Egypt: If the top intelligence Guy Thinks the Brotherhood is Secular; No Wonder U.S. Policy is so Screwed Up

By Barry Rubin

During a House Intelligence Committee hearing Thursday, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper called the Muslim Brotherhood "largely secular."

Clapper said:

"The term 'Muslim Brotherhood'...is an umbrella term for a variety of movements. In the case of Egypt, a very heterogeneous group, largely secular, which has eschewed violence and has decried al-Qaida as a perversion of Islam. They have pursued social ends, a betterment of the political order in Egypt, et cetera.....In other countries, there are also chapters or franchises of the Muslim Brotherhood, but there is no overarching agenda, particularly in pursuit of violence, at least internationally."

It is quite true that they don't like al-Qaida (they are competitors, after all) and there is no strong central direction to the international movement. Other than that, I think my 11-year-old son could have given a better briefing although, to be fair, he is very smart and follows international affairs--unlike Clapper.

From the way he worded the answer, he did seem to repeat accurately what he had been told in his CIA briefing. But it also seemed as if he had never been briefed on Egypt at all until moments before the hearing. This crisis has been going on for two weeks and he should have been discussing it every day. If that were true he should have known more.

In some ways, what happened is worse than people think because it implies he had been ignoring the issue until within 24 hours of his testimony.


Let's analyze what he said:

"The term 'Muslim Brotherhood'...is an umbrella term for a variety of movements,"

This is a distortion of what he was probably told (or should have been told): There are several Muslim Brotherhood movements in different countries (mainly Jordan and Syria, plus Hamas and now also branches all over the West). These movements are related but there is not a lot of centralized direction. They have a very similar ideology even if they do use different tactics.

But he implied these groups are totally different and have nothing to do with each other except the name. That's nonsense.

"in the case of Egypt, a very heterogeneous group, largely secular,"

A lot of analysts believe that many of the younger Brotherhood members are moderate. I think this is a misunderstanding. There was a moderate section but they have been largely suppressed and we've heard less from them in recent years. This is the source of the idea that the Brotherhood is moderate though. The English-language website is extremely moderate both as a propaganda device and probably because much of its staff are indeed less extreme.

It is really hard to think the CIA briefers said the Brotherhood is moderate, or is it? I saw how they "fixed" a study to ensure that it was uncritical of the Brotherhood. Yet I cannot imagine a briefer telling that to the top national intelligence official.

"which has eschewed violence"

They have eschewed violence within Egypt but of course not abroad--especially against Israel and in Iraq. of course, they only did so for tactical reasons. Is it really too hard to explain this pretty simple point?

"and has decried al-Qaeda as a perversion of Islam,"

that's true and if you only see al-Qaida as a threat (maybe that's the CIA's problem) then I guess the Brotherhood is the good guy since, the CIA thinks, they aren't going to attack Manhattan and Washington DC but just kill Israelis. Maybe that's their reasoning. If it is, they're wrong.

Clapper said. "They have pursued social ends, a betterment of the political order in Egypt, etcetera.....In other countries, there are also chapters or franchises of the Muslim Brotherhood, but there is no overarching agenda, particularly in pursuit of violence, at least internationally."

This is another of those amazingly dumb things that you think could be mastered by a sixth-grader. Yes, the Brotherhood has social welfare programs (as did the Viet Cong and the Latin American Communist guerrillas, for example) but that is a tactic to build a popular base. Is it really impossible that a group might do both?

What is such an obvious faliure here is not so much the inability to see the Brotherhood as really radical and dangerous but even to have a balanced analysis: using all these arguments about its moderation but at the same time discussing its violent, radical, anti-American, Islamist, and antisemitic tendencies.

But because of the lack of any serious balance this analysis is not just naive, it's outright dangerous.