Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: Top Ten Myths about the Libya War

http://www.juancole.com/2011/08/top-ten-myths-about-the-libya-war.html
Top Ten Myths about the Libya War
Posted on 08/22/2011 by Juan
The Libyan Revolution has largely succeeded, and this is a moment of 
celebration, not only for Libyans but for a youth generation in the Arab 
world that has pursued a political opening across the region. The secret 
of the uprising’s final days of success lay in a popular revolt in the 
working-class districts of the capital, which did most of the hard work 
of throwing off the rule of secret police and military cliques. It 
succeeded so well that when revolutionary brigades entered the city from 
the west, many encountered little or no resistance, and they walked 
right into the center of the capital. Muammar Qaddafi was in hiding as I 
went to press, and three of his sons were in custody. Saif al-Islam 
Qaddafi had apparently been the de facto ruler of the country in recent 
years, so his capture signaled a checkmate. (Checkmate is a corruption 
of the Persian “shah maat,” the “king is confounded,” since chess came 
west from India via Iran). Checkmate.
The end game, wherein the people of Tripoli overthrew the Qaddafis and 
joined the opposition Transitional National Council, is the best case 
scenario that I had suggested was the most likely denouement for the 
revolution. I have been making this argument for some time, and it 
evoked a certain amount of incredulity when I said it in a lecture in 
the Netherlands in mid-June, but it has all along been my best guess 
that things would end the way they have. I got it right where others did 
not because my premises turned out to be sounder, i.e., that Qaddafi had 
lost popular support across the board and was in power only through main 
force. Once enough of his heavy weapons capability was disrupted, and 
his fuel and ammunition supplies blocked, the underlying hostility of 
the common people to the regime could again manifest itself, as it had 
in February. I was moreover convinced that the generality of Libyans 
were attracted by the revolution and by the idea of a political opening, 
and that there was no great danger to national unity here.
I do not mean to underestimate the challenges that still lie ahead– 
mopping up operations against regime loyalists, reestablishing law and 
order in cities that have seen popular revolutions, reconstituting 
police and the national army, moving the Transitional National Council 
to Tripoli, founding political parties, and building a new, 
parliamentary regime. Even in much more institutionalized and less 
clan-based societies such as Tunisia and Egypt, these tasks have proved 
anything but easy. But it would be wrong, in this moment of triumph for 
the Libyan Second Republic, to dwell on the difficulties to come. 
Libyans deserve a moment of exultation.
I have taken a lot of heat for my support of the revolution and of the 
United Nations-authorized intervention by the Arab League and NATO that 
kept it from being crushed. I haven’t taken nearly as much heat as the 
youth of Misrata who fought off Qaddafi’s tank barrages, though, so it 
is OK. I hate war, having actually lived through one in Lebanon, and I 
hate the idea of people being killed. My critics who imagined me 
thrilling at NATO bombing raids were just being cruel. But here I agree 
with President Obama and his citation of Reinhold Niebuhr. You can’t 
protect all victims of mass murder everywhere all the time. But where 
you can do some good, you should do it, even if you cannot do all good. 
I mourn the deaths of all the people who died in this revolution, 
especially since many of the Qaddafi brigades were clearly coerced (they 
deserted in large numbers as soon as they felt it safe). But it was 
clear to me that Qaddafi was not a man to compromise, and that his 
military machine would mow down the revolutionaries if it were allowed to.
Moreover, those who question whether there were US interests in Libya 
seem to me a little blind. The US has an interest in there not being 
massacres of people for merely exercising their right to free assembly. 
The US has an interest in a lawful world order, and therefore in the 
United Nations Security Council resolution demanding that Libyans be 
protected from their murderous government. The US has an interest in its 
NATO alliance, and NATO allies France and Britain felt strongly about 
this intervention. The US has a deep interest in the fate of Egypt, and 
what happened in Libya would have affected Egypt (Qaddafi allegedly had 
high Egyptian officials on his payroll).
Given the controversies about the revolution, it is worthwhile reviewing 
the myths about the Libyan Revolution that led so many observers to make 
so many fantastic or just mistaken assertions about it.
1. Qaddafi was a progressive in his domestic policies. While back in the 
1970s, Qaddafi was probably more generous in sharing around the oil 
wealth with the population, buying tractors for farmers, etc., in the 
past couple of decades that policy changed. He became vindictive against 
tribes in the east and in the southwest that had crossed him 
politically, depriving them of their fair share in the country’s 
resources. And in the past decade and a half, extreme corruption and the 
rise of post-Soviet-style oligarchs, including Qaddafi and his sons, 
