Libyan War : Political and strategic aspects

[ramana]

According to this report it is retribution against Gaddafi supporters now in Benghazi. More tribal justice is what they can expect from the ‘Democratic’ rebels in the coming days.

Libya: it wasn't supposed to be like this in free Benghazi

Read this together with the Obama wasting his breath in Delhi article. The above articel shows that the massacre which was feared by Gaddafi forces is really the opposite. Its the rebels who are massacring the Gaddafi supporters.
Real Ptomekin world where up is down and bad is good. Recall the good and bad Taliban in Afghanistan.

[jimmyray]

Jimmy the cause against Gaddafi was legitimate. He should have been overthrown. However the West by use of massive force has made him legitimate. Its now an orientalist nithmare with France, UK and US with sundry countries pummeling him. The Benghazi rebels wanted reforms and not a rebellion. All Western supporters now are despondent that the rebels are not showing the finesse to carry the project forward.

I fully agree Ramana Ji. I have some firsthand experience of life in Libya. Gaddafi is a bloody tyrant and he needs to go. Intentions of some rebels are really democratic and in the rebel ranks there are some western educated people. But unlike western countries Libya is a complex tribal society with over 140 tribes and the rebels consist of many different subgroups and some of these subgroups have different ideas. This is predominantly a fight between rebel Eastern Libyan Arabic tribes against pro Gaddafi Western and Central Libyan Arabic tribes. The Mesrata tribe from East (which also has a stronghold in Misurata city in west and some non-Arabic tribes in West near Zintan are also traditionally anti-Gaddafi. Unless some major tribes supporting Gaddafi break away it would be very difficult to conquer Tripoli in west or for that matter even cross Sirte (Gaddafi’s birth place and another of his stronghold) in the center. Some of the large tribes in West Libya like Warfella were initially sympathetic towards rebels but the coalition airstrikes have forced them to Gaddafi fold. To me it appears that it is going to be a long bloody civil war, unless either Gaddafi is assassinated or coalition puts boots on grounds in overwhelming numbers (unlikely).

[Rudradev]

Not a realistic argument at all. As if the Euros and US who are pummeling Libya would drop the India-Pakistan equal-equal just because we decided to join in on their gangbang of Gaddafi. As soon as another Paki terrorist attack happened, they would be at the forefront of "counseling restraint" and reminding us that the Libyan action had "nothing to do with terrorism by non-state actors."

That is assuming the next attack is in India. The question could well be, would India be advising restraint to the West WRT TSP?

Given all available evidence, I honestly don't believe it would make any difference. You see, there is even a precedent for this: the 9-11 attacks. Also carried out by "non-state" actors with the 400% facilitation, sponsorship and financial support of Pakistan. Everybody in Washington whose job it was to know, found this out very early on... even to the extent of Omar Shaikh wiring $100,000 to Mohammed Atta at the behest of ISI head Gen. Mahmoud Ahmed.

In the first few heady days following 9-11, India showed its hand and offered all support to the US, even to the extent of offering IAF airbases in Punjab and J&K for any operations that might be required. There was a belief even in South Block that Pakistan was going to get the danda it rightfully deserved for the incident, even as Armitage threatened Musharraf to bomb the Pakis back to the stone age.

And that was that. The threat worked, and GUBO started. India was dutifully kept out of the picture, in full consonance with US strategy for the region.

Moral of the story: even if a Paki terrorist attack happened outside India, even if it happened within US territory, India's "counseling restraint" or "offering support" does not mean a damn thing. It will be used for leverage if at all, and then quickly sidelined, because in the Western scheme of things, India should have no geopolitical role west of Bikaner or north of Jammu. Do not underestimate the rock-solid commitment of the US foreign policy establishment to this paradigm... even a 9-11 could not change it.

Evidence? Rather than go after Pakistan for the 9-11 attacks with Indian help, the US preferred:
1) To allow itself to be sidetracked by a long ground war in Afghanistan, with full and continuing Pakistani support to their enemies.
2) To ignore the role of Pakistan in creating the Taliban and supporting the OBL group all the way up to the murder of Ahmad Shah Massood.
3) To facilitate the survival of ISI assets that were crucial to the Taliban's operations, by allowing the Kunduz airlift.
4) To ignore the proliferation of nuclear weapons by the Pakistan government, labeling it the work of a "rogue AQ Khan network" and saying "the past is the past" even as proliferation continued into the future.
5) To pump billions of dollars of aid into Pakistan even as Pakistan continued to support the Taliban against US forces in Afghanistan.
6) To arm Pakistan with modern weapons systems that were completely and entirely India-specific.
7) To ignore future attacks against Western interests and citizens, including Daniel Pearl, the London and Madrid Subways and many more that were still carried out with the full support and facilitation of Pakistan.
8 ) To warn, caution and threaten India against retaliating for Pakistani terrorist attacks in India, and counsel that India should instead stabilize a dysfunctional Pakistan by giving away J&K to Pakistan.

The truth is that EVEN IF the West changes its mind after another Pakistani terrorist attack in a Western country, EVEN IF the US decides to punish Pakistan militarily for this... they will still seek to avoid any Indian involvement whatsoever. It is vitally important to the US that India should not gain from the aftermath of any Western action against Pakistan. For now, that means that India does not have to counsel restraint.

Restraint is automatically built in to any Western response towards Pakistan, and will be for the foreseeable future, because the West's desire to prevent India gaining is far greater than the West's desire to punish Pakistan. Whether we counsel restraint or not doesn't matter at all.

By the way, despite all the eagerness here to have supported the attack on Libya by getting in a few MKI kicks of our own ... I still haven't seen one indication, anywhere, that we were ever invited to the party. Who asked us to join? At the most we could have shown our support in an inconsequential UNSC vote. Given that we do not know what the outcome will be, abstaining on that vote was the only sensible thing to do.

A rudimentary review of present geopolitics will make very obvious why the US and Euros do not want Indian participation in the NFZ enforcement even while they're gung ho for active Arab involvement.

“India, Uninvited, Joins Nuclear Club.” New York Times, May 19, 1974

You're not seriously comparing a nuclear test by Indian institutions using Indian resources on Indian territory, to military operations against a foreign government on another continent... are you? However you look at it, the latter is far more contingent on our receiving a willing "invitation" than the former.

IMO, all are welcome under the UN mandate, it is who shows up. (Don't want to send planes send medics like in the Korean War)

How would sending medics have established our power projection capabilities, exactly? The fact is we could have done nothing meaningful, so it's better to do nothing at all (and reserve our options for the future) than send in some token water-carriers for Massa. That would be like the Bangladeshis who (does anyone even remember?) sent combat troops to Operation Desert Storm! Poor buggers were put in the trenches in the very teeth of Saddam's Republican Guard as cannon fodder, while the ashraf Arabs and white folks stayed out of range and fought by pressing buttons. It wasn't a very impressive demonstration of Bangladesh's geopolitical clout.

"All are welcome" is very well in theory, but the fact is, leadership of the UN mandate invariably devolves to members of the P5-- in this case the US, UK and France. They are the ones who ultimately decide the composition of the task force and delegate the roles to be played within it. They have made no secret of wanting GCC armed forces to get involved in the Libyan NFZ, but again, I haven't heard a word from them encouraging Indian involvement... only sniping by their pet mongrels in the media about "BRIC" hypocrisy, etc.

