Libya - civil unrest & now NATO involvement

[quimcunx]

They were all flocking from Chad, IIRC.

Remarkably little being said or discussed on this other than people on the ground saying ''we were attacked by mercerneries, african from chad, french speaking africans, wearing yellow hats, paid $12k'' type stuff. Media are repeating this but no one seems to be talking about how they were recruited or where from or how they can be stopped from entering.

 

[TheHoodedClaw]

On BBC Someone in an interview just called for a NON flight zone around all Libian cities. Who could impose such a lockdown? The USA perhaps? No doubt their fleets will be in attendance with all that’s going on near “their” Oil.

Listening to the reporting is like listening to wishful thinking, even one of the posts in this thread is naively wishing for US intervention.

The ruling elites must be shitting bricks about all these revolutions. What are the odds on the good old US of A “intervening” in Lybia soon?

Yes, the US could impose a no-fly zone over Libya, with not much notice, having a carrier fleet based in the Med. At least over the cities where the very large bulk of the population lives. This is a terrible idea, however, and it looks like it's not on the agenda anyway. The US administration seems like it is just letting the cards fall as they may, well, at least for public consumption. The oil thing doesn't matter too much, the concern is temporary disruption to extraction and supply rather than anything, but it is a commodity that is too valuable not to sell, regardless of the regime selling it.

 

[DrRingDing]

We're talking about military action. There will be none - despite what this nutjob thinks.

Overt of course not.

 

[Anudder Oik]

Anyone wondering about military intervention, no fly zones and the like.

Don't look to the EU. Remember when the Muslims were being slaughtered in the former Yugoslavia and what did the EU do? Sweet nothing.

The only hope for a no fly zone is the US military.

Of course I could be wrong, but I doubt it.

Don't wish for a US intervention. They are NOT the owners of the world. They don't care about Libians. They just need their fix of oil. Hopefully the revolution will win before the US gets their act together.

 

[elbows]

Sounds like the Libyan deputy foreign minister has been on Al Jazeera Arabic and was repeatedly trying to stir up trouble for Qatar (where AlJazeera is based & funded by the Qatari royals), mentioning all sorts of things that he hoped would be controversial topics in Qatar, asking AlJazeera why they didnt talk about those things.

 

[quimcunx]

They did actually talk to some Qatari minister earlier. He denounced Gadafi violence.

 

[Maurice Picarda]

Remarkably little being said or discussed on this other than people on the ground saying ''we were attacked by mercerneries, african from chad, french speaking africans, wearing yellow hats, paid $12k'' type stuff. Media are repeating this but no one seems to be talking about how they were recruited or where from or how they can be stopped from entering.

It's one of the most interesting things about this: hadn't really thought before about what you do when you still have access to the treasury while the army can't be trusted and protests need to be crushed, but mercenaries are a better solution than asking the secret police to step in, Cairo-style. I'm sure a historian would tell me that it's been done a thousand times before though.

Difficult to believe that it's easy to mobilise enough mercenaries to frustrate domestic armed forces for long, anyway.

 

[butchersapron]

Overt of course not.

A secret battalion of shock troops. Yes. Off you go.

 

[TheHoodedClaw]

The Al Jazeera figures are that Italy gets a fifth of its oil from Libya.

What difference does that make? Italy might have a trading deal with Libya, but it's not like Italy can't get oil from anywhere else. The word is "fungible"

 

[butchersapron]

Who works at the oil places? Are they trained locals? Outsiders? How recruited if the latter?

 

[Idaho]

This thread has become like an unmoderated you tube thread.

 

[hipipol]

I hope so kuch the people prevail

They deserve better

The Chadians are prob the team that Ghad-nutter has sponsored for years ( with a number of Saudi funders....)

 

[quimcunx]

This has just come up on facebook feb 17 2011 page.

my brother this news confirmed by the sources of the system, of course I can not reveal my identity to the sensitivity of my site, but received some of the more than a source of confidence that the officers had met al-Qadhafi and asked him to leave, but he refused, the officers are the commander of the Committee Interim Defence, Major General Abu Bakr Younis, commander of the mechanisms Hamad General Aoun, after the rejection of Gaddafi told him, Major General Aoun Hamad inability to continue work E, and leave the office and went to his house, and Major General Abu Bakr Younis Valmallomp others saying he was detained by the system, because it disappeared after the meeting.
Officer of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya

I make no claim for it's veracity or otherwise. Just quoting it.

 

[AKA pseudonym]

Defection: Libyan pilots ordered to bomb protesters

The pilots of two Libyan fighter jets who landed in Malta on Monday said they had defected after they were ordered to bomb protesters in Benghazi, Maltese military and official sources told AFP.
The two men told Maltese military officers on the ground that they were senior colonels in the Libyan air force and one of them requested asylum, as they were getting out of their single-seater Mirage F1 jets.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

This thread has become like an unmoderated you tube thread.

What?

 

[butchersapron]

This thread has become like an unmoderated you tube thread.

No it hasn't. There's been a couple of uninformed comments by passing idiots. I think we're safe now. Got anything to say?

 

[elbows]

They did actually talk to some Qatari minister earlier. He denounced Gadafi violence.

