Ted Rall: Obama Destroyed Libya
Is Ted still acceptable in these parts? Used to be. In any case, given Libya's return to the news, it's probably worth a review of how it got in its present condition.
http://rall.com/2015/02/17/syndicated-column-obama-destroyed-libya
Barack Obama destroyed Libya.
What he did to Libya is as bad as what Bush did to Iraq and Afghanistan. He doesn’t deserve a historical pass.
When Obama took office in 2009, Libya was under the clutches of longtime dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. But things were looking up.
Bush and Gaddafi had cut a deal to lift Western trade sanctions in exchange for Libya acknowledging and paying restitution for its role in the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. In a rare triumph for Bush, Libya also agreed to give up its nuclear weapons research program. Libyan and Western analysts anticipated that Gaddafi’s dictatorship would be forced to accept liberal reforms, perhaps even free elections and rival political parties, in order to attract Western investment.
Libya in 2009 was prosperous. As citizens of a major oil- and natural gas-exporting nation, Libyans enjoyed high salaries, low living expenses, generous social benefits, not to mention law and order. It seems like a mirage today.
Looking back, many Libyans miss their former tyrant. “Muammar Gaddafi inherited one of the poorest nations in Africa,” notes Garikai Chengu of the Du Bois Institute for African Research at Harvard University. “However, by the time he was assassinated, Libya was unquestionably Africa’s most prosperous nation. Libya had the highest GDP per capita and life expectancy in Africa and less people lived below the poverty line than in the Netherlands.”
As a dictator, Gaddafi was guilty of horrendous human rights abuses. But life was better then than now. Women enjoyed more rights in Libya than in any other Arab country, particularly after the United States overthrew Saddam Hussein in Iraq. By regional standards, Libya was a relatively sweet place to live.
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Fred Sanders
(23,946 posts)
DetlefK
(16,423 posts)Do you remember how his eldest son bragged on TV that the rebels will be dead long before the West is even finished debating?
Fred Sanders
(23,946 posts)libdem4life
(13,877 posts)Clinton's was in the Balkans. Just find some little bitty place to hop on one side...now we've also got Syria and with any (bad) luck and maybe not so likely given Russia, but we're temped and "mulling over" in Ukraine. One African "ally" is asking for us to come and help them, too.
Buzz Clik
(38,437 posts)Isolationist style?
libdem4life
(13,877 posts)all over the globe and have since the dawn of time. It's called government...those in power vs. those not in power. To be sure it takes different forms, excuses, justifications, righteousness, religion, et al.
Our taxpayers may soon discover what the Roman Citizens discovered...there's only so much conquering our fool leaders can do, seeing as it's funded by the citizens/taxpayer and subtracted for our way of life. So you tell me.
What's the magic number?
Buzz Clik
(38,437 posts)Is that number zero?
libdem4life
(13,877 posts)It's for darn sure it's not this ...
http://academic.evergreen.edu/g/grossmaz/interventions.html
A Preview below...think it comes to around 120 or so...doing good deeds, spending a shitload of taxpayer money and spreading Democracy.
FROM WOUNDED KNEE TO SYRIA:
A CENTURY OF U.S. MILITARY INTERVENTIONS
by Dr. Zoltan Grossman
The following is a partial list of U.S. military interventions from 1890 to 2014.
Buzz Clik
(38,437 posts)Our current rate of intervention is far too high, but intervention seems to be justified every now and then.
libdem4life
(13,877 posts)DetlefK
(16,423 posts)libdem4life
(13,877 posts)I keep forgetting that we only help "good guys".
Buzz Clik
(38,437 posts)He painted himself as a gonzo cartoonist who loved giving the finger to everyone. Now, it seems he wants to be taken more seriously.
He'll need to avoid flirtations with fiction if he wants credibility. He can start by not taking the Fox News approach of truthiness in reporting: "In October 2011, one of Obama’s killer robot drones participated in Gaddafi’s assassination." No doubt a drone was around and maybe provided intel, but his assassination was purely by troops on the ground.
