NEW LIBYA: GADDAFISM WITHOUT GADDAFI.
The declining human rights situation in Libya has now been confirmed by the United Nations.
According to the BBC, the UN’s Libya envoy, Ian Martin, told the Security Council in New York last Wednesday.
“The former regime may have been toppled, but the harsh reality is that the Libyan people continue to have to live with its deep-rooted legacy,” said Mr Martin.
He described that legacy as “weak, at times absent, state institutions, coupled with the long absence of political parties and civil society organisations, which render the country’s transition more difficult”.
Mr Martin said some steps had been taken towards demobilising ex-combatants.But the government was struggling to establish its legitimacy, he added, with weapons freely available and various armed brigades having unclear lines of command and control.
While authorities had so far successfully contained any outbreaks of violence, they could escalate and widen in scope, he warned.
In addition
UN human rights chief Navi Pillay meanwhile raised concerns about detainees being held by revolutionary forces, saying there were some 8,500 prisoners in about 60 centres.
“The majority of detainees are accused of being Gaddafi loyalists and include a large number of sub-saharan, African nationals,” she said.
“The lack of oversight by the central authority creates an environment conducive to torture and ill treatment”
It would be obscene and inappropriate to judge the Western military intervention in Libya by comparing the deaths that have resulted from it with the unknown number of deaths that might other wise have happened. Nevertheless the chaos and continuing bloodshed does compromise the moral narrative of those who argued for NATO intervention.
It is therefore appropriate to revisit whether or not NATO’S involvement was posited upon a credible understanding of the situation in Libya, and whether the negative outcome was entirely predictable, as some of us argued at the time. Reconsidering the Libyan experience is particular urgent as the possibility of military actions against Syria (or even Iran) is looming.
The conceit behind the NATO intervention was its alleged necessity to prevent atrocities from the Gaddafi government in response to “Arab spring” demonstrations. However, there seems to have been little understanding of what the outcome would be were Gaddafi to be overthrown in such a manner.
The lazy assumption of Western governments and their liberal cheerleaders is that the overthrow of what they categorise as a “totalitarian” government aided by the military force of Western democracies will inevitably lead to a freer, and more pluralistic society. This argument is based upon a whole series of wrong assumptions, as the graveyards of Afghanistan testify.
Firstly, the whole concept of “totalitarianism” or “tyrannical” government is a superficial one, that inhibits a nuanced understanding of how particular societies outside of the norms of Western democracies, actually work.
Libya under Gaddafi was a relatively stable society in many ways, based upon distributive policies and oil exports, as Hugh Roberts explained in the London Review of Books last November.
The Jamahiriyya lasted 34 years (42 if backdated to 1969), a respectable innings. It did not work for foreign businessmen, diplomats and journalists, who found it more exasperating to deal with than the run of Arab and African states, and their views shaped the country’s image abroad. But the regime was not designed to work for foreigners and seems to have worked fairly well for many Libyans much of the time. It achieved more than a tripling of the total population (6.5 million today, up from 1.8 million in 1968), high standards of healthcare, high rates of schooling for girls as well as boys, a literacy rate of 88 per cent, a degree of social and occupational promotion for women that women in many other Arab countries might well envy and an annual per capita income of $12,000, the highest in Africa. But the point about these indices, routinely cited, naturally enough, by critics of the West’s intervention in reply to the propaganda that has relentlessly blackened the Gaddafi regime, is that they are in one crucial sense beside the point. The socio-economic achievements of the regime can be attributed essentially to the distributive state: that is, the success of the hydrocarbons sector and of the mechanisms put in place early on to distribute petrodollars.
However, the so called Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriyya was a particularly absent state, lacking any politi cal party or parties, and while it had a functioning bureaucracy with some degree of popular participation, it had neither the culture nor institutions for allowing political differences to be aired or resolved. We need to understand that the murder, torture and repression of political opponents is the attribute not of a strong state, but of a weak state.
