The weapon of choice

“THE little screaming fact that sounds through all history”, John Steinbeck wrote, is that “repression works only to strengthen and knit the repressed.” The standard Western critique of skull-crackers on the streets of Cairo, Moscow or Tehran is “You will regret it.” But will they? History’s lessons regarding protests and violence are more complex. Bloodshed sometimes works for autocrats, at least temporarily. But for protesters themselves, taking up arms is usually a mistake.