Gaddafi's Libya

Did the west invade Gaddafi's Libya for imperialistic gain of the oil reserves? Would this explain the lack of care for civilians in Sirte and the random bombing raids like in Dresden?

Short answer: Yes.

Long answer: Yeeeeeeeeeeessss.

Freedom had nothing to do with Libya's "liberation". It's all about gaining control of as much oil as possible. Western nations saw an opportunity and took it regardless of the lives and long term well being of the local people.

FC's got it. The Libyan Intervention is textbook Imperialism. Fully loaded with comprador bourgeoisie, false rebellions, and extensive historical-falsification. Libya is going to bite us in the ass just like Afghanistan did.

That's what Gaddafi gets for nationalizing. I'm sure there were other equally sneaky motives, but oil was a big one. Others would be Israeli Peace, destruction of a Pan-Arab/Pan-African spokesman, pressure on Egypt for new government to be pro-Western, Foreign Direct Investment, pressure against Iran, pressure against OPEC, another Sunni majority country with Western sympathies to help in the war against al Qaeda.

But yes, oil was a big part.

Sorry for having a one line question. I know that I shouldn't have. I forgot to preview. Anyway, is there any proof of my point? Have any files been leaked to back up this, for example? Also, how come Libya had a prior alliance against terror yet the west are invading it to help against terror? Wouldn't that make the situation worse because of the political vacuum?

Another factor in addition to those already mentioned is/was Gaddafi's desire to create a new regional currency in the form of the golden dinar, a currency backed by gold which several African and Asian countries took an interest in. Since the US dollar's credibility has been declining as of late, and the Euro has also been facing loss of confidence, the successful creation of a new global currency backed by gold would be disastrous for the West's global economic supremacy and threatened to result in an entirely new configuration of global economic power.

Also consider Libya as part of the reconfiguration of the entire Middle East region. With successful 'shedding of snake skin' revolutions taking place all over the region, the Gaddafi domino had to be toppled in order to maintain the 'cleansing' cycle. There is great pressure now to 'finish off' the process by getting rid of the anti-Western regimes in Syria and Iran, and to gain a region more pro-Western than at any time since the 1940s.

With regard to Islamic terrorism and the 'war on terror', these revolutions have made it apparent that the US had largely superficial and self-interested motives for that war, and that partially with the help of the Arab Spring they are returning to their traditional role of being allied to and/or ambivalent toward radical Islam. If you observe the entire post-WW2 era, you will note that the US nearly always supported Islamists against the threat of socialist and/or Arab nationalist figures, who were likely to align with the Soviet Union in the Cold War.

The whole "domino" is just history repeating. When South Vietnam fell the world didn't become communist. Just shows that the west still hasn't learnt from the Vietnam War.

This had nothing to do with the domino theory; there was no domino to fall. Whereas the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt seemed to be of an organic nature, the overthrow of Gadhafi looks highly pre-meditated, for the reasons mentioned above. One thing to observe is how quickly the NTC formed a new central bank earlier this year, which is an odd action to take for a group of disorganized rebels. It is a clear indication that NATO was orchestrating the whole affair short of putting boots on the ground, although even that happened in the form of British SAS teams, etc.

Of course it's imperialism. The West were happy to cooperate with Gaddafi a year ago but when the Arab Spring happened, the West seized the initiative and invaded Libya under the pretext that he was 'killing his own people'. Now that he's out of the picture, the NATO allies will be given 30% of the oil reserves by the NTC for overthrowing Gaddafi.

If anything, i'm surprised the NTC have been so welcoming and generous to the West. Considering how close Western relations to Gaddafi were, I would have thought that they would not been so nice. But in answer to your question - yes. Textbook Imperialism. The West smelled the oil, so jumped on the bandwagon and have now earned themselves another section of the Arab's oil.

Quote:

http://libyanfreepress.wordpress.com/2011/11/14/smoking-gun-gaddafi-was-to-receive-u-n-human-rights-award/
basically Before NATO and the U.S. started bombing Libya, the United Nations was preparing to bestow an award on Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, and the Libyan Jamahiriya, for its achievements in the area of human rights. That’s right–the same man, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, that NATO and the United States have been telling us for months is a “brutal dictator,” was set to be given an award for his human rights record in Libya. How strange it is that the United Nations was set to bestow a human rights award on a “brutal dictator,” at the end of March.