The stronger state is one where there is sufficient culture of respect for the rule of law in civil society; political institutions that allow the resolution of disputes; and the willingness of governments to renounce power to their political opponents via constitutional means. Constitutionality is the hallmark of a state whose sovereignty rests upon popular consent; and in the modern world, a state that can exercise popular sovereignty as a counterweight to corporate power is a precondition for meaningful democracy.
Hugh Roberts accurately describes the peculiarity of the Libyan system
[Gadaffi] dispensed with the [governing political party, the Arab Socialist Union] and the idea of a single ruling party, promoting instead People’s Congresses and Revolutionary Committees as the key political institutions of the Jamahiriyya, which was proclaimed in 1977.
The former were to assume responsibility for public administration and secure popular participation, the latter to keep the flame of the Revolution alive. The members of the People’s Congresses were elected, and these elections were taken seriously, at least at the local level and for a while. But voters were not, in theory, electing representatives, merely deciding who among the candidates on offer they wished to assume the mainly administrative responsibilities of the bodies in question.
The system encouraged political and ideological unanimity, allowing no voice for dissident opinion except on trivial matters. It drew many ordinary Libyans into a sort of participation in public affairs, although this was waning by the mid-1990s, but it did not educate them in other aspects of politics, and did not work well on its own terms either. … …
A distinction between revolutionary and constitutional government was made in 1793 by Robespierre, when he wrote: ‘The aim of constitutional government is to preserve the Republic; that of revolutionary government is to lay its foundation.’
The effective historical function of the revolutionary government in Libya was to ensure that, while the country was modernised in important respects, it did not and could not become a republic. The Libyan Revolution turned out to be permanent because its objects were imprecise, its architects had no form of law-bound, constitutional government in view as a final destination and no conception of a political role for themselves or anyone else after the Revolution.
The State of the Masses, al-jamahiriyya, was presented as far superior to a mere republic – jumhuriyya – but in fact fell far short of one. And, in contrast to states that call themselves republics but fail to live up to the name, its pretensions signalled that there was never an intention to establish a real republic in which government would truly be the affair of the people. The State of the Masses was in reality little more than a game to occupy and contain ordinary Libyans while the grown-up business of politics was conducted behind the scenes, the affair of a mysterious and unaccountable elite.
The traditions of constitutionality in Britain, for example, are deep rooted in decades and even centuries of political evolution, that has itself not been without violent conflict. Of course, other countries have achieved political stability and a commitment to the rule of law in more accelerated circumstances; and despite an inauspicious start, the German Bundesrepublik has been built as a stable constitutional democracy out of the ruins of a defeated Nazi dictatorship.
However, the crucial feature in the development of stable political institutions is that they have legitimacy based upon popular engagement. Respect for the rule of law, especially constitutionality, cannot be imposed from outside; and even the successful German experience was domestically driven, in conjunction with protracted nation building suport by the occupying powers. Conspicuous successes in conflict resolution, for example the end of South African Apartheid, or the process started by the Good Friday Agreement in Ireland, have involved long term commitment from the protagonists themselves to resolve their differences.
Arguably the NATO intervention curtailed any prospect of a process in Libya leading to a stable resolution. It is worth quoting Roberts at length:
The situation that developed over the weekend following the initial unrest on 15 February suggested three possible scenarios: a rapid collapse of the regime as the popular uprising spread; the crushing of the revolt as the regime got its act together; or – in the absence of an early resolution – the onset of civil war. Had the revolt been crushed straightaway, the implications for the Arab Spring would have been serious, but not necessarily more damaging than events in Bahrain, Yemen or Syria; Arab public opinion, long used to the idea that Libya was a place apart, was insulated against the exemplary effect of events there. Had the revolt rapidly brought about the collapse of the regime, Libya might have tumbled into anarchy.
An oil-rich Somalistan on the Mediterranean would have had destabilising repercussions for all its neighbours and prejudiced the prospects for democratic development in Tunisia in particular.
A long civil war, while costly in terms of human life, might have given the rebellion time to cohere as a rival centre of state formation and thus prepared it for the task of establishing a functional Libyan state in the event of victory. And, even if defeated, such a rebellion would have undermined the premises of the Jamahiriyya and ensured its demise. None of these scenarios took place. A military intervention by the Western powers under the cloak of Nato and the authority of the United Nations happened instead.
