"This Isn't Really About America"
BLITZER: Americans killed in Libya embassies and consulates under attack throughout much of the Muslim and Arab world. Clearly that anti-Islamic film has sparked some violence, but is there more to the story? Joining us now, someone with broad experience covering the Middle East and the intelligence community, David Ignatius, the columnist for "The Washington Post." David, thanks very much for coming in and your column today was intriguing among other things you wrote this, I'll put it up on the screen. "The Cairo uproar appears to be partly a case of radicals wanting to undermine a more moderate governing party. This isn't really about America. It's about factions battling for power in a fluid political situation." What you're suggesting is the Muslim Brotherhood-led government, President Mohamed Morsi, may be more moderate than some of the elements that are trying to undermine him.</s>DAVID IGNATIUS, COLUMNIST, "WASHINGTON POST": At the end of my piece, Wolf, I said we should call them less extremists. The Muslim Brotherhood is still can be very militant. But I think when we look at these events, even though we see the tragic death of an American ambassador and three other Americans, attacks on U.S. embassies and consulates, we obviously think of this as being about America. But we are in what I like to call the fog of revolution in these Middle East countries. And in these countries the ruling governments, the Muslim Brotherhood government of Mohamed Morsi now in Egypt are under challenge from people who are much more extreme. Who have much more radical vision of Islam and who are opportunists trying to challenge the government and using the U.S. as a handy target. That doesn't mean we shouldn't be worried about the safety of our personnel. It just means we should be careful and understand that this is really a power struggle in the midst of a revolution that's still going on.</s>BLITZER: Because when you see the U.S. Embassy attacked, the American flag torn down and burned in Cairo, that huge U.S. Embassy there -- you've been there many times, I've been there as well. And you see it all occurring on the 11th anniversary of 9/11, the immediate conclusion is these are simply people who hate America.</s>IGNATIUS: Part of it certainly is anti-Americanism, that's obvious to all of us and it troubles us deeply. We love our country. We hate to see our flag attacked, our embassies attacked. But at the end of the day, what has to happen in each of these countries is that the local authorities, the Egyptian security service, the Libyan security service, the Yemeni security service, has to stand up and protect the integrity of diplomatic facilities. Ours, everyone's, and that's the demand that we need to be making. The notion that the U.S. can send in the Marines and beat this back, unfortunately, the only reason we'd send in the Marines is to rescue our people and get them out of harm's way. But in terms of protecting these places, it's up to the governments. They're now in power. That's the demand we should be making.</s>BLITZER: You write of an intriguing parallel to what's happening potentially now in Cairo to what happened at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, in Iran back in 1979 in the aftermath when the Shaw was overthrown there, a long-time U.S. ally. Tell us what you meant.</s>IGNATIUS: Frankly, Wolf, this scares me. In 1979, you had an Islamic revolution in Iran. Ayatollah Komeni was in power, but there were many Iranians who were unhappy that it was moving too slowly. And so the more militant faction calling themselves radical students decided to capture the revolution and they did it by seizing the American embassy. We all remember that if we were alive then. This feeling of America held hostage. What really happened internally in terms of Iranian politics was that the radicals took over and grabbed revolution and still hold onto it this day. They seized control in '79 and never let go. And that's what we have to be watching for is in these countries radicals moving to exploit what is to some extent a vacuum of power and push the situation to a much more extreme level.</s>BLITZER: Because if the U.S. fears that those American diplomats, embassy personnel are in danger, whether in Cairo or Tripoli or any place else of being held hostage, we know that four American diplomats were killed at the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, then the U.S. immediately has to withdraw, get out of there. Don't you agree?</s>IGNATIUS: Well, I think we have to be sure that our people are safe and not in a situation where they could be held hostage. I'll tell you something that your viewers may not know, Wolf. Our embassy in Egypt on this night, Tuesday night, violent chanting, crowd storming going over the fence, the demand that our embassy made to the Egyptian government was get the police in here now. Get these people out of our compound. It took too long for the Egyptian government to respond, but it finally did. And the police were finally deployed and order was restored. But that's the demand that has to be made every day. Get the police here. You're responsible for the safety of these people. Exercise authority and I think if we focus on that and not just getting furious, we'll probably do ourselves more good.</s>BLITZR: These are live pictures coming in from Cairo right now, disturbing pictures indeed. David, thanks very much for joining us.</s>IGNATIUS: Thanks, Wolf. Mitt Romney's caught lots of flak for criticizing President Obama's international policies right in the midst of this crisis. We also noticed a significant change though in his tone today. It isn't an apology, but what's going on?