In tapping General Omar Suleiman as his vice president, Egyptian President Mubarak has effectively decided on his successor—apparently cutting his son out of the action. John Barry on the power waiting in the wings. Plus, full coverage of the Egypt uprising.
"The Egyptian government can't reshuffle the deck and then stand pat," State Department spokesman P.J.Crowley said in a message he circulated on Twitter after President Mubarak announced he had fired his government. "President Mubarak's words pledging reform must be followed by action."
Now Mubarak has acted—but whether Washington or, more importantly, the demonstrators still thronging Egypt's streets will regard his moves as a mere reshuffling of the deck is unclear. Today, Mubarak announced the appointment of his longtime intelligence chief, General Omar Suleiman, as vice-president and named Ahmed Shafik, aviation minister in the just-departed government, as prime minister of a new cabinet that first reports suggest will be composed largely of technocrats.
Suleiman's career parallels the arc of modern Egyptian history. Born in 1936 into a poor but deeply pious family in one of the poorest provinces in Egypt, Suleiman was accepted at the Cairo military academy in 1954. He served in the 1967 and 1973 wars against Israel, and during the 1960s, the heyday of Egypt's relationship with the Soviet Union, studied at the Frunze Military Academy in Moscow.
When the United States replaced the Soviet Union as Egypt's patron, Suleiman studied at the U.S. Special Warfare School at Fort Bragg. But his career really took off when, during the 1980s, he switched from the infantry to military intelligence, eventually rising to become deputy head of military intelligence in 1986—a job that brought him into direct contact with President Mubarak. Tall, slightly stooping, and with an iron-gray military moustache, Suleiman clearly impressed Mubarak because in 1993 the president appointed him head of Egypt's General Intelligence Service, a job he has held ever since.
During the last decade, Egypt's spymaster has been trusted with a series of increasingly sensitive diplomatic assignments, most notably the successful effort to broker the cease-fire with Israel
A failed assassination attempt in Addis Ababa in 1995 sealed the personal bond between the two men. Mubarak and Suleiman survived the ambush only because both were riding in the armored limousine Suleiman had insisted Mubarak bring to Ethiopia.
Source : http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2011-01-29/omar-suleiman-cairos-new-spymaster-in-chief/
