Abdel Fattah el-Sisi

The first of 75 U.S. troops have arrived in northeastern Sinai to help boost security for U.S. forces as part of a U.N. observer mission there, the Pentagon said Thursday.

For all of the attention that it generated in Washington, the U.S.-Egypt Strategic Dialogue came and went without much fanfare in Egypt.

In the four years since the Arab Spring, Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood has gone from the streets to the presidential palace and back again.

"Unfortunately, there are few signs that U.S. officials have learned that their preference for authoritarians is both sleazy and counterproductive."

But is it necessary?

With spectacle and ceremony, Egypt's president unveiled an unnecessary infrastructure project in a country that is falling to pieces.

The Suez Canal took 10 years to build and cost thousands of workers their lives. When planners suggested three years for a second one, Egypt’s president balked.

Egypt is back in America’s good graces despite deposing its first democratically elected leader and putting him on death row.

Amid a diplomatic drive to boost ties with Cairo, the British government in the first three months of 2015 sanctioned arms sales to Egypt's autocratic regime worth 48.8 million pounds ($76.3 million).

Despite the risk of instability posed by ongoing violence, the government's anti-Brotherhood focus is still a political winner and will likely remain so for some time.