Remember, India is PACCOM's brief while Pakistan is CENTCOM's... the Western strategy of cultivating these two countries as assets for different theatres, however, goes back all the way to partition. Pakistan was always seen as the potential bulwark north and west of the subcontinent, India to the south and east. Mutually exclusive spheres of influence that the West would not like to see overlap (even to the extent of Indian assistance to Afghanistan, or Indian retaliation against Paki terrorist HQs.) This is a primary reason for the whole "balance of power" emphasis still touted by people like George Friedman, however much it seems to fly in the face of current realities.

Added later: It's also interesting to see how eager the US is to have GCC take a leading role in the anti-Gaddafi operations. It can be compared to the classic Clinton-Wilsonian template established by the Yugoslav war in the '90s. Let the regional (aspiring) members of the integrating "core" take the lead, so that they are invested in conflict against powers that represent the non-integrating "gap" . Thus the concomitant rise of their regional leadership roles is immediately suborned to satrapy within the larger scheme of globalization devised by the US. http://globlogization.wikistrat.com/the ... s-new-map/

What is India's game in this? An unknown, unknown?

To devise a game effectively we must have intimate knowledge of the gameboard. The Pentagon's New Map is exactly that... a realistic assessment of the gameboard at the time of writing, plus a vision of how the gameboard should ideally appear, in order to best serve US interests. Only on that solid foundation can strategies be devised and implemented to go from point A to point B.

Do we have a South Block's New Map? Let's start by making one. I would suspect that on such a gameboard, Libya (given the stakes, risks and rewards) would simply not be in play for any of our opening moves. Bahrain, on the other hand, might be... we will have to watch that carefully.

[ramana]

Pioneer editorial, 24 march 2011

Another Afghanistan?March 24, 2011 10:49:31 PM

Bombing Libya a grave mistake

Less than 48 hours after the launch of a US-led military campaign in Libya, a senior American official assured newspersons during a Pentagon briefing that Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was not a target, but then added: “If he happens to be in a place — if he’s inspecting a surface-to-air missile site, (and) we don’t have any idea that he’s there or not — then, yeah...”. He did not complete the sentence but his afterthought has become an international concern that is the defining symptom of all that is wrong with the campaign. With clear evidence that the Western forces are looking for a regime change — a demand that goes far beyond the loosely worded UN Security Council resolution which forms the basis of the campaign — fears abound in the international community, especially among regional leaders, that Libya might just turn out to be another Afghanistan in the making. Indeed, it has now become amply clear that the US mission to protect civilians is only the first step towards a more long-term strategy of forcing a regime change. But given the lessons the world has, hopefully, learnt in Afghanistan and Iraq, it is imperative that the US military stays away from bringing about another regime change. It is little wonder then that as the allied forces continue to debate the management of their military campaign in Libya, the five-day-old Operation Odyssey Dawn has already lost much of its legitimacy, despite its much-touted ‘UNSC-approved’ tag. Created to enforce the UN Security Council Resolution 1973 that allows for the establishment of a ‘No- Fly Zone’ over Libya and the use of all necessary means, apart from foreign occupation, to protect civilians, the US Africa Command Task Force is by all means now on slippery ground.

Support from the Arab League, which was considered to be a crucial prerequisite for any kind of military intervention, has been less than forthcoming in the days since the operation was launched. Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa has gone back on his earlier stance, instead criticising the West’s ‘attack’ on Libya. This is essentially because the Arab League’s own resolution which preceded the Security Council vote had a much narrower mandate that included only a ‘No-Fly Zone’ and specifically warned against foreign military intervention, which is exactly what the ongoing military operations in Libya have begun to resemble. Secondly, the African Union, which was initially held as an important regional partner, has since been completely ignored, as it has refused to play along with the West and sign on to a plan that is essentially a blueprint for unmitigated disaster. In fact, soon after the operation was launched, the AU called for an “immediate stop” to all attacks — a call that has been ignored by Western allies.

More likely it will be Gulf War I redux with a wounded Gaddafi still in power and the problem left for someone else to solve.
Lets see if the other P-2 develop some guts and prevent further UN resolutions.

[ramana]

X-post...

They blew up the trainer becoz they could do it and get away with it. Just like Eyerak, the orders seem to be that no quarter must be given while using the UN (and Arab) permission as a fig leaf to justify those actions and as means to get rid of one's opposition when he poses no real threat and is at his weakest.

Something for our pseudo-dharmic GoI to keep in mind while they have their wet dreams about being a sooper power - singing Khumbaya does not a sooper power make. They should have sent the IAF to get some good long distance expeditionary experience here.

Firstly, IAF can get that kind of experience in Chitradurg. Blowing up a plane while landing is hardly great skill. And beating up a non-flying air force is hardly useful skill.

Also this would make India make the leap from pseudo-dharmic to adharmic!

Seondly, Unless there is a coup that replaces Gaddafi and even after that Libya is going to be the next Afghanistan on the Mediterranian Sea. This will lead to blowback into Western Europe especially France, Italy and Spain.

Eastern Libya will become safe haven for the Al Libbi elements who are battle trained in Af-Pak.

In this cauldron why would any one want India to get boiled in?

[Jeff Lira]

Very true, India doesn't want to get into the trouble, risk its economy by taking part in a war against a country with whom we have no hatred. We have our own problems and should make sure insurgence in north east and central east doesn't get inspired. I think our situations is little different

Rebels have regained the hold in the eastern oil city of Ajdabiya, which was captured by Gaddafi's troops last week. The article quoted rebels talking to the journalists of AFP saying that rebels only have some kalashnikova and knives whereas Gaddafi forces are using tanks and siege weapons for shelling.
Rebels Regain Hold of Ajdabiya in Libya

[Theo_Fidel]

Seondly, Unless there is a coup that replaces Gaddafi and even after that Libya is going to be the next Afghanistan on the Mediterranian Sea. This will lead to blowback into Western Europe especially France, Italy and Spain.

Eastern Libya will become safe haven for the Al Libbi elements who are battle trained in Af-Pak.

Well Algeria went through much much worse with a Islamic civil war as well and Europe remained relatively isolated.

The rebels to a man have made it clear that their aim is Gaddafi and Tripoli itself. Right now they are inexperienced and disorderly. But I've been impressed with their relatively patient probing and dismantling of the Gaddafi defense in Ajdabiya. Most importantly they have been trying to 'turn' the regime forces to their side. They are getting better and will be more effective as the battles continue. They also have oil and money on their side now.

Afghanistan shredded because different factions were funded, armed and supported by large external powers. No one has lined up behind Gaddafi. None of the arms and ammunition or spares he is using are made in Libya. In 6 more weeks most of his weaponry will be spent. He does not have staying power. Saddam Hussein for instance acquired weapons from a disorganised Eastern Europe during the Sanction period with the support of Russia. This is what gave him staying power.

Also a UN vote is not the same as joining the war coalition.