That's from the OWS Facebook page.

I found it pretty interesting and basically a summary of the hypocrisy of the overthrow of Gaddafi.

Very good question, as to the reason for NATO assault on the Qadaffi regime. I still haven't figured it out. The west had brought Q back into the fold sometime during the W. presidency, had recognized him diplomatically, put business firms into Libya, sold him weapons, and used him for extraordinary rendition purposes( I think only the US did this). Then, in a flash, they turned on him. They justified the attack on Libya as a case of preventing a bloodbath, ie., Qadaffi was going to commit a massacre in Benghazi, and they need to stop him. However, when you look at the evidence, there is very little to support the claim that Qadaffi was going to do that. He was going to march into Benghazi to retake it, but you would expect that in a civil war. He didn't massacre people in the cities he retook as his army swept eastward, so what evidence was there that he would do so in Benghazi?
Qadaffi gave up his nuclear ambitions about a decade earlier because he wanted a rapprochement with the west. Pretty big mistake.

Very very interesting on the human rights ordeal. I hadn't heard that before. But yes this would probably be about him wanting to nationalize the oil. They used the same tactics against him that they used against Hussein. Even though I don't quite have an opinion about Qadaffi and his rule (don't know enough I'm sad to say) I do recognize a bait and switch when I see it. One thing I would take from this is never try to make peace with the West. Just ask a lot of South America. Why else are many of them going towards more socialism?

It wasn't "Gaddafi's Libya" It was the Libyan's Libya. The Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya was one of the finest examples of what socialism should be like. Sadly after all of Gaddafi's attempts to delay a NATO invasion he failed.

No, it was just another example of what the democratic and secular Arab countries shouldn't have ended up like. Libya was a dictatorship that had nothing to do with socialism but it did have a very strong welfare state thanks to the immense oil revenue.

Libya was not a dictatorship. They had a combination of socialism, direct democracy, parliamentary democracy, and pan-africanism. Gaddafi was more of a figurehead and ideologue.

If Libya was a dictatorship, it was a very unique one. Most dictatorships don't give out their country's national wealth to ordinary people; they have no incentive or obligation to do so. In fact most dictatorships are set up in order to ensure that wealth stays concentrated in the hands of the few. I'm speaking here of the category of economic dictatorship, something all us Leftists are familiar with. I posit that the economic category is even more important than the political. Libya was not quite so far advanced as to be outright socialist (and in the last 25 years this would have been to their detriment anyway), but nationalizing natural resources and using them to pay for social welfare is quite a step, especially in a small underdeveloped country.

Quote:

If Libya was a dictatorship, it was a very unique one. Most dictatorships don't give out their country's national wealth to ordinary people; they have no incentive or obligation to do so.

That it certainly was. And Gadafi himself was quite an eccentric figure. But the fact that the huge oil revenues made possible for Libya to have an awesome welfare state doesn't change anything about Gadafi's Libya being a dictatorship. Curiously, native Saudis, Quataris and so on ( but not foreign workers of course ) also get similar state "salaries" and welfare even if they don't do anything.
But even that "sharing" of national oil wealth, for some reason, didn't preven't Libyans from rising up against Gadafi.

Loz wrote:

No, it was just another example of what the democratic and secular Arab countries shouldn't have ended up like. Libya was a dictatorship that had nothing to do with socialism but it did have a very strong welfare state thanks to the immense oil revenue.

Agreed and the World is a better place now he has gone! Who can forget the scenes of joy when he was overthrown and the workers running in to the secret service building to destroy their files!

soviet78 wrote:

If Libya was a dictatorship, it was a very unique one. Most dictatorships don't give out their country's national wealth to ordinary people; they have no incentive or obligation to do so. In fact most dictatorships are set up in order to ensure that wealth stays concentrated in the hands of the few. I'm speaking here of the category of economic dictatorship, something all us Leftists are familiar with. I posit that the economic category is even more important than the political. Libya was not quite so far advanced as to be outright socialist (and in the last 25 years this would have been to their detriment anyway), but nationalizing natural resources and using them to pay for social welfare is quite a step, especially in a small underdeveloped country.

Rubbish! He gave them the welfare state so that they would be able to compete in the World economy and to produce the best they could, so he could cream off the best of the best. A welfare state is not socialism as any fule now, the first one was in 19th century under Bismarck, or was he a socialist too! LOL