Anatomy of a Revolution
CBC Radio 1 interview with Carol Off on her TV report "Anatomy of a Revolution" concerning the background of Serbian Bulldozer Revolution, Eastern European Colored Revolutions, etc. She reflects on the striking similarity between these revolutions and points out some of the key financial, diplomatic and intelligence figures some of whom were sometimes present in more than one of these revolutions.
When it comes to these revolutions, the advocates of nonviolent resistance usually tend to deny any kind of hidden agenda in western involvement and, of course, claim that it was all about good intention and spreading liberty and democracy. Any such criticism will be discarded as a conspiracy theory on the spot based on some unwritten skeptic rule that there's no conspiracy if the action if overt. I'm sure it also doesn't matter that during these revolutions none of the information regarding their supporters was available to majority of the people involved in revolutionary activities and nonviolent coups.
Anyways, one thing that most (if not all) of these movements share are their claims that their nonviolent actions were based on Gene Sharp's book "From Dictatorship to Democracy". Yet, it amazes me, how all of them failed to notice Sharp's warnings concerning the hazards of foreign involvement:
"Usually no foreign saviors are coming, and if a foreign state does intervene, it probably should not be trusted."
A few harsh realities concerning concerning reliance on foreign intervention need to be emphasized here:
Frequently foreign states will tolerate, or even possibly assist, a dictatorship in order to advance their own economic or political interests.
Foreign states may be willing to sell out an oppressed people instead of keeping pledges to assist their liberation at the cost of another objective.
Some foreign states will act against a dictatorship only to gain their own economic, political, or military control over the country.
The foreign states may become actively involved for positive purposes only if and when the international resistance movement has already begun shaking the dictatorship, having thereby focused international attention on the brutal nature of the regime."