[brihaspati]

Very true, India doesn't want to get into the trouble, risk its economy by taking part in a war against a country with whom we have no hatred. We have our own problems and should make sure insurgence in north east and central east doesn't get inspired. I think our situations is little different
Rebels Regain Hold of Ajdabiya in Libya

^^^It is not about "hatred". Gaddafi supported Islamist separatism in Kashmir. Whatever be the Thaparite style of claiming that such statements were rhetorical/real-politik onlee, and Gaddafi reallyd di not mean it - with Gaddafi's history of sponsoring various rebellious outfits - the risk of his money somehow supporting the Geelanis of the valley (unless of course India gains from such sponsorship as according to some speculators - Geelani is a likely RAW agent) - is too great. Gaddafi is too much of a loose cannon with proven track record of subversion to deserve our sympathies.

[brihaspati]

It is not wise to underestimate a popular uprising simply because it has been deprived of military experience and equipment. People learn quickly, and commanders and organizers emerge from such struggles. Some of the most significant successful popular uprisings were largely led by people with little or no previous military experience.

[Pranav]

^^^It is not about "hatred". Gaddafi supported Islamist separatism in Kashmir. Whatever be the Thaparite style of claiming that such statements were rhetorical/real-politik onlee, and Gaddafi reallyd di not mean it - with Gaddafi's history of sponsoring various rebellious outfits - the risk of his money somehow supporting the Geelanis of the valley (unless of course India gains from such sponsorship as according to some speculators - Geelani is a likely RAW agent) - is too great. Gaddafi is too much of a loose cannon with proven track record of subversion to deserve our sympathies.

B ji, elites who own America have also supported Islamist separatism in Kashmir.

[Pranav]

It is not wise to underestimate a popular uprising simply because it has been deprived of military experience and equipment. People learn quickly, and commanders and organizers emerge from such struggles. Some of the most significant successful popular uprisings were largely led by people with little or no previous military experience.

The rebels are bolstered by hundreds of European special forces personnel. Also, they have at their disposal the combined Air Forces of UK, France and the US.

[brihaspati]

Pranav ji,
did I ever say that we should have sympathies for UK which foisted Pak on us, and USA which became the successor to the British empire and maintained this atrocity of a state? The only difference is that at the moment it is an opportunity to allow one small time betrayer like Gaddafi to be pulverized, while the time to do the same for the big-timers will come in the future.

[brihaspati]

How do we know about the "special forces" - from innuendos and hints and wise prophecies. That such forces or units are not very numerous or well integrated with the local opposition is obvious from the initial fiasco of a contact/surveillance mission. For me, who has seen how [some] popular uprisings form and turn, and how later on people claim that they "helped" the uprising towards "successes", it is a much more complex situation likely to be on ground. Communication [even if they use Libyan but naturalized Euro/Brit/US guys] is the first casualty - not just language, but also because of being out of touch for a long time even if a native born.

Moreover several different factions are working there. The pro-democracy movement there has a long history - starting almost in 60's - some of these people are now in it for two-three generations, with a memory of torture/abductions/disappearances. They have their own momentum. They are using an opportunity or gap in the international arena - where the west is slightly on the backfoot.

I think we Indians tend to have a strange suspicion of the authenticity of popular movements anywhere, but that is because of a peculiar brainwashing of the educated class post-Independence. We should drop that India-glass in looking at the current Arab world.

[Sanku]

B-ji; this is going to be one of the very very rare occasions that I am going to disagree with you. What is happening in Libya is pure murder, and irrespective of what Gaddafi has and has not done, and inspite of the ham-handed statement which preceded the lack of GoI action (where I completely agree with you)

I would like India to have no part whatsoever in the mess in Libya. Probably India knew that the UN mandate was likely to be used a little too freely and desisted.

If there was a time when not taking a stand was the right thing -- this is now. Irrespective of the real politic merits.

[brihaspati]

To give a hint of the complexity of such movements - most such movements are joined by different thought processes, each having their own dreams. But the fact is that movements become "revolutions" when those different dreamers decide that they can compromise somewhat on the other person's dream but their overall dreams broadly coincide and that it was time for them to act.

Here is poem from a Libyan-American [don't hold his naturalization against his feelings, for that will strike many Indians in USA too] (quoting in full):

NOW THAT WE HAVE TASTED HOPE

Now that we have tasted hope
Now that we have come out of hiding,
Why would we live again in the tombs we’d made out of our souls?

And the sundered bodies that we’ve reassembled with prayers and consolations,
What would their torn parts be other than flesh?

Now that we have tasted hope
And dressed each other’s wounds with the legends of our oneness
Would we not prefer to close our mouths forever shut on the wine
That swilled inside them?

Having dreamed the same dream,
Having found the water that gushed behind a thousand mirages,
Why would we hide from the sun again
Or fear the night sky after we’ve reached the ends of darkness,
Live in death again after all the life our dead have given us?

Listen to me Zow'ya, Beida, Ajdabya, Tobruk, Nalut, Derna, Musrata, Benghazi, Zintan,
Listen to me houses, alleys, courtyards, and streets that throng my veins,
Some day soon
In your freed light and in the shade of your proud trees,
Your excavated heroes will return to their thrones in your martyrs’ squares,
Lovers will hold each other’s hands.

I need not look far to imagine the nerves dying rejecting the life that blood sends them.
I need not look deep into my past to seek a thousand hopeless vistas.
But now that I have tasted hope
I have fallen into the embrace of my own rugged innocence.

How long were my ancient days?
I no longer care to count.
How high were the mountains in my ocean’s fathoms?
I no longer care to measure.
How bitter was the bread of bitterness?
I no longer care to recall.

Now that we have tasted hope,
Now that we have lived on this hard-earned crust,
We would sooner die than seek any other taste to life,
Any other way of being human.

Khaled Mattawa

If you look at it line by line, you will have an insight into a certain mindset and viewpoint that has joined forces with the "ragged", "untrained, ill-disciplined" "fanatical" youth. These signs for me are unmistakable signs of something much more complex going on than mere mis-adventures promoted by a few Brit/US agents.

[svinayak]

I would like India to have no part whatsoever in the mess in Libya. Probably India knew that the UN mandate was likely to be used a little too freely and desisted.

If there was a time when not taking a stand was the right thing -- this is now. Irrespective of the real politic merits.

With accusation of crusades and killing this is a mess which is from the past of their relationship. India will be an outsider in this deja vu. Their relations built in the last 40 years for opportunistic goals is unravelling

BBC News Turkey and France clash over Libya air campaign
The Guardian - ‎3 hours ago‎
The Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, accused France of seeing Libya as a source of 'oil, gold mines and underground treasures'.
Video: No concensus on NATO's role in Libya Times Now
Turkey attacks France over Libya 'crusade' Financial Times

[brihaspati]

Sanku ji,
I am not on any of the sides that are fighting it out in Libya. But for me Gaddafi's open betrayal on the Kashmir issue makes me endorse his opponents. I am not here pretending to be unbiased and looking at vishwa-bhatrittwa -or nyaya-vichaar that too a biratheri that feels any sympathy for Gaddafi. I am biased entirely in favour of what I consider to be Indian interests. A betrayer to Indian interests deserves to be crushed and erased. If not by my hands, why not by another's hands? Also just because I cannot bring it on other betrayers right now, that does not imply I cannot wait patiently for the right time.

[ramana]

I have been reading a lot of medevial European history. Its awful how many times the Crusdes(Eurospeak for Jihad) originated in France! And mostly from Southern France. And usually halted in modern Turkey which was Byzantium in those days and on to modern Syria and Lebanon. Every two- three hundred years the French quest repeats.