How should we evaluate this fourth scenario in terms of the democratic principles that have been invoked to justify the military intervention? There is no doubt that many Libyans consider Nato their saviour and that some of them genuinely aspire to a democratic future for their country. Even so I felt great alarm when intervention started to be suggested and remain opposed to it even now despite its apparent triumph, because I considered that the balance of democratic argument favoured an entirely different course of action.
The claim that the ‘international community’ had no choice but to intervene militarily and that the alternative was to do nothing is false. An active, practical, non-violent alternative was proposed, and deliberately rejected. The argument for a no-fly zone and then for a military intervention employing ‘all necessary measures’ was that only this could stop the regime’s repression and protect civilians. Yet many argued that the way to protect civilians was not to intensify the conflict by intervening on one side or the other, but to end it by securing a ceasefire followed by political negotiations.
A number of proposals were put forward. The International Crisis Group, for instance, where I worked at the time, published a statement on 10 March arguing for a two-point initiative: (i) the formation of a contact group or committee drawn from Libya’s North African neighbours and other African states with a mandate to broker an immediate ceasefire; (ii) negotiations between the protagonists to be initiated by the contact group and aimed at replacing the current regime with a more accountable, representative and law-abiding government. This proposal was echoed by the African Union and was consistent with the views of many major non-African states – Russia, China, Brazil and India, not to mention Germany and Turkey. It was restated by the ICG in more detail (adding provision for the deployment under a UN mandate of an international peacekeeping force to secure the ceasefire) in an open letter to the UN Security Council on 16 March, the eve of the debate which concluded with the adoption of UNSC Resolution 1973.
In short, before the Security Council voted to approve the military intervention, a worked-out proposal had been put forward which addressed the need to protect civilians by seeking a rapid end to the fighting, and set out the main elements of an orderly transition to a more legitimate form of government, one that would avoid the danger of an abrupt collapse into anarchy, with all it might mean for Tunisia’s revolution, the security of Libya’s other neighbours and the wider region. The imposition of a no-fly zone would be an act of war: as the US defense secretary, Robert Gates, told Congress on 2 March, it required the disabling of Libya’s air defences as an indispensable preliminary. In authorising this and ‘all necessary measures’, the Security Council was choosing war when no other policy had even been tried.
The proposal for a cease fire and negotiations could not allow the absent state model of the jamahiriyya, to survive. The jamahiriyya lacked the civic institutions and political traditions to engage in negotiations, and so would have needed to generate them. There is evidence that the jamahiriyya was reformable, and the compelling impetus of a peace process would have accelerated support for the reforming current led by Gaddafi’s son, Saif al-Islam, who had been previously praised by among others Tony Blair, and was well placed to use the crisis to its advantage to create civic institutions. As Hugh Roberts explains:
It was the fashion some years ago in circles close to the Blair government – in the media, principally, and among academics – to talk up Saif al-Islam’s commitment to reform and it is the fashion now to heap opprobrium on him as his awful father’s son. Neither judgment is accurate, both are self-serving. Saif al-Islam had begun to play a significant and constructive role in Libyan affairs of state, persuading the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group to end its terrorist campaign in return for the release of LIFG prisoners in 2008, promoting a range of practical reforms and broaching the idea that the regime should formally recognise the country’s Berbers. While it was always unrealistic to suppose that he could have remade Libya into a liberal democracy had he succeeded his father, he certainly recognised the problems of the Jamahiriyya and the need for substantial reform. The prospect of a reformist path under Saif was ruled out by this spring’s events.
But paradoxically, because the NTC rebellion arose in the Libyan context without pre-existing civic and political institutions, the NTC also needed time to coalesce and develop. The military victory of NATO not only ruled out reform of the jamahiriyya under Saif, but it also ruled out the NTC going through the process of political evolution and clarification, the development of institutions, mechanisms of accountablity and self-discipline. The jamahiriyya was not founded upon the principle of the rule of law, and sadly neither is the new NTC state that has succeeded it. NATO’s military action has perpetuated the worst features of Gaddafism, without Gaddafi; and in fact marked a tangible regression in racism, and probably a reduced commitment to egalitarianism.