Keep trying, Ted.
Maedhros
(10,007 posts)What Obama did in Libya was poorly conceived and has led to suffering on a massive scale.
At the time many objected strongly to Obama's defiance of Congress in bombing Libya on the grounds that it would lead to chaos and suffering. Party loyalists scoffed at them. Looks like they were right.
Buzz Clik
(38,437 posts)"Is Ted still acceptable in these parts?"
Considering that Libya is being discussed on several other threads, I thought I'd stick to the author's question.
polly7
(20,582 posts)somebody might find some of the info interesting.
The Untold Story in Libya
Posted by polly7 in General Discussion
Tue Oct 18th 2011, 10:06 AM
In May 2010, Libya was voted on to the UN Human Rights Council by a huge majority. The UN Watch's campaign to remove Libya from the Human Rights Council began immediately.
In March, 2011, a report, containing positive quotes from UN diplomatic delegations in many countries, was due to be presented by the UN Human Rights Council, leading to a Resolution commending Libya's progress in a wide aspect of human rights (listed in the article). March 19, 2011, the attack on Libya began.
Libya was one of only five countries without a Rothschild model central bank, Quaddafi openly discussed, in 2009, the nationalization of US, UK, Germany, Spain, Norway, Canada and Italy's oil companies, switching to the gold dinar - a single African currency that would serve as an alternative to the U.S. dollar and allow African nations to share the wealth. Libya has an abundance of water - Gaddafi’s Great Man-Made River Project project offers limitless amounts of water for Libyans and would allow them to be totally self-sufficient. In the near-future, water will be the next resource equated with money and power, other countries may be dependent on its reserves. A self-sufficient, dictator-ruled nation with control over some of the world’s most precious resource waves a big red warning flag.
In 2010 Gaddafi made a motion to the UN General Assembly to investigate the circumstances of the invasion of Iraq. He was also wasting the west's ....... 'libya's' oil on free education, housing, tolerance of immigrants, raising the standard of living in Africa, lowering infant mortality while raising life expectancy.
Many of these things are completely similar to what we learned of Iraq.
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Yes, simply put, Nato's member nations are trying to steer back Libya Central Bank into the mainstream financial structure, under the watching eyes of the World Bank and the International Monetary Funds, to provide (reconstruction) funds to Libya with hefty interests payments - and transform a country which was free of debts into a heavily indebted country - as done everywhere else in sub-Saharan African countries.
http://businessafrica.net/africabiz/graphs...
http://businessafrica.net/africabiz/arcvol...
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From a 'no fly zone to all out bombing of targets called out by rebels'. NATO's high-precision bombing preceeded 'rebel' incursions.
http://antemedius.com/content/libya-r2p-no...
"It's now common knowledge that British SAS, French intelligence, US Central Intelligence Agency assets, Qatar special forces and mercenaries of all stripes were parachuted as boots on the ground for months, planning and training the "rebels" and in close coordination with that philanthropic prodigy, NATO.
That was never the UN mandate - but who cares? NATO/GCC paid the bills, NATO conducted the bombing and NATO/GCC will "stabilize" the mess, according to a 70-page plan leaked by the British to Rupert Murdoch'sz Times of London."
"Expect local - and global - fireworks as far as grabbing the loot is concerned. Without even considering the (still unexplored) oil and gas wealth, Libya's foreign assets are worth at least $150 billion. Libya's central bank, now about to be privatized, has no less than 143.8 tons of gold. Then there's at least a millennium supply of fresh water, which had started to be harnessed by Gaddafi via the spectacular, multibillion dollar Great Man-Made River (GMR) project."
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"Oil-rich but with a relatively small population of 6.6. million, Gadhafi's Libya welcomed hundreds of thousands of black Africans looking for work in recent decades. "
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/01/l...