Bji, A weak Gadda fi is good for India.

[Sanku]

No Sir, you misunderstand me. I know where you are coming from fully. I have only two issues

1) In crushing a betrayer, are we aiding other betrayers? Would his continued presence help in making life for all our betrayers more interesting.

2) Would a action here, boomrang in terms of getting effected by law of unforseen circumstances? The betrayer(s) may still meet their destined ends without our hands being sullied and have a clean solution from our PoV.

You see, I have over last few days been told repeatedly that I am those who low lives who would captialize on human suffering for petty reasons, so I would hardly be one to take a stand which is about "morality"!

[Sanku]

ramana-ji query on mail please.

[ramana]

OK.

[brihaspati]

The crusade is an often used buzz word by any regime in Islamic countries if they want to mobilize support against any western intervention. It is an appeal to the wider ummah - and it being made inevitably shows that the using regime is on rather shaky grounds and does not feel confident enough to win on its own. If it is an "economic crusade" say, then Iranian leadership has no hesitation in declaring "economic jihad" too - quite openly. If the islamists can see no wrong in [start with the legendary authority of Al Azhar scholars on jihad] appealing to "jihad", they should not be that surprised in a quid pro quo.

The ruling Turkish regime has its own axes to grind with the EU, and it uses its leverage due to the historical alliances and shared ventures or commitments developed under regimes the current regime has done its best to undermine.

There is a surprising degree of heterogeneity in the "Arab street" about the so-called "western crusade" against Libya. Over the last week some of my friends collected opinions about this in a survey format. Roughly 1/3 thinks of it as a crusade, 1/3 think of it as a crusade but one that is directed at an evil ex-ally of the crusaders - hence a good same-side goal, 1/3 think it is not a crusade and it is only "fundamentalists" who are trying to tar and feather a genuine popular uprising against a returnee from dozakh.

[brihaspati]

I have been reading a lot of medevial European history. Its awful how many times the Crusdes(Eurospeak for Jihad) originated in France! And mostly from Southern France. And usually halted in modern Turkey which was Byzantium in those days and on to modern Syria and Lebanon. Every two- three hundred years the French quest repeats.

Bji, A weak Gadda fi is good for India.

ramana ji,
only the first successful one [the one that formed the Templars and Baldwin at head] was dominated by the French. the other very nearly successful and the one the Islamists use as iconic, with Salahuddin - this one was tripartite - German, French and Brit. Here ultimately Richard took over leadership. Ultimately it was a conflict between two leaders from the margins of then Mediterranean world - desperately trying to establish their personal control on the then "centre" of their world. Mediterranean economic hinterland, crossroads of East-west trade through the Levant, and centre of ideological mobilization - iconic Jerusalem. Salahuddin was originally a Kurdi - Richard then a king of a land mostly seen by Europeans of mainland as "barbarians" and marginal.

Had Richard waited out a few more months, when in due course Salahuddin passed away and the Islamic state he built fell apart, we could have seen a different ME. The years were significant - when Richard finally gave up, it was the period of the Ghurid murder of north India - exactly the same period, 1190's. I feel nothing wrong in what Richard did to the Levantine Islamists - for Islamists were doing same or even worse on Indians at exactly the same period.

[brihaspati]

ramana ji,
a weak Gaddafi would be even more thoroughly integrated with European interests. Since the Oiropeans are inclined underhand to making noises in favour of valley Islamists, I don't see much hope in that direction.

[svinayak]

ramana ji,
a weak Gaddafi would be even more thoroughly integrated with European interests. Since the Oiropeans are inclined underhand to making noises in favour of valley Islamists, I don't see much hope in that direction.

It will be good since this will make the NATO and US to spend money in NFZ and war preparations. Global economy will sink and in the over all scheme is good now since it will create the conditions for NWO

Oil is tje key. Future oil control with those new gen in the ruling regime will determine the Indian relations. India has to be patient

[Pranav]

B ji, one has to understand the philosophies that motivate the various actors. Gaddhafi, with his female bodyguards, is very far from being an Islamist. He may be a tyrant, but he was also giving 12,000 Libyan students scholarships to study abroad each year.

Islamists are a major component amongst the fighters that are being backed by western air power. Note also that organizations like the "Libyan Islamic Fighting Group", who are fighting against Gaddhafi, are based in the UK.

One also needs understand the philosophy of the elites controlling the US, UK and France. Why are they doing what they are doing.

[ramana]

A weak Gaddafi will be busy quelling East Libya without forces and be busy. But powerful enough to need NFZ and thus keep the EU busy. They need their Iraq.

I do not judge the crusades. What am pointing out is its again a struggle for the Mediterranean and the role of France is contant in all that.

Op-Ed in Pioneer

Reeking of hypocrisy

March 25, 2011 2:09:13 AM

SUNANDA K DATTA-RAY

Having backed and armed the murderous Pol Pot regime and other tyrannical dictatorships in the past, the US has no right to ‘intervene' in Libya.

Wars of intervention, ostensibly to rescue innocent sufferers from brutal rulers, bristle with so many paradoxes and reek of such hypocrisy that I cannot help but hope that Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, dictator though he is, gives the Western allies a bloody nose.

Libya is very different from Cambodia which seemed like an open and shut case for the intervention that Mr Brajesh Mishra so stoutly defended at the United Nations. Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge killed an estimated two million people. It reduced the country to grinding poverty. Yet — and in sharp contrast to the Western response to Libya — the US and the Association of South-East Asian Nations preferred this murderous regime to the opposition United Front for National Salvation supported by Vietnam. That was because the Soviets backed Vietnam, as did India. Power politics triumphed over humanity.

The US and China were ranged on the other side with ASEAN. It was an open secret that they were routing funds and arms for Pol Pot through Singapore. Sino-American collusion was bizarre enough without the paradox being repeated in personal relations.

While Singapore’s Ambassador Tommy Koh led the diplomatic offensive against Vietnam for invading Cambodia and ousting the Khmer Rouge, the defence was led by his “guru”, Mr Mishra. Way back in 1968, when Mr Koh was a 30-year-old novice at the UN, Mr Mishra had been one of three seasoned Indian diplomats (the others being G. Parthasarathi and Alfred Gonsalves) who had “mentored” him.

The battle was no less fierce because of enduring ties of affection, and Singaporean diplomats comment to this day on the aggressiveness with which Mr Mishra pushed what they call the Soviet line. According to Mr Koh’s junior, Mr Kishore Mahbubani, who later headed the Singapore foreign office and was for many years permanent representative at the UN, no other Indian diplomat “was so very active on the Cambodian issue as Mishra, and after he left, the others just didn’t get involved.”

Mr Mahbubani claims to have been “stunned” when he visited India in the 1990’s to find Mr Mishra so important in the NDA Government. “It was astonishing”, he exclaimed when we were discussing my last book, Looking East to Look West: Lee Kuan Yew’s Mission India. “Then he seemed very pro-Soviet, the most pro-Soviet among the Indian diplomats. Very outspoken in defence of Soviet policies.” There was a further surprise in store for the Singaporean. Mr Mishra “had completely forgotten all about those hectic tussles in New York”!