PICTURE: PAMBAZUKA
This makes sense to Cameron the evil one ! Remove a dictator to gain mob rule.
A good and balanced analysis.
Thanks, Andy – there is this piece by Glenn Greenwald in Salon as well: http://www.salon.com/2012/01/26/the_human_rights_success_in_libya/singleton/
It is particularly sharp in observing how the media circus moves on after these interventions, hungry for the next one.
the NTC also needed time to coalesce and develop.
—
But the NTC *is* Qaddafism without Qaddifi and that is the very thing that the grass roots is revolting against.
NY TImes January 22, 2012
Libya Protests Spur Shake-Up in Interim Government
By LIAM STACK
Libya’s post-Qaddafi transitional government faced a political crisis
Sunday after protesters ransacked its offices in Benghazi, highlighting growing nationwide unease with its leadership and triggering a shake-up in which the governing council’s No. 2 official resigned and several members were suspended.
For months, youth groups with a range of complaints have been protesting against the Transitional National Council in Benghazi, the eastern city whose protests sparked the nine-month revolt and which once served as the rebel capital. Protests have cropped up elsewhere, too, including in Tripoli, the capital, where activists have erected a small tent city across from the prime minister’s office.
Protesters are demanding more transparency from the transitional
council, which holds executive power and is tasked with overseeing the election of a constituent assembly to draft a new Constitution. It is dominated by figures from the eastern rebel movement, much to the suspicion of other regional factions, and there are accusations, too, that many of its members are tainted by past ties, real or suspected, with the government of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.
full: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/23/world/africa/protests-shake-libyas-interim-government.htm
the NTC also needed time to coalesce and develop.
—
But the NTC *is* Qaddafism without Qaddifi and that is the very thing that the grass roots is revolting against.
NY TImes January 22, 2012
Libya Protests Spur Shake-Up in Interim Government
By LIAM STACK
Libya’s post-Qaddafi transitional government faced a political crisis
Sunday after protesters ransacked its offices in Benghazi, highlighting growing nationwide unease with its leadership and triggering a shake-up in which the governing council’s No. 2 official resigned and several members were suspended.
For months, youth groups with a range of complaints have been protesting against the Transitional National Council in Benghazi, the eastern city whose protests sparked the nine-month revolt and which once served as the rebel capital. Protests have cropped up elsewhere, too, including in Tripoli, the capital, where activists have erected a small tent city across from the prime minister’s office.
Protesters are demanding more transparency from the transitional
council, which holds executive power and is tasked with overseeing the election of a constituent assembly to draft a new Constitution. It is dominated by figures from the eastern rebel movement, much to the suspicion of other regional factions, and there are accusations, too, that many of its members are tainted by past ties, real or suspected, with the government of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.
full: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/23/world/africa/protests-shake-libyas-interim-government.html
I just posted something that did not show up. Testing again to see if I am being excluded.
the NTC also needed time to coalesce and develop.
—
But the NTC *is* Qaddafism without Qaddifi and that is the very thing that the grass roots is revolting against.
NY TImes January 22, 2012
Libya Protests Spur Shake-Up in Interim Government
By LIAM STACK
Libya’s post-Qaddafi transitional government faced a political crisis
Sunday after protesters ransacked its offices in Benghazi, highlighting growing nationwide unease with its leadership and triggering a shake-up in which the governing council’s No. 2 official resigned and several members were suspended.
For months, youth groups with a range of complaints have been protesting against the Transitional National Council in Benghazi, the eastern city whose protests sparked the nine-month revolt and which once served as the rebel capital. Protests have cropped up elsewhere, too, including in Tripoli, the capital, where activists have erected a small tent city across from the prime minister’s office.