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NATO’s War on Libya is an Attack on African Development–Dan Glazebrook
6 09 2011
http://globalciviliansforpeace.com/tag/afr... /
To prevent this ‘threat of African development’, the Europeans and the USA have responded in the only way they know how – militarily. Four years ago, the US set up a new “command and control centre” for the military subjugation of the Africa, called AFRICOM. The problem for the US was that no African country wanted to host them; indeed, until very recently, Africa was unique in being the only continent in the world without a US military base. And this fact is in no small part, thanks to the efforts of the Libyan government.
Before Gaddafi’s revolution deposed the British-backed King Idris in 1969, Libya had hosted one of the world’s biggest US airbases, the Wheelus Air Base; but within a year of the revolution, it had been closed down and all foreign military personnel expelled.
More recently, Gaddafi had been actively working to scupper AFRICOM. African governments that were offered money by the US to host a base were typically offered double by Gaddafi to refuse it, and in 2008 this ad-hoc opposition crystallised into a formal rejection of AFRICOM by the African Union.
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The force used by the occupier to displace the old regime always makes sure the new regime is supine and complaint. The National Transitional Council, made up of former Gadhafi loyalists, Islamists and tribal leaders, many of whom detest each other, will be the West’s vehicle for the reconfiguration of Libya. Libya will return to being the colony it was before Gadhafi and the other young officers in 1969 ousted King Idris, who among other concessions had let Standard Oil write Libya’s petroleum laws. Gadhafi’s defiance of Western commercial interests, which saw the nationalization of foreign banks and foreign companies, along with the oil industry, as well as the closure of U.S. and British air bases, will be reversed. The despotic and collapsed or collapsing regimes in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and Syria once found their revolutionary legitimacy in the pan-Arabism of Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser. But these regimes fell victim to their own corruption, decay and brutality. None were worth defending. Their disintegration, however, heralds a return of the corporate and imperial power that spawned figures like Nasser and will spawn his radical 21st century counterparts.
Libya: Here We Go Again
Monday 5 September 2011
by: Chris Hedges, Truthdig | Op-Ed
http://www.truthout.com/libya-here-we-go-a...
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LIBYA: Rebels execute black immigrants while forces kidnap others
http://somalilandpress.com/libya-rebels-ex...
"Many Africans have virtually nothing after years in Libya, many have been looted, robbed, while others saw their living quarters and apartments go in flames. Now they are praying to God to send them home.
While the international leaders are busy drafting resolutions to dismantle Muammar Gaddafi, the African Union has not yet commented on the situation in Libya.
Meanwhile, the International Criminal Court is said to have started a formal inquiry into possible crimes against humanity in Libya that will investigate the Libyan regime."
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JohnPilger.com
8 September 2011
http://johnpilger.com/articles/hail-to-the...
..."I quote that not so much for its Orwellian quality but as a model of journalism's role in justifying "our" bloodbaths in advance.
This is Rupert's Revolution, after all. Gone from the Murdoch press are pejorative "insurgents". The action in Libya, says The Times, is "a revolution... as revolutions used to be". That it is a coup by a gang of Muammar Gaddafi's ex cronies and spooks in collusion with Nato is hardly news.
The self-appointed "rebel leader", Mustafa Abdul Jalil, was Gaddafi's feared justice minister. The CIA runs or bankrolls most of the rest, including America's old friends, the Mujadeen Islamists who spawned al-Qaeda.
They told journalists what they needed to know: that Gaddafi was about to commit "genocide", of which there was no evidence, unlike the abundant evidence of "rebel" massacres of black African workers falsely accused of being mercenaries. European bankers' secret transfer of the Central Bank of Libya from Tripoli to "rebel" Benghazi by European bankers in order to control the country's oil billions was an epic heist of little .
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Sirte a 'living hell,' says aid group
http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/news/co...
Tuesday 04 October 2011 by Our Foreign Desk Printable Email
A Red Cross team finally entered the besieged Libyan town of Sirte yesterday and delivered urgently needed surgical supplies to treat about 200 wounded people.