{It was not pro-Soviet polices but the defence of policy close to Indian interests. Getting Vietnam to spank Pol Pot was a blow to PRC. And made them on the wrong side of humanity. Not to mention Pol Pot was doing ethnic cleansing and driving out Vietnam ethnics from Cambodia. India had goen to war with Paksitna on the very same issues in 1971. Singapore supporting the US and PRc was due to economy and Overseas Chinese ties to mainland China.

A similar charge of being pro-Soviet was made about Mishra's batchmate KS garu!}

That’s diplomacy for you. Individuals follow governments that fight for the oppressed in one situation and back the oppressor in another. Dividing lines are faint and constantly shifting. James Cameron, the veteran British journalist who covered the Korean War, described movingly in his memoirs how the atrocities committed by the North Korean baddies were indistinguishable from the atrocities committed by South Korea’s good guys. Japan and the US, yesterday’s enemies, are the best of today’s friends.

Changed roles are glaringly obvious in Vietnam where Vietcong tunnels and the museums and war remains evoke no bitter memories. On the contrary, China’s growth has prompted Vietnam to make special overtures to the US they battled for so many years. It is no different, perhaps, from Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s welcome in 1974 to Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto and his own participation (with his foreign minister, Mr Kamal Hossain) in the Lahore summit of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference.

The Western allies are struggling to find a credible rationale for their strategy in Libya while India ponders on the difficulty of following an independent foreign policy that serves the national interest but not necessarily America’s cause. Meanwhile, the question that should be asked is whether gratuitous intervention is ever justified, no matter how detestable the regime. Perhaps it can’t be asked too loudly because everyone knows that no matter what the interventionist might plead, he goes in for himself and not for charity. I can still hear Admiral William J Crowe, former chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, chuckling that the US would not have bothered defending Kuwait against Iraq if the emirate exported bananas. I was interviewing him for my book, Waiting for America: India and the US in the New Millennium.

Military men like him can afford to be blunt for they are not accountable to voters or posterity. Thus, Lord West, the former British naval chief, had no compunction about denouncing Col Gaddafi as a “loathsome” individual even before the Allied action began. Mr David Cameron is more circumspect, as the senior President George Bush was in 1990. He cited democracy and freedom to assemble a coalition during Operation Desert Shield which preceded the full-scale hostilities of Operation Desert Storm, because Saddam Hussein had made himself master of seven per cent of the world’s fuel by annexing Kuwait.

Democracy and freedom can have played little part in an exercise that was directed by Prince Bandar bin Sultan, Saudi Arabia’s high-profile ambassador to the US whose royal master in Riyadh paid all the costs of that war. The Saudis and Kuwait’s al-Sabah dynasty are hereditary friends. Iraq is their traditional enemy. It suited Riyadh to claim that Saddam was targeting Saudi Arabia’s petroleum fields which would have brought more than 40 per cent of the world’s oil production under Baghdad’s control.

How the Western powers interpret UN Security Council’s Resolution 1973 which explicitly bars a full-scale occupation force depends on how badly they want to control Libyan oil. It seems increasingly clear to them that despite the damage inflicted on government forces, the rebels are unlikely to achieve a military victory. The British are, therefore, talking of partition which will give them a foothold over part of the country at least.

If that happens, Col Gaddafi will not cease trying to regain lost territory. The Allies will not cease trying to use it as a springboard to acquire the rest. It will mean endless friction. The inescapable conclusion is that nations should be left to themselves to work out their own destiny. Intervention — no matter what the excuse — makes mockery of national sovereignty. Iraq and Afghanistan also demonstrate that a third party can push a country from the frying pan into the fire.

Wars to end wars only prolong warfare because the protagonists are so seldom honest about their aims.

--[email protected]

[brihaspati]

No Sir, you misunderstand me. I know where you are coming from fully. I have only two issues

1) In crushing a betrayer, are we aiding other betrayers? Would his continued presence help in making life for all our betrayers more interesting.

2) Would a action here, boomrang in terms of getting effected by law of unforseen circumstances? The betrayer(s) may still meet their destined ends without our hands being sullied and have a clean solution from our PoV.

You see, I have over last few days been told repeatedly that I am those who low lives who would captialize on human suffering for petty reasons, so I would hardly be one to take a stand which is about "morality"!

Sanku ji, if I was in your place I would beam in a smile if I was given such an attribution. I would take it as a compliment.

The law of unforeseen circumstances most often is used as an extension to the ABCD of management formula. One more high and mysterious sounding concept that can never really be pinned down to concrete analysis. We need to get out of this not-taking-sides mentality - that is our mercantile mentality. Applied to Gaddafi, we need to look at it as overtly a tripartite struggle for supremacy - Gaddafi, Anglo-Saxon (notwithstanding German escape), Libyan domestic opposition to Gaddafi. Behind each there are a range of forces - who have joined in the fray to indirectly carry out their respective international agenda - but by proxy.

We have stayed away from helping opposition to totalitarian regimes that have already proven hostile to India - even before - during the late 40's and 1950's Korean war crisis, when there was a chance to fix Tibet. We protected the communist totalitarian Mao. Not being firm at crucial junctures of history - no - not recognizing that it is a crucial juncture is a supreme fault. Consequences need to be worked out - there are always limitations, but we cannot allow that limitation to handicap us from taking steps.

[brihaspati]

ramana ji,
it is impossible to "weaken" Gaddafi. Given his totalitarian regime - you cannot dismantle his power bit by bit. It is either a total removal or allowing him to grow back. Allowing him some survival means he will wipe out any liberal tendencies possible.

[brihaspati]

Pranav ji,
Gaddafi is an opportunist whose roots are in Islamism. That makes him an opportunist unreliable on any deals we cut with him as non-Muslims - because he can excuse his betrayals - when needed - on the basis of solid Islamic precedence about such betrayals. It does not matter if he bends this and that school of Islamic jurisprudence to suit his personal tastes. What matters is that he can take shelter behind Islamism as and when needed -which he has proven time and again.

[ManuT]

That is assuming the next attack is in India. The question could well be, would India be advising restraint to the West WRT TSP?

Evidence? Rather than go after Pakistan for the 9-11 attacks with Indian help, the US preferred:
1) To allow itself to be sidetracked by a long ground war in Afghanistan, with full and continuing Pakistani support to their enemies.
2) To ignore the role of Pakistan in creating the Taliban and supporting the OBL group all the way up to the murder of Ahmad Shah Massood.
3) To facilitate the survival of ISI assets that were crucial to the Taliban's operations, by allowing the Kunduz airlift.
4) To ignore the proliferation of nuclear weapons by the Pakistan government, labeling it the work of a "rogue AQ Khan network" and saying "the past is the past" even as proliferation continued into the future.
5) To pump billions of dollars of aid into Pakistan even as Pakistan continued to support the Taliban against US forces in Afghanistan.
6) To arm Pakistan with modern weapons systems that were completely and entirely India-specific.
7) To ignore future attacks against Western interests and citizens, including Daniel Pearl, the London and Madrid Subways and many more that were still carried out with the full support and facilitation of Pakistan.
8 ) To warn, caution and threaten India against retaliating for Pakistani terrorist attacks in India, and counsel that India should instead stabilize a dysfunctional Pakistan by giving away J&K to Pakistan.
The truth is that EVEN IF the West changes its mind after another Pakistani terrorist attack in a Western country, EVEN IF the US decides to punish Pakistan militarily for this... they will still seek to avoid any Indian involvement whatsoever. It is vitally important to the US that India should not gain from the aftermath of any Western action against Pakistan. For now, that means that India does not have to counsel restraint.
Restraint is automatically built in to any Western response towards Pakistan, and will be for the foreseeable future, because the West's desire to prevent India gaining is far greater than the West's desire to punish Pakistan. Whether we counsel restraint or not doesn't matter at all.