Protesters are demanding more transparency from the transitional
council, which holds executive power and is tasked with overseeing the election of a constituent assembly to draft a new Constitution. It is dominated by figures from the eastern rebel movement, much to the suspicion of other regional factions, and there are accusations, too, that many of its members are tainted by past ties, real or suspected, with the government of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.
full: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/23/world/africa/protests-shake-libyas-interim-government.html
Fuck it. What bullshit. Andy has my fucking blog in his blog roll but has banned me from posting.
So long, Stalinist scum.
“…whether or not NATO’S involvement was posited upon a credible understanding of the situation in Libya…” Depends on your point of view. The Western governments who saw in the rising a golden opportunity to get rid of the irksome colonel at relatively little cost, probably had a fair understanding of the situation. NATO’s liberal cheerleaders, as usual, didn’t.
According to this post, the above comment from “Hukkalaka Meshabob” is actually from Louis Proyect. Apparently he has used the pseudonym because he claims he is banned from here.
What’s all that about?
I don’t get it. What?
I hope Louis feels a fair amount of shame and embarrassment about this.
He posted a few things that got caught in the automated spam filter. It happens to a lot of people. Blogs as popular as this one come under continual spam attack, and the spam filters go through periods where they hit a lot of false positives – Francis King’s comment got caught, as did yours, levi9909. Anyone who knows anything about automated spam filters knows that sometimes, weeks go by where all the actual spam is just normal paragraphs of text – this is so that the spam filters start adjusting and passing normal comments into the filter and spam comments pass as “cleared”.
Now, I’ve mentioned this often enough on here. As has Andy – it’s a common refrain, people think their post didn’t get through, but in fact the “Akismet” automatic spam detection system that WordPress uses has falsely marked normal posts as spam.
There are a few people on here who always seem to get marked as spam. Iain Brown is one, John Grimshaw is another. It’s a quirky system.
Now, had Louis waited, or tried to contact me, I could’ve said all of this.
But he didn’t. He posted at 13.14 and 13.20 – and then wrote his “banned from Sociality Unity” post just 15 minutes later.
Perhaps Louis lives in a world where people who run blogs are able to sit at the screen all day every day. Well in this world, we’ve all got full-time jobs and we moderate the blog during our lunch breaks or on our days off.
So, I did as I always do: Every few hours, I come on here and check the spam filters. I saw a few, and as you’ll see above, I “liberated” them from the spam filter.
But Louis couldn’t wait for mere mortals to take action. No, instead, he posts calling us “stalinist scum”.
Perhaps he’d like to post an apology. It won’t make any difference to me, I’ll judge him by the fact that he felt it was more important to source a photo of Andy Newman and to write a blog post about being “banned” than to wait for a train driver to start his lunch break so he could check the spam filters.
Oh well, life on the blogs eh?
#11 Thats me. I posted when I thought I was #5. And it was just to express confusion.
John, the crown of “always ending up in the spam filter” has passed from you to someone else, it seems. I hope you enjoyed your brief moment of glory.
#12 Well I can’t apologise for Louis or whoever. But thats a perfect explanation of whats going on. Akismet indeed. Whatever will they think of next. Hope the train’s okay.
Oh by the way will someone raise the issue of the very right wing Austrian waltzing at some stage?
#14 Alas everything comes to an end sometime.
My sincere apologies…
I think leaping to the conclusion that something may have happened to your comment on account of Stalinist scum is taking the Trotskyist all purpose narrative of Stalinist betrayal a bit far. But it is faintly illuminating nonetheless.
Hmm. It does say something about large sections of the left however that we automatically assume there is a conspiracy going on though. Mind you if this Akismet spam thing is really some kind of AI lurking in the shadows..?
I like the spam filter. It is responsible for some of the most bizarre, inconsequential and surreal exchanges on this blog, as well as some very funny political embarrassment. Can something be done to make it even more capricious and unpredictable?
Speaking of Stalinism – how come the comment accusing the admin of this site of being Stalinist scum disappeared faster than purged cadre from a newspaper clipping? Is this some kind of Stalinist, anti-stalinist school of falsification? Or maybe it would be better if people stopped using Stalinist as a swear word and instead applied it where it fits as an analytical category.