This one wasnt denouncing Gaddafi, he was talking pro-regime shit, denying many of the things reported have actually happened, apaprently the anchor slapped him down repeatedly which is probably why he started goingon about Qatar.

Havent heard this interview myself as it was on AlJazeera Arabic.

 

[Pickman's model]

Defection: Libyan pilots ordered to bomb protesters

doubling the size of the maltese air force no doubt

 

[elbows]

What difference does that make? Italy might have a trading deal with Libya, but it's not like Italy can't get oil from anywhere else. The word is "fungible"

Im not sure if that concept really does the complex energy supply & security issue justice, but anyways, Im not claiming the Italians are going to start a great big military campaign, or evena little one, so I wont press this issue any further.

 

[quimcunx]

It's one of the most interesting things about this: hadn't really thought before about what you do when you still have access to the treasury while the army can't be trusted and protests need to be crushed, but mercenaries are a better solution than asking the secret police to step in, Cairo-style. I'm sure a historian would tell me that it's been done a thousand times before though.

Difficult to believe that it's easy to mobilise enough mercenaries to frustrate domestic armed forces for long, anyway.

It is quite hard to believe that so many can be mobilised and we don't have any numbers just that they've been seen in Benghazi and Tripoli and poss other places. However I seem to remember something along the lines of more of 'our' 'security forces' in Afghanistan (or Iraq) are private rather than state. I might be getting that all wrong though.

Somehow they are being provided or contracted, that is CONFIRMED, as far as anything is confirmed in this.

 

[elbows]

A more positive rumour than most of the horrific stuff from recent hours:

Iyad El-Baghdadi
Breaking: Soldiers from Migrahi tribe marching towards Sibha in southern #Libya amid reports Gaddafi fled there. #Feb17

 

[Maurice Picarda]

He's still supposed to be making a speech soon, isn't he? BBC still seems to think so.

 

[butchersapron]

The mercenaries ransack the treasury and acclaim a new leader. Not happening here.

 

[Pickman's model]

Im not sure if that concept really does the complex energy supply & security issue justice, but anyways, Im not claiming the Italians are going to start a great big military campaign, or evena little one, so I wont press this issue any further.

yeh. let's not forget what happened the last time the italians tried to have any sort of military campaign in libya

 

[littlebabyjesus]

hard to say, as you say, quimcunx. In a large group of men with brown faces, one or two white or black faces will be noticed and their numbers could quite easily be exaggerated. It seems that they are there, and it's easy to see why they have been brought in, but we can't know their real significance.

 

[elbows]

Wish we had more detail about this:

Breaking Al Jazeera: Statement by Libyan Military Officers asks all members of the Libyan army to join the protesters

 

[DrRingDing]

No it hasn't. There's been a couple of uninformed comments by passing idiots. I think we're safe now. Got anything to say?

pride cometh before the fall

 

[dylans]

It's one of the most interesting things about this: hadn't really thought before about what you do when you still have access to the treasury while the army can't be trusted and protests need to be crushed, but mercenaries are a better solution than asking the secret police to step in, Cairo-style. I'm sure a historian would tell me that it's been done a thousand times before though.

Difficult to believe that it's easy to mobilise enough mercenaries to frustrate domestic armed forces for long, anyway.

Libya has had a fairly complex relationship with Chad throughout the Gaddafi time. It was involved in an on again off again war with Chad from 78 to 87 and even annexed part of Chad after he took power. He has had an on again off again support of various Chad rebel groups throughout his time in power too. The population of northern Chad has close cultural ties to Libya and it is probably through these connections that Gaddafi can utilise armed forces

After seizing power in 1969, Libyan head of state Qadhaafi reasserted Libya's claim to the Aozou Strip, a 100,000-square-kilometer portion of northern Chad that included the small town of Aozou. Libya based its claim on one of several preindependence agreements regarding colonial boundaries, and it bolstered these claims by stationing troops in the Aozou Strip beginning in 1972. (Maps printed in Libya after 1975 included the Aozou Strip within Libya.)

Qadhaafi attempted alliances with a number of antigovernment rebel leaders in Chad during the 1970s, including Goukouni, Siddick, Acyl Ahmat (a Chadian of Arab descent), and Kamougué, a southerner. Goukouni and Acyl were most sympathetic to Qadhaafi's regional ambitions, but these two men clashed in 1979, leading Acyl to form the CDR. After Acyl's death in 1982, Libyan support swung strongly to Goukouni's GUNT.

 

[elbows]

hard to say, as you say, quimcunx. In a large group of men with brown faces, one or two white or black faces will be noticed and their numbers could quite easily be exaggerated. It seems that they are there, and it's easy to see why they have been brought in, but we can't know their real significance.

Yeah, they may be a large factor or maybe a relatively small part of the picture, butcertainly a lot of the rumours in recent days, especially regarding 'africans raping the woman while the men are out' tend to suggest that there are some underlying opinions within Libya which are contributing to this stuff, whether these specific fears are being deliberately stoked by elements within the regime or not is unknown.

 

[quimcunx]

hard to say, as you say, quimcunx. In a large group of men with brown faces, one or two white or black faces will be noticed and their numbers could quite easily be exaggerated. It seems that they are there, and it's easy to see why they have been brought in, but we can't know their real significance.

Woman talking about it now on AJE. In washington DC.