Onlee, contrary to a preference for TSP, there was a quid-pro-quo between Mush and Amritraaj that TSP's GUBO was conditional to keeping India out of any Afghanistan solution.
Let me put it like this.
1. At the time of 911 US was ignorant. The narrative of the Indian subcontinent was held by TSP, because that is what happens when you allow others to tell your narrative. There was no Indian narrative in the beltway (because no one was invited). TSP had the long institutional awareness of the US, because of its past alliances and the Soviet-Afghan War. The narrative only started to change from the middle of Kargil after IA started evicting NLI. (Before that US, UK wanted India to declare a ceasefire because frankly they did not believe IA would get them evicted). The first milestone was reached on 4 Jul, 1999 when NS was made to wait for an appointment with Bill Clinton. Though Jaswant Singh helped, 2001 was too less of a time frame to break TSPs instituational linkages with US. Besides, India (prone to self goals), itself had legitimised Musharraf by inviting him to Agra summit, weeks before 911.
2. TSP has not kept part of its deal for US to continue to hold any part of its side. In the meantime TSP is practically being frog marched to the point of exhaustion.
3. Anyways, looking to the future. US after 10 years is more than aware of the duplicitous game of TSP. It has used drone to wreck every peace deal between taliban and TSPA that ISI has tried to manufacture.
4. As wikileaks have pointed out, regular US Army officers were reporting back to their superiors of TSPA's double game. But CIA covered for TSP. (I am disappointed though that the State Dept has clamped down on it employees officially to read about them)
5. That has changed since the RD affair (and streaming out of other operatives as were disucss). TSP has made some enemies in the last pillar of institutional support in the US. This means more than awareness, the linkages are breaking apart. I do not think the US intel community will be forgetting the RD affair in a hurry. Going forward the dice is loaded against TSP.

You're not seriously comparing a nuclear test by Indian institutions using Indian resources on Indian territory, to military operations against a foreign government on another continent... are you? However you look at it, the latter is far more contingent on our receiving a willing "invitation" than the former.

1. The point is about 1974 to 2005. No 2005 deal without 1974 Pokharan 1 (and consistent clean record in nuclear non-proliferation).
2. Inspite, of the quid-pro-quo of keeping India out, it has more street credibility and milestones in the eyes of Afghans than US-TSP combined, and could not be kept out of the Afghan solution, even after killing of its Attache.

How would sending medics have established our power projection capabilities, exactly? ..
"All are welcome" is very well in theory, but the fact is, leadership of the UN mandate invariably devolves to members of the P5-- in this case the US, UK and France. They are the ones who ultimately decide the composition of the task force and delegate the roles to be played within it. They have made no secret of wanting GCC armed forces to get involved in the Libyan NFZ, but again, I haven't heard a word from them encouraging Indian involvement... only sniping by their pet mongrels in the media about "BRIC" hypocrisy, etc.

1. I am just curious to know the where it is on the scale, other than a 0. Sending medics, would at the very least, shown solidarity to the people of Libya. IMO there was a need to take sides. What India is saying is that is OK with dictators. In all likelyhood someone from Indian Oil is still holding deeds worth $4B from Saddam's era. (Same for ONGC for gas from Burma)
2. I do not care for the pet mongrels or blame them becuase they are in 1 of the 2 categories - 1 those feel let down by India's non-performance and want to know What are India's strategic objectives and What is India willing to do, to attain them.
The other are who are paid to be ignorant, who really not critical of India's abstention at UNSC per se, but India itself. They should also, not be allowed to hold the narrative.
3. P3 out of P5 because wikileaks do not happen with the other 2. If they did, not difficult to imagine the fate of the people who will do that, same day firing squad.

To devise a game effectively we must have intimate knowledge of the gameboard. The Pentagon's New Map is exactly that... a realistic assessment of the gameboard at the time of writing, plus a vision of how the gameboard should ideally appear, in order to best serve US interests. Only on that solid foundation can strategies be devised and implemented to go from point A to point B.
Do we have a South Block's New Map? Let's start by making one. I would suspect that on such a gameboard, Libya (given the stakes, risks and rewards) would simply not be in play for any of our opening moves. Bahrain, on the other hand, might be... we will have to watch that carefully.

I would see it as a failure of policy, in case, US punishes TSP militarily and without India getting a piece of the action from the start. Because, per Mirza Alsam Beg, TSP would nuke India, anyways. For India to then join the fight after having missed all opportunities to shape - prevent or limit - the battleground.
Also, for the same reason, I would also see it as failure of strategy and its inability to in case India decides to punish TSP without US on board, only because the job will get done quicker. If TSP is solved for India, for the US, Iran with a pretense of nuclear weapons, ceases to be a threat too.

[shiv]

Coalition against Libya


Roman Empire

[shyamd]

My blog post on situation in the MENA region at the moment and what to expect.
Quick Update: Libya + GCC

Here is a short update on Libya as well as the GCC.


Libya

* We expect to see more coalition strikes on Gaddafi's armed forces. In particular we expect Libyan tanks and other artillery equipment to be destroyed over the next few days.
* If a settlement is to be agreed, we expect the country to be split into 2 - Tripolitania and Cyrenica. Where Gaddafi will retain control of the West (Tripolitania) with the rebels holding the East (Cyrenica).
* The person running the rebellion is Gaddafi's former interior minister Younis Al Obaidi, who is backed by a few military officers.
* One of the officers backing Obaidi is supposedly close to the US pentagon. As the WSJ had reported the Libyan National Council can rely on arms supplies coming from over the border in Egypt that is indeed partly financed by the KSA.
* Obaidi's aim is to recapture Adjdabia from the Gaddafi forces, since the western coalition air force is taking out any Gaddafi forces on the main highways. Once this is complete, we believe he will head for the coastal oil transportation hubs - especially Ras Lanouf ( a site of a major oil export terminal).
* Capture of these oil export terminals would mean oil revenues and hence greater viability of the state of Cyrenica. Establishing a state of Cyrenaica is the minimum the rebels aim to achieve at the moment.
* A problem Obaidi is facing is that the force is filled with enthusiastic civilians who have very little military training.
* Meanwhile Gaddafi is aiming to grab Zintan and Misrata as well as other Western towns. These cities would be important to be able to stabilise the Tripolitania region.
* We expect additional political appointments to be made over the coming week - we strongly expect Ali Issawi (the former Ambassador to India) to be given a very senior posting - either in Foreign Affairs or Economy.
* We believe most western capitals are now debating on the end game in Libya - as in what the west hopes to achieve in Libya. Also at what point do they cease military operations.

----------------------

Thank you for reading. Feel free to email us any questions you have to eye.on.middleeast "at" gmail "dot" com.