Kevin double think. I love it. But since the accusation made of the admin that they are Stalinist scum is still there when you assert it isn’t (#8) what does this mean? Very shadowy.
I knew Ovenden was a Stalinist!
I think Kevin is referring to the blog post by Louis Project on Louis’s own website accusing me of Stalinism, that has now disappeared down the memory hole.
Kevin (21), the “Stalinist scum” comment is still up – or has it been reinstated by those devious Stalinists Collins and Newmam since they’ve had an apology from Comrade Project, in order to misrepresent him – and therefore all principled Trotskyists – as someone prone to make rash, superficial and sweeping judgements?
I agree that we should reserve the use of the term Stalinist only when referring to:
(1) All “official” Communist Parties and their members, past and present.
(2) Any social democrats (e.g. Epigone Newman) who see anything positive in any aspect of the deformed/ degenerated/ state capitalist “workers’ states”.
(3) Any bureaucratic or anti-democratic actions, regardless of who perpetrates them or why.
(4) Anybody who uses or threatens violence against anyone on the left and/or for political reasons.
(5) Trade union leaders who fail to lead the revolutionary masses into industrial action at any time or place.
(6) Any person or movement who advocates any political strategy that involves “stages”.
(7) Any person or movement that advocates “socialism on one country”, or even “socialism in one continent”, (with the possible exceptions of Liverpool and Scotland).
There, that should help make it a really scientific, precise and useful concept.
Kevin was talking about this post, which Louis Proyect deleted rather than admit that he’d got it wrong
Have you noticed how his apology above wasn’t even in his own name, and have you noticed that he doesn’t have the courtesy to openly admit that he got anything wrong?
What’s this we keep hearing about “stalinism” then?
Oh I see! Thats a bit embarassing isn’t it.
Are we in favour of ‘relatively stable societies’, and in what context do we think this is a good thing. I’m opposed to NATO intervention, here there and everywhere, but I have a real problem with the special pleading involved here. I am not in favour of ‘relatively stable societies’ which murder, torture and oppress people, just because they are more stable (relatively or otherwise) then other societies. I think its a huge mistake to premiss ones opposition to NATO intervention on some hamfisted attempt to defend the lunatic and vicious pharoahs they’re intervening against, and I think these arguments about ‘relatively stable socities’ does this. I am violently opposed to ‘relatively stable societies’ and even more violently opposed to defenders of ‘relatively stable societies’. Given the extraordinary joy and hope of democratic and social change sweeping the entire region, I think this CIA language of ‘relatively stable societies’ cannot possibly be something which any left worth the name can want to have anything to do with. Its the language of the rich both here and there, and something to be utterly opposed by anyone who is in the least sympathetic to the overturn of the established order either in the middle east or anywhere else. Down with relatively stable societies everywhere. Down with extraordinary rendition. Down with neo-liberal reforms. Down with kleptomaniac bureacrats.
Back the revolution and oppose imperialism. You know it makes sense.
johng:
‘I’m opposed to NATO intervention, here there and everywhere,’
No you’re not. Remember, you were calling for the rebels to be armed and Gaddafi’s overthrow when the NATO intervention was well underway.
Oh yes he is.
[Isn't this the wrong month for panto?]
The Libyan uprising contained various elements, but the main effect of Western intervention was to encourage the most pro-capitalist elements to coalesce around the NTC.
There is very little to suggest some kind of “rank and file” revolt from forces to its left is now occurring.
Despite oil production now being around one million barrels per day, only $3 billion of the estimated $150 billion Libyan Wealth fund has been released to the NTC.
In order to pay state employees and run government services, it has to borrow some of this from the Central bank. But as yet, the currency isn’t fully liquid.
Statements from the IMF imply that they want the Libyan government to abolish state price subsidies before further funds are released.
This is tending to encourage a turf war between the rival militias.
Today fighting broke out in Tripoli. But rather than this being based on political demands, it appears to be over attempts to control Gaddafi family assets.
Further pressures on the NTC come from Qatar and the Aljazeera Channel, which has been mobilising support for the Muslim Brotherhood to act as the main channel for creating a party system. It’s been suggested that this is being done with the full support of the US government.
