Breaking the Wave — The War in Iraq, US–Egyptian Relations and the Bush Administration’s ‘Democratic Tsunami’

Abstract

In the aftermath of the events of 11 September 2001, political commentators and representatives of the foreign policy decision-making process in Washington DC engaged in a serious debate about the extent to which governments such as the one in Egypt, long considered to be a reliable US ally, might have contributed to the emergence of the direct threat to US national security in the form of Osama Bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda organisation. While the regime in Cairo had been able to suppress the violent fringes of its domestic Islamist movement, Egypt’s ongoing political, economic and social crises continued to strengthen the support for domestic and transnational Islamist movements (Gerges, 2005, 2000). In light of these discussions the following paper seeks to analyse how the Bush administration’s decision to invade Iraq has impacted the ability of Hosni Mubarak’s regime to secure continued US foreign aid in the context of Washington’s erratic reform pressures.