[shiv]

Pisko-wise - we are all exposed to moralistic tales about the big bully who bullies the small helpless child - and the story does not go much further than bully being disciplined and the bullied being avenged. Nothing is said about the possibility that the bullied child may himself end up being a wife beater or a rapist in a self feeding cycle that invites further punishment.

Again very little is said about the thoughts of the bully. He may be a bully, but his intelligence in recognizing who is weak and what fights he will win go un noticed and un-praised. Also unnoticed is his Sun-Tzutiyapanti in instinctively understanding that if he bullies X, then Y and Z will hesitate to pick on him - even though he may not be strong enough to bully Y and Z. He automatically becomes leader of pack by being the bully.

So there is an entire soap opera of emotions and motivations that are left out of the simplistic bully story we are taught to love.

The US and the colonial powers before them were bullies who picked on those whom they could bully. This can be praised as intelligent and Chankian as long as you are not tied down by the moralistic bull of bullies bullying the poor ickle bullied.

Time pass onlee..

[Sanku]

Sanku ji, if I was in your place I would beam in a smile if I was given such an attribution. I would take it as a compliment.

Perhaps in the context that the statement was made I did take it as a compliment

We have stayed away from helping opposition to totalitarian regimes that have already proven hostile to India - even before - during the late 40's and 1950's Korean war crisis, when there was a chance to fix Tibet..

B-ji; I am not the one to worry about consequences in the sense you mentioned, but nevertheless you would agree that in SOME cases the best course of action is INDEED doing nothing.

What I am trying to say that the action of inaction is thoroughly discredited by GoI using that C-excuse at every possible opportunity. However that does not discredit the concept at its root.

If there was a fit case for inaction as action. Then IMVHO this is it.

[Pranav]

Here is an article from 2009:

Is Libya Going To Boot U.S. Oil Companies?
Christopher Helman 01.22.09, 10:09 AM ET

Houston -

HOUSTON -- On Wednesday Libya's President Muammar Gaddafi made a bad week for ConocoPhillips even worse. Talking with Georgetown University students via satellite, he said, according to Reuters, that oil prices ($43/barrel Wednesday) were "unbearable" and that Libyan oil "maybe should be owned by national companies or the public sector at this point, in order to control the oil prices, the oil production or maybe to stop it."

"We may refuse to sell it at this very low price," he added.

ConocoPhillips operates the Waha concession, Libya's biggest collection of fields, producing some 300,000 barrels of oil per day. It's unknown how much Waha production was affected by Gaddafi's order last month to reduce Libyan oil production by 270,000 bpd to 1.4 million bpd.

Last Friday the company pre-announced write-downs of $34 billion, 1,400 layoffs and a sad sack 30% reserve replacement rate for 2008. No better time to bury bad news than the Friday before the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday and Barack Obama's inauguration. By the time ConocoPhillips officially releases fourth-quarter results Jan. 28, investors might be less fixated on the mistakes of the past and more worried about the risks of the future in Libya.

Is Libya about to take the lead of its friends in Venezuela and Russia and launch a new round of energy-sector nationalism? The thought sends a shiver through the collective spines of ConocoPhillips, Marathon Oil, Occidental Petroleum, Amerada Hess and Royal Dutch Shell. All have made massive new investments in Libya since Gaddafi renounced his nuclear weapons program, made reparations for past terrorist activities like the Lockerbie jetliner bombing and returned to the fold of seemingly responsible nations.

Libyan newspapers have been actively discussing nationalization in recent weeks as a response to crude prices plunging 75% from last year's highs. "We are facing a difficult situation. We hope that the prices will go up again, say $100 a barrel, so that this idea would be discarded, to stop this idea of calling for nationalization," Ghaddafi said Wednesday.

Conoco was an original member, with Marathon and Hess, of the so-called Oasis group that discovered some of Libya's most prolific oil fields back in the 1960s and operated there until the enactment of U.S. sanctions in 1986. In 2005 the trio agreed to pay Libya $1.8 billion to get back in to the Waha concession, comprised of a $1.3 billion fee and $500 million for improvements Libya's national oil company had made in their absence. They got a 25-year lease and 40% collective stake in fields that produce on the order of 250,000 barrels a day, with ample opportunities for further development.

For its share, some 48,000 bpd (2% of the company's total daily output), ConocoPhillips forked over more than $700 million. It expects to amortize that investment over decades. But if Gaddafi takes his cues from buddies Vladimir Putin and Hugo Chavez and moves to dilute western oil companies' stakes, ConocoPhillips might soon have to add Libya to its list of write-downs (which included the $7.2 billion impairment in value of its 20% stake in Russia's Lukoil and $25.4 billion of goodwill, most tied to the 2006 acquisition of Burlington Resources).

The three strongmen are proven comrades. Gaddafi has hosted Venezuelan President Chavez in Libya at least four times in recent years and in 2004 bestowed on Chavez his human rights award for "fighting imperialism," (i.e., George W. Bush and ExxonMobil, among others). Putin, last April, made a state visit to Tripoli accompanied by Gazprom execs and a group from Italian energy company ENI. Putin forgave Gaddafi several billion dollars in Soviet era debt in exchange for Gaddafi agreeing to buy many more billions of weapons from Russia. Gazprom soon swapped ENI's stake in Libya's 100,000 bpd Elephant field for some arctic assets.

In October Russian warships stopped in Tripoli on their way to Venezuela. In November, Gaddafi made his first visit to Moscow since the Soviet era. Discussions with Putin and President Dimitri Medvedev reportedly involved visions of a gas cartel that would include Russia, Libya, Iran, Algeria and some Central Asian nations.

Gazprom is most interested in getting control of ENI's Greenstream natural gas pipeline, which runs 370 miles across the Mediterranean from Libya to Sicily, delivering as much as 1 billion cubic feet of gas a day. Just one more energy lever a Moscow-led gas cartel could use against Europe.

There's little reason to believe that Gaddafi wouldn't selectively target U.S. oil company assets for partial nationalization. Though U.S. oil companies lobbied Congress to have Libya excluded from a U.S. terrorism compensation law, Libya ended up shelling out $1.5 billion last October to settle all claims by U.S. citizens for damages caused by past state terrorism.

It's enchanting, almost, that Gaddafi hasn't softened with age, that his revolutionary zeal is alive and well. During the Q&A with Georgetown students yesterday, he showed the yawning gap between U.S. and Libyan foreign policy: "Terrorism is a dwarf, not a giant. I think Osama bin Laden should be given a chance to reform and redirect his followers if he wants a dialogue." U.S. oil companies should brace themselves to leave Libya yet again.

http://www.forbes.com/2009/01/22/libya- ... libya.html

[Pranav]

To some in Libya, ‘Brother Leader’ Gaddafi still a hero
By Liz Sly, Thursday, March 24, 11:25 PM

But six days into the allied bombardment of Libyan military targets, it is clear that Gaddafi can count on the fierce loyalties of at least a significant segment of the population in the vast stretches that lie beyond the enclave of rebel-held territory in the east.

“We don’t want anyone except him,” gushed Fatima al-Mishai, 20, who joined the crowds assembled at Gaddafi’s Bab al-Aziziyah compound to offer their services as voluntary human shields against the bombs. “He gave us freedom and everything we need.”

Indeed, the Libyan government has kept average incomes relatively high, while doling out generous social benefits, including health care and education. ...