have discouraged investment and blighted the economy. Workers were 
strictly controlled and unable to collectively bargain for improvements 
in their conditions. There was much more poverty and poor infrastructure 
in Libya than there should have been in an oil state.
2. Qaddafi was a progressive in his foreign policy. Again, he traded for 
decades on positions, or postures, he took in the 1970s. In contrast, in 
recent years he played a sinister role in Africa, bankrolling brutal 
dictators and helping foment ruinous wars. In 1996 the supposed champion 
of the Palestinian cause expelled 30,000 stateless Palestinians from the 
country. After he came in from the cold, ending European and US 
sanctions, he began buddying around with George W. Bush, Silvio 
Berlusconi and other right wing figures. Berlusconi has even said that 
he considered resigning as Italian prime minister once NATO began its 
intervention, given his close personal relationship to Qaddafi. Such a 
progressive.
3. It was only natural that Qaddafi sent his military against the 
protesters and revolutionaries; any country would have done the same. 
No, it wouldn’t, and this is the argument of a moral cretin. In fact, 
the Tunisian officer corps refused to fire on Tunisian crowds for 
dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, and the Egyptian officer corps refused 
to fire on Egyptian crowds for Hosni Mubarak. The willingness of the 
Libyan officer corps to visit macabre violence on protesting crowds 
derived from the centrality of the Qaddafi sons and cronies at the top 
of the military hierarchy and from the lack of connection between the 
people and the professional soldiers and mercenaries. Deploying the 
military against non-combatants was a war crime, and doing so in a 
widespread and systematic way was a crime against humanity. Qaddafi and 
his sons will be tried for this crime, which is not “perfectly natural.”
4. There was a long stalemate in the fighting between the 
revolutionaries and the Qaddafi military. There was not. This idea was 
fostered by the vantage point of many Western observers, in Benghazi. It 
is true that there was a long stalemate at Brega, which ended yesterday 
when the pro-Qaddafi troops there surrendered. But the two most active 
fronts in the war were Misrata and its environs, and the Western 
Mountain region. Misrata fought an epic, Stalingrad-style, struggle of 
self-defense against attacking Qaddafi armor and troops, finally proving 
victorious with NATO help, and then they gradually fought to the west 
toward Tripoli. The most dramatic battles and advances were in the 
largely Berber Western Mountain region, where, again, Qaddafi armored 
units relentlessly shelled small towns and villages but were fought off 
(with less help from NATO initially, which I think did not recognize the 
importance of this theater). It was the revolutionary volunteers from 
this region who eventually took Zawiya, with the help of the people of 
Zawiya, last Friday and who thereby cut Tripoli off from fuel and 
ammunition coming from Tunisia and made the fall of the capital 
possible. Any close observer of the war since April has seen constant 
movement, first at Misrata and then in the Western Mountains, and there 
was never an over-all stalemate.
5. The Libyan Revolution was a civil war. It was not, if by that is 
meant a fight between two big groups within the body politic. There was 
nothing like the vicious sectarian civilian-on-civilian fighting in 
Baghdad in 2006. The revolution began as peaceful public protests, and 
only when the urban crowds were subjected to artillery, tank, mortar and 
cluster bomb barrages did the revolutionaries begin arming themselves. 
When fighting began, it was volunteer combatants representing their city 
quarters taking on trained regular army troops and mercenaries. That is 
a revolution, not a civil war. Only in a few small pockets of territory, 
such as Sirte and its environs, did pro-Qaddafi civilians oppose the 
revolutionaries, but it would be wrong to magnify a handful of 
skirmishes of that sort into a civil war. Qaddafi’s support was too 
limited, too thin, and too centered in the professional military, to 
allow us to speak of a civil war.
6. Libya is not a real country and could have been partitioned between 
east and west.
Alexander Cockburn wrote,
“It requites no great prescience to see that this will all end up badly. 
Qaddafi’s failure to collapse on schedule is prompting increasing 
pressure to start a ground war, since the NATO operation is, in terms of 
prestige, like the banks Obama has bailed out, Too Big to Fail. Libya 
will probably be balkanized.”
I don’t understand the propensity of Western analysts to keep 
pronouncing nations in the global south “artificial” and on the verge of 
splitting up. It is a kind of Orientalism. All nations are artificial. 
Benedict Anderson dates the nation-state to the late 1700s, and even if 
it were a bit earlier, it is a new thing in history. Moreover, most 
nation-states are multi-ethnic, and many long-established ones have 
sub-nationalisms that threaten their unity. Thus, the Catalans and 
Basque are uneasy inside Spain, the Scottish may bolt Britain any 
moment, etc., etc. In contrast, Libya does not have any well-organized, 
popular separatist movements. It does have tribal divisions, but these 