There are also indications of a sectarian campaign against Sufi shrines and schools in Benghazi. Sufism is seen by hard line Wahabist elements as a “folk religion” and form of mysticism. However, it played a major role in the growth of the Senussi order in Libya.
In short, it seems that there are attempts to sow discord on the one hand, while promoting the MB as the solution to it on the other.
Can you be against NATO intervention and call for rebels to be armed at the same time?
“Are we in favour of ‘relatively stable societies’, and in what context do we think this is a good thing.”
Yes – context is very important, John: Somalia, Haiti, Afghanistan for much of the last 40 years… I’d go somewhat further than that: what groups of revolutionary socialists Egypt and Greece, who will be familiar to you, are saying is not in fact bent around calling for destabilisation, but is aimed at demonstrating that they have a strategy to bring stability and an end to social and economic crisis.
If the collapse of a central state, under whatever circumstances, was in and of itself either revolutionary or something that socialists would automatically cheer on, then Somalia has been the most revolutionary society at the cutting edge of the class struggle for the last 20 years.
And as for ” lunatic and vicious pharoahs” – well, why don’t we go the whole hog, “Mussolinis, Hitlers, tinpot Galtieris, fascists, … “? Or we could decide that we won’t fall into either liberal imperialist demonology or misplaced apologias, and instead take as considered a view as we can of the whole picture.
In your and this blog’s case an unavoidable part of the picture is that Britain is at war in several theatres. Its external spying/assassination agency has announced it is for covert actions in Iran and its diplomats are at the moment refusing to include a clause in a UN resolution on Syria explicitly ruling out overt military action on Syria. Why do you think that is? And don’t you think that we should do something about it?
Didn’t correct in time #33 should read is “not in fact bent around calling for destabilisation, but is aimed at demonstrating…” Sorry about that. Goes to show Tony’s wonderful new systems are not, unfortunately, idiot proof.
[CORRECTED FOR YOU - EDITOR]
#32
Who else would have armed the rebels other than the West, John? Calling for the rebels to be armed was at best naive and worst downright reckless, especially when there was no clear understanding of who and what the rebels represented politically and socially.
What johng’s position exemplifies is that we should support anything that moves, any uprising or rebellion regardless of in whose interests it is or in which direction it’s moving.
As the thrust of Andy’s piece describes, we now know that Libya without Gaddafi is not the burgeoning democracy or independent Arab state many supporters of the NATO intervention and rebels assumed it would be. The widespread human rights abuses, racism towards black migrant workers and black Libyans is testament to that.
The idea that the the Libyan uprising could ever be placed in the same box as the Egyptian Revolution or what took place before in Tunisia illustrates a paucity of analysis, esp when NATO got involved. On the contrary, NATO’s intervention was about taking control of the so-called Arab Spring and its outcome rather than helping it along a path towards a new era of Arab liberation and independence.
#36 In this context yes. And I agree with Kevin context is everything. Its not just potentially the west in Syria though is it? Perhaps a whole different context would be the revolutionaries of the Spanish Republic where in fact the west refused to arm the rebels. Would we call for them to be armed by others?
If I were to point out that Louis Proyect never fails to provide ample evidence of what a sad wanker he is every time he posts on here I would be breaking my own rule that anonymous commentators shouldn’t insult named individuals.
So I won’t.
Louis you are the gift that keeps giving.
#36
But this is a false analogy. The revolutionaries were fighting to maintain a democratically elected government against an avowed fascist assault. The context here was a Europe-wide struggle against the rise of fascism and the vested interests in that struggle by the European working class and socialist movement.
But when the facts change so must our conclusions, and the facts in regard to Libya in 2011 must start with an understanding of the role of the West throughout the region in retarding its social, political and economic development through decades of imperialism and colonialism, in the process dislocating said societies.
#37 But the Saudis and Qataris are already arming their favoured forces. There’s a reason why the price of an RPG launcher in Lebanon has rocketed (pun intended) to $2,000.
