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Rebel Legitimacy And Other Points on Libya
What is providing legitimacy to a rebel movement like the one in Libya? The Wall Street Journal explains:
The opposition in eastern Libya took further steps toward establishing its legitimacy Wednesday, meeting with a U.S. envoy and loading its first shipment of oil for export since the uprising began.
So legitimacy is the easy part. At least when one speaks English and has some cheap oil to give away. The Brits want Blackwater/Xe or some other mercenary outlet to train the rebels which I understand means to do "training on the job", i.e. to fight their fight. I am sure that will also add to the rebels legitimacy. As Britain is broke, the Saudis are supposed to cough up the money for that. Getting support from Saudi money also adds to legitimacy?
The Libyan head of security Moussa Koussa who fled to London is said to be an MI6 double agent. That might well be the reason why restrictions on his bank accounts were immediately removed. Expect more propaganda talk about such false defections.
When I wrote How The War On Libya Will Continue, predicting their defeat, the rebels controlled the oil hubs Ras Lanuf and Brega. They soon lost both and their attempts to recapture them failed.
Attempts by the rebels to send resupplies to Misurata in the west also failed. Their ships were stopped by a Turkish patrol boat. The UN resolutions says "no additional weapons" and Turkey is serious in enforcing that part.
Gaddafi forces are still "cleaning up" in Misurata. In a few days that will be done and he will start new offense efforts in the east. But his forces must now "hug the enemy" to discourage further air attacks. Thereby it is unlikely that he will try a frontal assault on Ajdabia and later Benghazi. Instead Gaddafi will likely have some forces infiltrate into those cities, from the sea, the south and the east, and then roll the rebels up from their back.
Some NATO buffoon said that Gaddafi forces are "hiding behind civilians". That is a sure sign that more attacks on those civilians are now likely to happen. It is always the same sorry excuse. Hitler had to bomb London because Winston Churchill was "hiding behind civilians" there. Then again NATO is also bombing the rebels. Maybe they make up their mind.
The situation is now in a temporary stalemate and when the scale slides further towards Gaddafi forces, as it will, the attackers are in a bind. Protect civilians or bomb the heck out of them because they happen to be on the wrong side of the front? With the UNSC resolution and the attack Britain, France and the U.S. put themselves into an idiotic position. This was foreseeable. One might want ask what is their plan B but that would be wrong question. What was their plan A in the first place?
The most significant aspect of the “UN” involvement is the complete freedom with which the governments of Britain, France and the US operate. It would appear that nobody at home gives a damn. They have as much freedom to act as the Saudis: maybe the Saudi Royal Family should be told that you can hold elections, have a legislature, political parties, the entire nine yards of Representative Democracy. And it makes no difference. Nobody cares. Well some do, but nobody cares about the people who care. And they don’t care very much either.
Thus it is that Portugal, broke and begging for loans, doesn’t stop for a moment before it pledges its full support to the NATO attack: Aggression budgets are inelastic.
The media and the Academy have become a clean up squad, ready to rationalise and sanctify any idiocy the government cares to slip into; drunk or sober; frothing at the mouth or as solemn as a Priest in the pulpit.
The “plan” seems to be very simple: at any opportunity attack any muslim country which cannot defend itself. The benefits are, firstly to please islamophobes, particularly Israel, a state founded in islamophobia. Secondly to entertain that portion of the populace with a hankering for Capital Punishment, pogroms and lynchings. Thirdly to keep the armed forces active and to use up ammunition and other materiel, supplied by the arms industry. Fourthly to ensure a steady stream of the terror alerts needed to ensure public support for mass surveillance, secret policing and the makings of a police state. Fifth… the list is very long, and we can all add to it. Suffice it to say that no specific plan is needed, not any longer. It is accepted that, from time to time, attacks will be made on defenceless countries.
It is a classic protection racket: “You don’t want to be invaded, conquered and looted? It’s easy: join NATO, kow-tow to the US government. Otherwise ‘look out’ your time is coming.”
And it works: Ghadaffi’s biggest political error was to give into fear of the US after Iraq was invaded. It is not hard to see why he took the dangerous step of inviting slimy Tony Blair to come to Tripoli and receive Libya’s ‘nuclear’ materials (if there were any) and humblest apologies. The problem was that the resulting neo-liberal ‘reforms’ must have cost the regime large amounts of public support, which is always useful when an invading force appears. It cost billions in blood money taking the fall for Lockerbie and other payments. Money that was taken out of the mouths and pockets of the Libyans who own the country’s resources; that cannot have been without political consequences either.
Saddam made a similar error in co-operating with the UN disarmament process: giving the ‘west’ clear evidence that you cannot defend yourself amounts to an invitation to aggression.
The question is who, after Ivory Coast is next?
My guess is that the action will swing back to Latin America, but b might be right: all the signs are that Iran has been chosen as the final resting place for the remains of US democracy. The idea is so crass (“It would please AIPAC and make fund raising for next year so easy…”)And so utterly stupid, a war stretching from East Africa, across Arabia and Persia through Afghanistan to Pakistan, for no possible profit, that it would fit right in with the cardinal US Foreign Policy objective of using wars to start other wars and spreading war everywhere for reasons that the intelligentsia will come up with, later.
As to Libya the first time, in 1911 was tragedy so this one must be something else, which will be a consolation to those about to die. The only good thing about this is that the “west’ is wasting its power and substance so quickly that, in future, its hegemony will not be unchallenged. A great thing “The Balance of Power” when you look at the alternative: a state so drunk on its own indispensability that it allows the most corrupt, self-serving, bigoted and idiotic elements within it to control its destiny. Take a look at Congress. Listen in to the Supreme Court as it delivers its decisions. Bathe in the vacuities of the President’s rhetoric.
Swift, leave alone Sinclair Lewis, could not have come up with legislative bosses like Boehner and Reid, Judges like Thomas and Scalia or a President like this with Chiefs of Staff such as Daley and his predecessor Emanuel. No doubt the real meaning of the Chinese curse is “May you live in extremely amusing times, a golden age of parodists and satirists.”
Posted by: bevin | Apr 7 2011 19:37 utc | 11
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