> Venezuela is Catholic and while it definitely has crime issues, there's no religious/fundamentalist element to the violence so the odds of anyone fighting to the death to support their failed dictator and his ideology is slim to none.

Colombia managed a decades long violent armed conflict with the same demographics. Organized crime, political instability, political ideologues, etc all can get people to kill each other without religious extremists.

> So get rid of the government and all the extremists take over.

Oh, the so called "extremists" are/were the ones with power. This is where it tops out. I know it's hard to see from a distance but you have no idea how bad can it get under the safe and sound status quo.

Which government was relatively moderate? Gaddhafi who threatened to slaughter the rebellious cities block to block on TV? Assad who did just that and gassed his own people for a good measure?

The indecision of the international community to act is what caused the suffering lasting a decade, led to the rise of ISIS and refugee crisis of enormous proportions.

I think what was meant was moderate ideologically and religiously. Still extreme in their disregard for human life and their determination to maintain power.

> Which government was relatively moderate? Gaddhafi who threatened to slaughter the rebellious cities block to block on TV? Assad who did just that and gassed his own people for a good measure?

Both of them were more moderate than ISIS lol.

But yeah, Egypt is more moderate than the Muslim brotherhood. Jordan is moderate. The non-Hezbollah part of Lebanon. UAE, Qatar, Oman all quite moderate. The Saudis are even secularizing a tad to try calming down fundamentalist sentiment. All these states actively suppress Islamism and generally are pro-west.

None of them where Arab Spring had struggled were "moderate", this is ridiculous. Assad has caused death of over 600k people (by the time they stopped counting in 2019). And ISIS is a natural consequence of these secular (if you can call personality cults even that) dictatorships lasting decades.

Ok so you ignored the states I did list and focused on the tongue in cheek comment. Gotcha.

None of the places you listed (sans Egypt) were a part of Arab Spring, I wonder why.

The US supported the Arab Spring not understanding that the public mob is worse than the dictators. No country that's not China and perhaps the most powerful NATO allies can resist US military superiority.

Most of the states I listed stayed on the right side of the US and US military equipment and aid keeps them stable.

Oh, so Obama admin was behind this? Same admin that had to be dragged by the French to help Libyans and that ceded Syria to Assad and Russia in 2013? Gotcha.