Arab uprising: How far will the sparks spread?

So Libya burns and we are  left to the most basic devices, denied access, to try to fathom the truth.

In thirty-five years of reporting, I have witnessed two worldwide mass revolutionary movements: The felling of the Berlin Wall, and the protest movement across the Arab world.

Whilst the Berlin Wall consequences were essentially linear and continue to play out to this day. I would argue the Arab protests are more formless and much less predictable. The causes often distil around one word or one name.

Take the current standoff and protest involving tens of thousands of trades Unionists in the US state of Wisconsin – up in arms over the new Governor’s decision to abandon collective bargaining. Anything to do with Egypt?

Trouble in Morocco, Algeria, Yemen, Bahrain and above all Libya. Anything to do with Egypt? Certainly. So where will it end, and when will it end? And will it threaten the double standards that have enabled Western democratic nations to nurture and sustain these and other corrupt and now endangered leaders?

As China battles to suppress images and news of Egypt and beyond – will this thing overwhelm China too?

Some take it as a given that it will eventually engulf one of the world’s least attractive regimes – that in Saudi Arabia. Can the ailing octogenarian King look forward with confidence to the current plan – in which his equally unwell octogenarian successor will take over?

And if not, then what? What of America’s oil supplies? What effect would social convulsion in China – America’s biggest lender – have on us all?

Returning home from a conference in India – I find myself wondering what if the Internet infection seizes a spark from the current unease there about the latest police investigation into vast corruption in government contracts.

We live in fascinating but highly dangerous times. 2011 may prove a more “interesting” year that perhaps we any of us ready for.