Arms aren’t the issue. The fact that every would-be power in the region has a long hand in Syria and is attempting to manipulate the genuine and legitimate grievances of many of its people, and the movement that arose on the back of those, is at issue.
#40
Kev, you are the only person I know who would have that information to hand
heavy shit at the Egyptian football match.
#42 Yes. Terrible. And the kind of social disaster that various people will try to exploit and the left will have to provide a convincing response to.
#35 Thanks, ed.
The cartoon is reminiscent of this great film scene:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhBIPZCVj84
#43 Definitely correct Kevin. The news is saying that sources in Egypt are saying that the Port Said team attacked the Cairo team deliberately. The Port Said supporters being Mubarak loyalists and the Cairo team being made up the Ultras that defended the revolution. Whether this is true I don’t know. The government has now called an emergency meeting.
V good about Iran
http://azarmehr.blogspot.com/2012/02/extreme-idolatry.html
What strikes me about the situation in Libya is the apolitical nature of so much of it. Usually, opposition movements have manifestos, statements, declarations, programmes, often of great length.
The NTC issued a year back a manifesto that could have been copied from any local authority ‘equality and diversity’ statement, that is, just blather to keep the Western governments happy.
The Islamists have made their position clear, even if disingenuously dissociating themselves from al Qaeda.
But what of the militias? They have had time enough to write something, but I’ve come across nothing. What are their demands, their programmes for the future of Libya? They seem to be just groups of young men, haring around in jeeps, firing away at anyone they don’t like, treating the towns and cities as their personal fiefdoms. I’ve never seen such an apolitical affair.
Re #8 etc. It is rather sad the way Louis Proyect seems to have gone downhill in recent years.
I first heard of him during the conflict in / against Yugoslavia, when he was a principled opponent of NATO bombing. Before that, Proyect did some very good work supporting the Nicaraguan Sandinistas against the US-backed & armed opposition and US sanctions.
More recently, however, Louis Proyect has taken on the role of vitriolically opposing anyone on the left who he sees as sympathetic to whichever governments / countries are next in line for US-backed overthrow, eg by missile attacks and bombing.
He now appears as a minor reprise of the so-called ‘leftist’ support for the US / UK invasion of Iraq, in that he focuses his vitriol against those who are against the Western / Saudi & Qatari agendas for NATO-enforced regime change in, eg, Libya and Syria.
#48. Yes, the apolitical nature of the militias makes it easier for the West to manipulate them. And if they turn on the NTC, it will hardly be from the “left”.
#49. Indeed, but a whole swathe of the left has made this shift. Exactly why I don’t know, but it could be due to post-Soviet malaise and disorientation, long-term penetration by the security services reaching their maturation point, individual cynicism and corruption, or all of the above.
#49 Doesn’t Nick Cohen do the same thing?
#32 John Grimshaw
“Can you be against NATO intervention and call for rebels to be armed at the same time?”
It’s all about understanding two things.
1- When a qualititative change has have taken place in a political situation.
2- What the role of political leadership is.
I’m well aware that there were conspiracies against Gaddafi backed by the West during the 80′s and 90′s.
But unless one argues that the Libyan revolt was a conspiracy from the very start, then it has to be seen in the context of what was happening in Tunisia and Egypt.
i.e. a spontaneous wave of popular protest against autocratic governments.
When the Libyan revolt started, Gaddafi should have gone into retirement.
It’s even possible that Saif al Islam would have become a transitional figure, given his previous role in doing a deal with the former LIFG members.
Instead, a decision was taken to respond to the demonstrators with lethal force.
They had every right to defend themselves against this.
But, in practice, the West opposed arming the rebels.
While the NATO air intervention completely degraded the Libyan army as a fighting force, they clearly didn’t trust the rebels.
They didn’t supply them with heavy weaponry and sent in their own military advisers to direct them.
The rebel’s use of cannibalised Libyan army weaponry right until the end of the conflict shows this.
Of course had there been a political leadership that stuck to its guns on “no-intervention”, the political course of the rebellion could have been changed.
A qualitative change in the political situation occured when the Benghazi leadership decided to support the No fly zone.
The TNC is the political expression of that decision.
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