Well, that is entirely Gaddafi’s fault, isn’t it? No such has been allowed under his decades of rule. Not the policy of a ruler confident of the people’s support.
I doubt there’s a volunteer army in the world without a few soldiers in it who enlisted out of sheer boredom. But, generally true. But, OTOH, people who will go to war for political abstractions are comparatively rare. The rebels against Gaddafi obviously feel actual grievances, seriously enough that they will risk death to redress them.
Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
John F. Kennedy
If a government does not allow the governed to scrutinise it, to question it, to criticise it and to hold it to account, and if it does not allow them to do so without fear of imprisonment, torture or death, that that government is a tyranny and is unfit to rule.
You mean there’s no reason it can’t be better than Dubai, don’t you?
Libya has wonderful potential for tourism, too, I should think. Convenient to Europe, (probably) cheaper than Egypt, (definitely) less crowded than Egypt, lovely African-Mediterranean coastline, lotsa cool ancient and medieval ruins.
Weellll . . . Nowadays, that makes sense, but let’s not set the “fit to rule” bar at a point where almost no government in human history would have passed it.
No, I don’t think even you really believe that for a moment. Without Gaddafi and his family, what would “loyalists” have to fight for? The regime really has never been about anything else.
Hmm, when NATO started the guy was about to take over Benghazi. Now he seems to be on his back-foot even in the West. I think that this is quite the tide turning, although it wasn’t the magic wand that journalists were expecting. But journos are basically superficial gits anyway.
High speed rail over that geography makes no bloody sense at all. Rational, non-political infrastructure - as anywhere in Africa - I am sure would be of huge value. Even of more value, effective mechanisms and procedures to allow people and goods to cross borders. Far more useful than pissing away money on some damned high speed rail.
Sorry mate, but Libya is not going to be Dubai this century. Just like Malaysia isn’t Singapore. Being Singa wouldn’t be bad, but a city state one can move in ways that one can’t move a country. Although given the whack shite that I have seen Q doing in Africa, if Libya just started spending its money in a half-way sensible fashion (i.e. not completely insane), I am sure that you’d jump light years ahead.
He may mean that, but it aiin’t going to happen. Benchmark Libya against a proper country, Indonesia, Malaysia, not a city state. It simply isn’t fair.
That would probably be true, I have heard absolute horror stories about getting visas to go to Libya from colleagues / friends in various areas. If Libya just had a no-visa tourism policy for Europeans they would do massive business… but attention, you need a hotel infrastructure else one will waste the first impression. Still I can see a start up with open visa, but focused on high end tour operators, while attracting in private capital to invest in and manage a real tourism sector. That could create some serious revenues.
Well, like I said, from my experience in Africa, the most important part is not the pouring of cement, it is addressing the administrative barriers - that is the bloody government that you are so in love with. Make the passage of goods and people practical and effective (which in SSA, I see as the usual failure point, heads of state sign grand treaties and then nothing changes at the border because shitty crappy little functionaries make their money out of imposing controls and thus bribes) and after that works, then pour cement.
Oh, come on. Even I find it ridiculous to completely blame one side for a complicated situation such as this. What have the traitors done to foster a national dialogue? Have they tried to hold talks with representatives of the other side? Have they tried to resolve their differences through peaceful means? Hell, have they even clarified what their goals, aims, and policies actually are?
Absolutely. And the loyalists feel actual loyalty, seriously enough that they **will **risk death to protect the government. Hence the dilemma. Both sides believe in their respective positions strongly enough to die for them. Neither side has exactly made it clear what these positions are, apart from an all-consuming hatred of the other side. I don’t see a magic bullet that will extinguish these differences any time soon. The killing of the good Colonel will not eviscerate the loyalist resistance any more than the killing of the top traitors would convince the rebels to give up and go home. Libya is probably in this civil war for the long haul. Once you start killing your brethren in earnest, it usually proves pretty difficult to stop.
Hah. You severely underestimate the resilience and pride of human beings. What does the Taliban fight for, if it has no real chance of retaking Kabul by military force? What did the French, Polish, Bellorussian, etc. partisans fight for once the NAZIs conquered their homelands?
I get the impression that you take an individual-centered view of conflicts; people fight for other people, and if those other people are removed, they stop fighting. The world doesn’t really work that way, though. People will and do fight to the death for abstract concepts such as freedom. The rebels and the loyalists both have their own views as to what constitutes freedom, and neither side is budging. We have seen this scenario play itself out over and over again, and I do not see it falling by the wayside any time soon.
:dubious: :mad: Is that supposed to be some kind of sick joke?
They fight for the cause of Islamist jihadism and all that. But what would Gaddafi-loyalists-minus-Gaddafi have to fight Libya’s new government for? What cause? What beliefs? What ideology? Nothing. Nothing at all.
To defend their homeland from foreign invaders, which is completely irrelevant to the Libyan Civil War.
Who knows how long that gratitude will last. But, for the moment, it’s significant: Before, we had a country on the Mediterranean whose government was always going out of its way to rattle sabers at the West. And now it looks like we’ll have a government there that feels grateful to the West.
If you watched the Al Jazeera arabic channel the last two nights, in Ben Ghazi square you saw the sea of people and among the revolution flags they also waved the flags of the countries that have supported them.
One should make the comparison with the event in Baghdad of the americans making the photo of pulling down the statue of Sadam and pretending in the photo there were many many Iraqis there, when there were few. This is the difference between genuine revolution and the fake initiative of Bush. The USA and the NATO efforts were attached this time to a real genuine popular movement, and it was evident in the liberation of Tripoli with thousands and thousand coming out despite the great danger. This is the smart way to do things, not to send the American troops in. Give support to those seeking liberation, as in this case.