are not the basis for nationalist separatism, and tribal alliances and 
fissures are more fluid than ethnicity (which is itself less fixed than 
people assume). Everyone speaks Arabic, though for Berbers it is the 
public language; Berbers were among the central Libyan heroes of the 
revolution, and will be rewarded with a more pluralist Libya. This 
generation of young Libyans, who waged the revolution, have mostly been 
through state schools and have a strong allegiance to the idea of Libya. 
Throughout the revolution, the people of Benghazi insisted that Tripoli 
was and would remain the capital. Westerners looking for break-ups after 
dictatorships are fixated on the Balkan events after 1989, but there 
most often isn’t an exact analogue to those in the contemporary Arab world.
7. There had to be NATO infantry brigades on the ground for the 
revolution to succeed. Everyone from Cockburn to Max Boot (scary when 
those two agree) put forward this idea. But there are not any foreign 
infantry brigades in Libya, and there are unlikely to be any. Libyans 
are very nationalistic and they made this clear from the beginning. 
Likewise the Arab League. NATO had some intelligence assets on the 
ground, but they were small in number, were requested behind the scenes 
for liaison and spotting by the revolutionaries, and did not amount to 
an invasion force. The Libyan people never needed foreign ground 
brigades to succeed in their revolution.
8. The United States led the charge to war. There is no evidence for 
this allegation whatsoever. When I asked Glenn Greenwald whether a US 
refusal to join France and Britain in a NATO united front might not have 
destroyed NATO, he replied that NATO would never have gone forward 
unless the US had plumped for the intervention in the first place. I 
fear that answer was less fact-based and more doctrinaire than we are 
accustomed to hearing from Mr. Greenwald, whose research and analysis on 
domestic issues is generally first-rate. As someone not a stranger to 
diplomatic history, and who has actually heard briefings in Europe from 
foreign ministries and officers of NATO members, I’m offended at the 
glibness of an answer given with no more substantiation than an idee 
fixe. The excellent McClatchy wire service reported on the reasons for 
which then Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, the Pentagon, and Obama 
himself were extremely reluctant to become involved in yet another war 
in the Muslim world. It is obvious that the French and the British led 
the charge on this intervention, likely because they believed that a 
protracted struggle over years between the opposition and Qaddafi in 
Libya would radicalize it and give an opening to al-Qaeda and so pose 
various threats to Europe. French President Nicolas Sarkozy had been 
politically mauled, as well, by the offer of his defense minister, 
Michèle Alliot-Marie, to send French troops to assist Ben Ali in Tunisia 
(Alliot-Marie had been Ben Ali’s guest on fancy vacations), and may have 
wanted to restore traditional French cachet in the Arab world as well as 
to look decisive to his electorate. Whatever Western Europe’s 
motivations, they were the decisive ones, and the Obama administration 
clearly came along as a junior partner (something Sen. John McCain is 
complaining bitterly about).
9. Qaddafi would not have killed or imprisoned large numbers of 
dissidents in Benghazi, Derna, al-Bayda and Tobruk if he had been 
allowed to pursue his March Blitzkrieg toward the eastern cities that 
had defied him. But we have real-world examples of how he would have 
behaved, in Zawiya, Tawargha, Misrata and elsewhere. His indiscriminate 
shelling of Misrata had already killed between 1000 and 2000 by last 
April,, and it continued all summer. At least one Qaddafi mass grave 
with 150 bodies in it has been discovered. And the full story of the 
horrors in Zawiya and elsewhere in the west has yet to emerge, but it 
will not be pretty. The opposition claims Qaddafi’s forces killed tens 
of thousands. Public health studies may eventually settle this issue, 
but we know definitively what Qaddafi was capable of.
10. This was a war for Libya’s oil. That is daft. Libya was already 
integrated into the international oil markets, and had done billions of 
deals with BP, ENI, etc., etc. None of those companies would have wanted 
to endanger their contracts by getting rid of the ruler who had signed 
them. They had often already had the trauma of having to compete for 
post-war Iraqi contracts, a process in which many did less well than 
they would have liked. ENI’s profits were hurt by the Libyan revolution, 
as were those of Total SA. and Repsol. Moreover, taking Libyan oil off 
the market through a NATO military intervention could have been foreseen 
to put up oil prices, which no Western elected leader would have wanted 
to see, especially Barack Obama, with the danger that a spike in energy 
prices could prolong the economic doldrums. An economic argument for 
imperialism is fine if it makes sense, but this one does not, and there 
is no good evidence for it (that Qaddafi was erratic is not enough), and 
is therefore just a conspiracy theory.
-- 
Namib
"La force ne fait ni raison ni droit ; mais il est peut-être impossible 
de s'en passer, pour faire respecter le droit et la raison" (Saint-Just)