In Green Square, small crowds of Gaddafi supporters sustain what is supposed to be a permanent vigil of chanting, dancing and singing in celebration of the so-called perpetual revolution. They are watched over by matronly female guards dressed in camouflage and armed with shiny new AK-47s.

“He made me feel like a free man. If I don’t hurt anyone, I’m free in my own environment,” said Majdi Daba, a 42-year-old dentist who was born the year Gaddafi wrested power from Libya’s monarchy. Majdi said he goes to the square every day. “Gaddafi gives us advice, that’s all, and when he dies, 7 million people will rule themselves.”

The regime’s opponents, he said, are interested only in making more money, while most Libyan people are satisfied that the government adequately supports their needs.

“It’s not complicated,” he said. “This place is different from Egypt. There, a lot of people are poor, a lot of people are hungry, but here there are no poor people, no hungry people.”

Libya’s role as a sparsely populated, oil-rich state may go some way toward explaining why Gaddafi has been able to retain the support he has. Libya is nearly twice as big as Egypt, yet contains less than one-tenth as many people. Per capita incomes are more than double those in Egypt, where a successful revolt last month inspired Libyans to take to the streets.

The government funds generous social welfare programs that include free education and health care, helping keep at bay the poverty that has fueled discontent elsewhere.

“He has done a lot for the country and no one can deny it,” said Mustafa Fetouri, director of the MBA program at the Academy of Graduate Studies in Tripoli. “He’s built hospitals, schools, roads, lots of things.”

Moreover, he said, the powerful tribal structure that forms the backbone of the government has remained behind Gaddafi, despite initial reports in the early days of the uprising that powerful tribal leaders had defected. Gaddafi has apparently been helped in this regard by making good on a pledge to distribute weapons.

“There are two kinds of people: those who believe in the regime itself and just don’t care too much about freedom, and then there is the tribal structure, which is behind him,” he said. “The support of the tribes goes beyond Gaddafi to his tribe, and to their relationship with his tribe, which predates Gaddafi. It’s nothing to do with Gaddafi.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/cri ... print.html

[Singha]

the roads we see in pix are definitely very good.

[ramana]

ShyamD, Agree looks like a Sudan solution is in the cards. I think Gaddafi will retake Mishrata and consolidate the Western Libya.

If you see the map of Ancient Mediterranean, posted by Shiv (thanks) Tripoli is old time Carthage in Numidia (Hannibal etc) hence the Italian interest. And Cyrene is Benghazi now. The map also explains the Crusades as tug of war to control the Mediterranean under the war of religions.

It was another attempt by the West trying to conquer the East, a reverse of the all the ancient wars and ended in failure. We now understand that colonialiasm as to bypass that is to go around the wall of the West Asia-North Africa (WANA).

The more things change the more they remain the same due to terrain.

[ramana]

X-posting as it gives an idea of the Costs of NFZ to the NFZ coalition:

Interesting article on the costs of Rafale and Eurofighter ops ... See towards the end of the article ...

This is the source ...
LINK

Libya no-fly zone cost could hit $1bn in months

Destroying Gaddafi air defense could cost $800 million
By Reuters Published Wednesday, March 23, 2011

France, which has mobilised about 100 warplanes - mainly Rafale and Mirage 2000 jets - was the first country to overfly the rebel bastion of Benghazi last, using 20 warplanes for air strikes after the go-ahead for a no-fly zone. (AFP)

The no-fly zone over Libya could end up costing the Western coalition more than $1 billion if the operation drags on more than a couple of months, defense analysts say.

Zack Cooper, a senior analyst at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, said the initial cost of eliminating Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's air defenses was likely to be between $400 million and $800 million.

The expense of patrolling the no-fly zone once it is established is likely to be $30 million to $100 million a week, he said.

The U.S. military has no official cost figures yet for the operation, which has been going on less than a week. By comparison, the much more extensive Afghan war costs more than $9 billion a month.
Some U.S. lawmakers and critics of President Barack Obama's decision to join allies in the Libya bombing campaign have argued the United States cannot afford the operation while Congress wrangles over spending cuts and the country's $1.48 trillion deficit.

The Pentagon already has plans to cut $78 billion in defense spending over five years and is delaying weapons programs and putting off maintenance to reduce costs.

The operation unfolding in Libya resembles a scenario for a limited no-fly zone analyzed by Cooper and his colleague Todd Harrison. The scenario assumed a limited no-fly zone covering Libya north of the 29th parallel, not the entire country.

They made their projections by computing the cost per square mile of previous no-fly zones and applying that to the situation in Libya. The price of munitions, jet fuel and maintenance were the primary cost drivers. Their figures reflected the cost over and above regular operations.

One thing Cooper and Harrison had not anticipated was significant coalition support, with allies bearing part of the expense. Cooper said it appeared the United States had flown more than half of the sorties and fired most of the Tomahawks.

"In our analysis, we assumed that the U.S. would be picking up the bulk of the cost," he said. "So even though the U.S. has picked up more than a majority of the cost, I assume, so far, it probably hasn't picked up as much as we estimated."

Cooper said the Tomahawk cruise missiles fired so far by Britain and the United States cost about $200 million, putting the price for taking out Gaddafi's air defenses on target to hit their projection.

"We estimated $400 million to $800 million. Between the Tomahawks and other munitions and flight hours and fuel, it's probably going to be somewhere in that ... range for the initial cost of suppressing the air defenses," he said.

The crash of a U.S. F-15 warplane was an unexpected cost. Cooper said the Pentagon was unlikely to buy another F-15 and probably would replace it with a joint strike fighter, with an estimated price tag of between $100 million and $150 million.

NO 'ROBUST ESTIMATE'

The main European countries enforcing the no-fly zone downplayed the cost of the operation. British Finance Minister George Osborne, whose government has staked its reputation on eliminating the country's budget deficit, told Parliament to expect the cost to be in the tens of millions of pounds.

While saying it was too early for a "robust estimate" of the price of the Libya operations, Osborn projected the costs would be "modest" compared with operations like Afghanistan.

"The Ministry of Defence's initial view is that this will be in the order of the tens of millions not the hundreds of millions of pounds," Osborne said.
But defense analysts warned that British expenses for even a limited operation like Libya could quickly add up. Analyst Francis Tusa told BBC Radio 4 the missions flown so far cost Britain about 200,000 pounds ($325,000) per aircraft, with missiles running 800,000 pounds ($1.3 million) apiece.

With Britain flying 10 Typhoon fighters to patrol the no-fly zone, "you'll be looking at potentially 2, 3 million pounds a day ($3.25 million to $5 million)," he said.

French analysts also attempted to downplay the expense, saying the intervention was likely to cost Britain and the United States much more since they used pricier weapons.

"It's peanuts," said Jean Dominique Merchet, editor of blog secretdefense on military affairs. It costs about 30,000 euros ($45,000) per hour to operate a Rafaele fighter, he said, but most would have been in the air at least an hour a day anyway.
But Pierre Tran, Paris bureau chief for specialist weekly Defense News, said even though France was using less expensive munitions, the costs would quickly begin to add up.
"If this campaign goes on for very much longer, it would be costly in terms of fuel consumed, flying hours for the pilots, and eventually munitions used," he said.

Something to think about for India.