Re: What a surprise
"what would you do in their shoes"
Stopping being idiot dictators and trying to move the countries to a real democracy? Oh yes, there's a lot of money, power and easy women to lose... but you may choose to enter History on the same index as Hitler, Stalin. etc. of far better people who actually did something for their citizens.
But it looks fears - too many fears - is turning again Western countries to think "dictators" are the way to go to keep things quiet. History has shown several times it's the wrong bet. There's never a "good dictator" - too much power corrupts anybody, and then stopping them becomes terribly expensive - including lives.