Whatever happened to critical thinking in foreign policy?

Now that the Middle East is basically moving to Europe after Germany did the national equivalent of advertising a house party on Facebook, it’s worth looking back four years ago to when the ‘Arab Spring’ was beginning, and what might have been done.

At the time, you’ll recall, Egypt’s kleptocrat dictator had just fallen and the first protests were beginning in Syria. David Cameron flew to the Gulf where he attacked suggestions that the Middle East ‘can’t do democracy’. As the Mail reported at the time:

He rejected the idea that ‘highly controlling’ regimes are needed to ensure stability as violence and protests continued in Libya. He dismissed the idea that Arab or Muslim countries cannot cope with free and fair elections and said: ‘For me, that’s a prejudice that borders on racism.’ The former Prime Minister declared as decolonisation occurred across Africa: ‘The wind of change is blowing through this continent. Whether we like it or not, this growth of national consciousness is a political fact.