 The Libyan Revolution
piantala di bestemmiare, imperialista di merda

 Posted on 08/22/2011 by Juan
Cioè... te trovi in rete un lungo e noiosos elenco di opinioni
piuttosto ridicole, e lo posti saenza aggiungerci niente?
A Frattini de' noiatri, prenditi le tue responsabilità ed aggiungici
un commento  invece di postare robe altrui e non entrare nel merito
e soprattutto nel giro di schiaffi conseguente a tale azione
Ciao! 

 piuttosto ridicole, e lo posti saenza aggiungerci niente?
Confidavo nella tua acuta disamina.


 Confidavo nella tua acuta disamina.
ricordiamo al gentile pubblico che il compagno namib si esalta per una
"rivoluzione" i cui capi hanno promesso al suo ministro degli esteri
che continueranno a massacrare migranti nel deserto come (e più, visto
che danno la caccia al nero anche in città) chi li ha preceduti.

 Confidavo nella tua acuta disamina.
Ah Fratti', per quella hai da paga'!
P.S. per il testo sotto posto poi, non serve manco la mia
sfavillante logica, basta un bimbo di tre anni (meglio se
non della tua famiglia, sai...la genetica puň essere crudele)
Ciao!

 che continueranno a massacrare migranti nel deserto
Per ora, sappiamo con certezza che il massacratore si chiamava Gheddafi. 
Vedremo il nuovo Governo - quando si insedier� - come agir�. Mi ricordi 
qualcuno, lo sai?
-- 
Namib
"La force ne fait ni raison ni droit ; mais il est peut-�tre impossible 


 Ah Fratti', per quella hai da paga'!
Intendi dire che non sei già lautamente stipendiato da Foreign Affairs? 
Sono sbalordito che si siano lasciati scappare un talento analitico come 
il tuo...


 Vedremo il nuovo Governo
non lo vedremo, Frattini l'ha detto apertamente che gli hanno
assicurato che tratteranno gli immigrati come Gheddafi. E a differenza
di Gheddafi oltre a quelli del deserto HANNO GIA' AMMAZZATO parecchi
neri in città. Ergo il tuo "vedremo" è negazionismo consequenziale
all'imperialismo

 neri in città.
Nel caos di una guerra in cui molti neri erano stati arruolati (anche 
con la forza, pare) nell'esercito del tuo beniamino, testè sconfitto. 
Vedremo però come le forze pol. emergenti gestiranno la necessaria fase 
della riconciliazione (che dovrebbe comportare anche sanzioni contro i 
delitti commessi dai ribelli, s'intende). Lo so che sei lì speranzoso in 
massacri p.v., eh, ma staremo a vedere. Faccio i miei migliori auguri 
alla nuova Libia, per l'intanto.
-- 
Namib
"La force ne fait ni raison ni droit ; mais il est peut-être impossible 


 massacri
ci sono già stati. Solo che siccome li ha fatti la Nato coi soliti
bombardamenti indiscriminati dal cielo, e i suoi mercenari via terra,
allora li cancelli. A imperitura dimostrazione di quanto te ne freghi
meno di un cazzo del popolo libico

 meno di un cazzo del popolo libico
Il quale popolo libico, con tuo gran disappunto, si comporta come se 
avesse vinto la Coppa del Mondo. Si vede che non ti leggono.


