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Terrorist incidents continue, and much of the rhetoric appears unchanged, but there are some subtle transformations on the ground in a number of Middle Eastern strategic environments. The past few years have seen, particularly with the Clinton Administration in the US, and now with the Blair Administration in the UK, a shift away from traditional patterns of alliances and geopolitical logic. Toward the end of the Major Administration in the UK (ie: until early 1997), the UK had begun clearly pulling away from accepting that Washington's "sphere of influence" included Egypt and that Britain could not act unilaterally there without Washington's nod. The UK stepped in with on-the-ground security support in Egypt's counter-terrorism activities, when the US clearly failed to help.
Today, Egypt is not understood...