running dogg wrote:


The US on some level may be beginning to realize that it's not smart to
completely hook their wagon to Karimov's horse. Unfortunately, it may be
too late. Like you said, the opposition has become increasingly
Islamicized (meaning extreme Wahhabi type Islam) and the population is
increasingly seeing the US as the oppressor, not the liberator like in
the old Soviet Union. These two things mean that any revolution in
Uzbekistan probably won't turn out well for US interests. The
revolutions in Georgia and Ukraine were very pro Western and pro US; in
each case, it was Putin's favorite that got booted. Look at the
reception Bush got in Tbilisi. But in Uzbekistan the revolution is very
Islamic and very anti Western, fighting against a US backed despot; the
situation is very much like Iran in the 70s. The situation could turn
out the same way, with the mullahs in control and the US kicked out of
its base. The US has a positive in that there's no Khomeini to rally the
disaffected and spur them to revolution; all the Islamic leaders that
have emerged have little of the Ayatollah's following or star power. But
a leader like Khomeini could still emerge.

I don't know if they need a focal head person to do the terror thing these
days. Just cells of people willing to die martyrs.

We've got the "great game" of the 19th century going again, this time the
players are Russia, USA, Islamic extremists. It scares me. Probably should
scare us all.

And the average person in countries like this really suffers.