 Suvvia, Frattini
Dovrebbero mettere un'accisa sul nome di Frattni.
Sarebbe doppiamente vantaggiosa per la comunita`:
1 - la menzione del suo nome, produrrebbe un'entrata per lo stato
2 - la non menzione, un risparmio di tempo, banda, inchiostro, carta
impegnati in attivita` assolutamente priva di qualsiasi beneficio
Comincero` col dare l'esempio versando 1 euro: qualcuno mi dia un IBAN
minsteriale a cui versare il tributo volontario!

 impegnati in attivita` assolutamente priva di qualsiasi beneficio
3 - potrebbe sostituire l'iniqua tassa-lucalogi
-- 
Io non gufo l'Inter. Le spacco le corna.

Il quale popolo libico, con tuo gran disappunto, si comporta come
se fosse circondato da feccia armata fino ai denti che ha già sterminato un
paio di migliaia di tripolini.
-------------------------------------------------------------------	
uomo bianco parla con lingua biforcuta.
il Diamat è la spiegazione di tutte le cose

 o ammetti che del popolo libico non ti importa un cazzo,
Quel popolo in festa, dici? Toccherà tu vada a spiegargli che dovrebbero 
essere infelici.


Quel popolo in festa
sei cosě accecato dall'idiozia da continuare a non vedere i "ribelli" a mitra
spianato, vero?
-------------------------------------------------------------------	
uomo bianco parla con lingua biforcuta.
il Diamat č la spiegazione di tutte le cose

 analitico come il tuo...
Evitavano 6 mesi di sangue in cui hanno ucciso migliaia di persone
tra cui dei bambini (i nipoti di Gheddafi di certo) o almeno
non si coprivano di riciolo inventando scuse cos� farlocche
(quella con cui hanno giustificato l'attacco alla tv libica, credo far�
storia.. del ridicolo) .
Ora, Fratti' torna alle Lampados
Ciao! 

 sei così accecato
Eh, già. A me e al resto del mondo sembra un giorno di festa, quando 
calciano un parassita a calci nel culo. Saremo strani.


 E te lo verrei a dire
La lontra ti ascolta?


calciano un parassita a calci nel culo. Saremo strani.
no, sei cieco perchè in malafede. Persino il NYTimes, che non è certo filogheddafiano,
ha fatto degli articoli sulla caccia al nero scatenata dai "calciatori". Calciatori
che hanno già promesso solennemente di trattare i migranti come il parassita.
MA cosa sono queste quisquilie rispetto ad aver cacciato il parassita?
Immagino che sarai coerente e se Berlusconi venisse cacciato da una sommossa
che portasse al potere Fiore e Borghezio farai festa, vero? Perchè è questa
la festa che stai facendo. E non è facendo finta di essere ubriaco che negherai
l'evidenza che Fiore e Borghezio stanno facendo bastonare a morte tutti i politici
di sinistra.....
-------------------------------------------------------------------	
uomo bianco parla con lingua biforcuta.
il Diamat è la spiegazione di tutte le cose

