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Erian, a veteran Brotherhood leader and the vice chairman of its new
party, who met with Mr. Walles. “And we are keen and eager to say
that we respect the democratic process and the rights of all people
according to the Constitution and the law.”
Administration officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to
discuss private diplomatic exchanges, said they hoped that a
combination of internal and external pressure on the council would
persuade it to yield power and submit to civilian oversight. In
addition to the public comments by Mrs. Clinton, other senior
American officials have privately urged the council to revise its
recent proposals to preserve power, the officials said.
The officials noted that since Mr. Mubarak’s ouster, the council’s
leaders had repeatedly offered, then backed away from, some
proposals only after street protests and public pressure, in a kind of
prolonged back-and-forth that some noted reflected a true, if messy,
democratic process taking root.
But administration officials and Egyptian activists note worrying
signs. The military core of Mr. Mubarak’s government has
“reasserted itself again,” a senior administration official said. “We
don’t have great expectations that this is going to be the creation of a
democratic system,” the official said, referring to the coming
elections.
At best, the official added, the elections will be “a transition to a
transition,” one that could leave the military as the de facto power in
Egypt for years to come, as it was under Mr. Mubarak’s rule.
The military has said that it intends to hold ultimate political power
even after the election of a Parliament in the coming months, and that
it will play a role in drafting the constitution as well. It has refused to
lift the Mubarak-era “emergency law” allowing arrests without trial,
and it has sent as many as 12,000 civilians to military trials.

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