Nato has repeatedly targeted Sirte in its seven-month bombing campaign that enabled armed rebels to topple the government of Muammar Gadaffi and gain control of most of the oil-rich state.
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http://www.democraticunderground.com/discu...
bvar22:
The Untold Story in Libya:
How The West Cooked Up The People's Uprising
http://whowhatwhy.com/2011/08/31/now-that-... ... /
The Global Disaster Capitalists never let a good disaster go to waste.
In the case of Libya, they used their Enforcement Arm (NATO & The US Military) to CREATE a disaster where there was none.
” For all his dictatorial megalomania, Gaddafi is a committed pan-African - a fierce defender of African unity. Libya was not in debt to international bankers. It did not borrow cash from the International Monetary Fund for any "structural adjustment". It used oil money for social services - including the Great Man Made River project, and investment/aid to sub-Saharan countries. Its independent central bank was not manipulated by the Western financial system. All in all a very bad example for the developing world.”
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/M...
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Libya: Oil, Banks, Water, the United Nations, and America’s Holy Crusade by Felicity Arbuthnot
Posted on April 5, 2011 by dandelionsalad
.."The country was commended: “for the progress made in the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, namely universal primary education (and) firm commitment (to) health care.” There was “praise” for “cooperation with international organizations in combating human trafficking and corruption ..” and for cooperation with “the International Organization for Migration.”
“Progress in enjoyment of economic and social rights, including in the areas of education, health care, poverty reduction and social welfare” with “measures taken to promote transparency”, were also cited. Malaysia: “Commended the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya for being party to a significant number of international and regional human rights instruments.” Promotion: “of the rights of persons with disabilities” and praise for “measures taken with regard to low income families”, were cited...
.."So how does the all tie together? Libya, in March being praised by the Majority of the UN., for human rights progress across the board, to being the latest, bombarded international pariah? A nation’s destruction enshrined in a UN., Resolution?
The answer lies in part with the Geneva based UN Watch.(vii) UN Watch is : “a non-governmental organization whose mandate is to monitor the performance of the United Nations.” With Consultative Status to the UN Economic and Social Council, with ties to the UN Department of Public Information, “UN Watch is affiliated with the American Jewish Committee.” (AJC.)"
http://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2011/0... /
Interesting ..... the involvement in HR Watch of persons whose core values include securing energy resources.
And I think we're going to be shocked and disgusted as more and more information comes out.
Check this out - 'The Humanitarian War' = http://www.laguerrehumanitaire.fr/english It's horrifying.
A bunch of LIES submitted to the ICC ..... by the UN - who got their 'numbers and crimes' from the NTC Prime Minister - 'word to ear'. Pages and pages redacted.
No Evidence? No Problem!!
Exposed: The "Humanitarian" War In Libya
Must Watch Video
How the CIA Used "Libyan Expatriates" To Engineer Consent For Regime Change
One of the main sources for the claim that Qaddafi was killing his own people is the Libyan League for Human Rights (LLHR), an organization linked to the International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH). On Feb. 21, 2011, LLHR General Secretary Dr. Sliman Bouchuiguir initiated a petition in collaboration with the organization U.N. Watch and the National Endowment for Democracy. This petition was signed by more than 70 NGOs.
Then a few days later, on Feb. 25, Dr. Bouchuiguir went to the U.N. Human Rights Council in order to expose the allegations concerning the crimes of Qaddafi’s government. In July 2011 we went to Geneva to interview Dr. Sliman Bouchuiguir.
"How to circumvent international law and justice 101." - originally published by http://laguerrehumanitaire.fr
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article29428.htm
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What you don't know about the libyan crisis:
On edit: And it was far from only Obama caused the devastation in Libya. Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Italy, Norway, Qatar, Spain and the UK all participated or provided assistance for it.
On the Road
(20,783 posts)but God, has that man jumped the shark.
MisterP
(23,730 posts)and hired meta-Salafist rebels that we liked then and dislike now after we liked them a second time
I don't see what the US has to do with this: Libya's peaceful today
