaeda Version 1.0 is nearing its end.” The reason? In his view, the takedown of Osama bin Laden and the anti-autocracy revolutions of the Arab Spring combined for a staggering one-two punch. To extend Olson’s tech-related metaphor, it seems fair to say that the Middle East is no longer firewalled from freedom. This, too, is partly a function of the global campaign against terrorist groups and terrorist states, which began on Oct. 7, 2001 with the U.S.-led strikes on al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Ten Octobers ago, the dominant – and seemingly unchangeable, unchallengeable – form of government across the Greater Middle East was dictatorship. Saddam Hussein’s Iraq represented the horrific end of the spectrum, Hosni Mubarak’s Egypt the merely objectionable end. The only alternatives seemed to be the violent fundamentalisms of the Taliban, bin Laden, and Iran. The reformers, if there were any, kept quiet.

Ten years later, the reformers are shouting. And they aren’t chanting “Death to America” or “Long live bin Laden.” Most are demanding freedom, opportunity, justice, and an end to government corruption. In Libya, they are even embracing the American flag.

In other words, the changes rocking the Middle East are nothing short of … well, revolutionary...