 ha fatto degli articoli sulla caccia al nero scatenata dai "calciatori".
Ebbasta. E' (stata) una guerra, con tutti gli schifi che le accompagnano 
(violenze carnali, vendette, saccheggi, ecc.). Sei diventato cristiano o 
gandhiano o jaina? Perché, c'è da andar fieri delle foibe, o dei 
fascisti fucilati in cella? O dell'esibizione del cadavere di Mussolini 
(o dell'omicidio della Petacci)? No; però il risultato "complessivo" me 
lo tengo per caro. Tu no? "La rivoluzione non è un pranzo di gala; la 
rivoluzione è un atto di violenza"; ricordi? Stai sempre a sfrakatzar 
los cojones con Lenin; beh, stavolta se la sono cavata con un numero di 
cadaveri assai minore di quanti ne abbia dovuti falciar lui, no? O per 
le rivoluzioni che ti capitano mentre campi sei più educato e 
teneramente umanista? :) Visto, poi, che insulti quel grand'uomo di 
Gramsci *perché è stato incarcerato dai fascisti* (e già per questo 
saresti da pestaggio alla sudamericana), beh, compagno, rendicontami un 
po' su che cazzo stai facendo TU per la revoluciòn, salvo bruciar 
incenso per ogni macellaio ti capiti a tiro (da Assad a Gheddafi; la 
triste sorte di Mubarak non ti infastidisce, però: vassapè perché -- non 
che sia difficile divinarlo...). Prego. Il curriculum vitae di noi 
imperialisti ce lo ricordi cotidie (siamo terribili). Favoriscimi il tuo.


il tuo.
il mio è semplicissimo: non esiste peggiore violenza sui popoli di quella degli
imperialisti e dei loro servi, ergo nessun dittatore può essere peggiore del
migliore dei Quislinge. E questo sono, i tuoi "liberatori", perchè questo vogliono
le multinazionali che li hanno foraggiati


 il mio è semplicissimo: non esiste peggiore violenza
No, no: nun svicola'. Visto che sfotti Gramsci (quel fallito che - IYSO, 
in your sad opinion - s'è fatto poco astutamente ingabbia' da li fasci), 
beh, raccontami che cazzo fai TU per la revoluciòn. Nada, suppongo, 
salvo omaggiare (god knows why) i bava Beccaris invisi allo "Zio Tom"; o 
mi sbaglio? Io, come sai, sostengo attivamente l'imperialismo, almeno :) 
Tu, che cazzo fai? Il vagone tedesco è pronto? :) Serve 'na spinta? :)


Tu, che cazzo fai? 
io dico che chi sostiene l'imperialismo è degno nipote di chi massacrò un ottavo
del popolo libico 80 anni fa. Però quelli non avevano paura di chiamarsi fascisti


 ALLO STATO LIBICO (e non a Gheddafi)?
ROTFL Bombacci, ancora a credere che i libici sono incazzati a morte
con Gheddafi  perche` gli svizzeri hanno messo droghe nel Nescafe`?

 dai nazifascisti morivano invocando il nome di Stalin.
Sì, certo, voi catecomunisti avete la vostra divinità in terra, vanne ben fiero.
Sugli esiti del socialismo reale propinato dalla tua divinità abbiamo evidenze
decisamente sperimentali, sul numero di comunisti morti maledicendo il nome di Iosif
potremmo fare qualche educated guessing, per il resto ti rimando alla lettura di un
libricino intitolato "I crimini di Stalin", scritto da un tizio che la rivoluzione di
Ottobre l'ha fatta.

 con Gheddafi  
palla, visto che senza nato i ratti mercenari non avrebbero mai vinto.
Laddove nei paesi confinanti i dittatori se ne sono dovuti andare per
la sola protesta popolare

 palla, visto che senza nato
Quindi, secondo te, quando la nato finira` l'intervento, il popolo
ristabilita` la famiglia Gheddafi al trono, per acclamazione.
Basta aspettare per vedere se e` vero :-)

 Sì, certo, voi catecomunisti avete la vostra divinità in terra, vanne ben fiero.
certo, come ne andavano fieri i partigiani che combattevano in suo nome

 certo, come ne andavano fieri i partigiani che combattevano in suo nome
Com'è che tagli tutto il resto, tenero coniglietto?
Allora, degli enormi successi del socialismo reale di matrice stalinista non vuoi
proprio parlarmi?

 io dico
Meno bene di Gramsci, mi pare :)


 ristabilita` la famiglia Gheddafi al trono, per acclamazione.
O forse Gheddafi verrà portato in cielo da una gru (o era una cicogna? 
:), come Kim Il Sung.


 Sì, certo, voi catecomunisti
LOL buona, me la rivendo.
PP

 :), come Kim Il Sung.
Kim dalle gru, Mussolini dalla Cicogna :-D
PP