Gadhafi is Dead!!

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22-10-2011, 11:16 PM
coldvvvave

Quote:

Originally Posted by kirrus

I think you've been listening to too much propaganda.

I was half-joking the whole time, still. What propaganda? Whos propaganda? You think First Channel is brainwashing Russians into 'Run for the hills, NATO is coming'? No.

Quote:

Originally Posted by kirrus

No-one is touching russia, you've got Nukes.

Nukes don't just fly by themselves( and I believe fabled Dead Hand is just a myth), theres gotta be someone who orders stuff to happen and loyal generals who execute orders. Basically, some El Presidente guy( you think Putin is some 'strongman'? He was who exactly in KGB? 'Legal' spy attached to embassy in Germany?) have to choose between MAD and Nobel Prize for Peace with some cash. And his generals too. Some hard choices, like asking a child if he wants candy or if he wants to be beaten with a baseball bat repeatedly.
22-10-2011, 11:39 PM
Joseph-Sulphur

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rii

At worst? I'd say at best.

I'd say a dictator overthrown by a movement with clear popular backing is a good result. I'm not going to quibble over the details. Radical nutjobs don't need any help from us to spin propaganda.
22-10-2011, 11:46 PM
Rii

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joseph-Sulphur

I'd say a dictator overthrown by a movement with clear popular backing is a good result.

I was talking about from the self-interested perspective of (in this case) the United States. You don't need to be a pacifist socialist hippie to oppose most of what the US did post-9/11, you just need a brain.
23-10-2011, 12:11 AM
Joseph-Sulphur

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rii

I was talking about from the self-interested perspective of (in this case) the United States. You don't need to be a pacifist socialist hippie to oppose most of what the US did post-9/11, you just need a brain.

I'm not talking about the gagglefucks in Afghanistan and Iraq. I'm wondering how Gaddafi being overthrown could be a bad thing for the USA.
23-10-2011, 12:28 AM
Rii

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joseph-Sulphur

I'm not talking about the gagglefucks in Afghanistan and Iraq. I'm wondering how Gaddafi being overthrown could be a bad thing for the USA.

For the same reason the US supports all those other dictatorships throughout the region: the likely alternatives don't serve US interests. As with Hussein, Qaddafi was just unfortunate enough to find himself on the wrong side of a mercurial United States, an irrational exception to a rational (if short-sighted and entirely amoral) policy. And as with Hussein and Iraq, the toppling of Qaddafi's regime may yet prove damaging to US interests.
23-10-2011, 12:48 AM
Joseph-Sulphur

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rii

For the same reason the US supports all those other dictatorships throughout the region: the likely alternatives don't serve US interests. As with Hussein, Qaddafi was just unfortunate enough to find himself on the wrong side of a mercurial United States, an irrational exception to a rational (if short-sighted and entirely amoral) policy. And as with Hussein and Iraq, the toppling of Qaddafi's regime may yet prove damaging to US interests.

Mercurial? So if the USA (and more importantly France and the UK) decide to militarily support a democratic revolution it must be because they are acting irrationally? I mean why else would they abandon their evil manipulation of puppet tyrants?
The US has gone at least some way to restoring good relations with the Arab world and removed a head of state who was an unreliable ally at best, compared to the NTC who are grateful to the US for obvious reasons. I'd say that's quite beneficial.

Also, I'm fed up with this narrative of the West 'supporting' dictators. Many countries in the world are run by dictatorships or at least in an undemocratic fashion, and pretty much every Middle Eastern country is (apart from Israel and Turkey). We can't just completely cut off these countries because of the nature of their government. For example people make a big deal out of the US selling Mubarak's regime F-16s and M1 Abrams, but arms sales were/are an important part of the ongoing peace brokered between Egypt and Israel. I for one would rather sell a shady autocrat some fancy new war toys than have another Arab-Israeli war.
23-10-2011, 01:07 AM
Rii

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joseph-Sulphur

Mercurial? So if the USA (and more importantly France and the UK) decide to militarily support a democratic revolution it must be because they are acting irrationally?

No, supporting the revolution was a calculated decision. I'm talking about the United States' hostility towards Libya before that.

France (not being possessed of the United States' irrational dislike for Qaddafi) had been negotiating to sell Rafales to Libya before all this Arab Spring stuff started. Now that would've made for some interesting PR footage.

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The US has gone at least some way to restoring good relations with the Arab world and removed a head of state who was an unreliable ally at best, compared to the NTC who are grateful to the US for obvious reasons. I'd say that's quite beneficial.

Not really, no. The policies, implications and so on are matters of decades, not weeks. It wasn't immediately apparent just how much of a disaster Iraq would turn out to be for America either.

Quote:

Also, I'm fed up with this narrative of the West 'supporting' dictators. Many countries in the world are run by dictatorships or at least in an undemocratic fashion, and pretty much every Middle Eastern country is (apart from Israel and Turkey). We can't just completely cut off these countries because of the nature of their government.

I think the citizens in the region would be satisfied if the United States (and, yes, the rest of the west) merely ceased actively supporting the regimes in question. The United States doesn't record >90% unfavourables in polls of the Arab world and Middle East because it refuses to let Joe Arab Citizen starve -- indeed we know from Iraq in the 90s* that the west has no problem with doing exactly that when it feels like it.

* That is, most recently.; the citizens of many other nations (perhaps most notably Russia following the revolution) have similarly been left to starve by the west when convenient.
23-10-2011, 01:17 AM
Nalano

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rii

And as with Hussein and Iraq, the toppling of Qaddafi's regime may yet prove damaging to US interests.

Different problems.

Iraq was stable, if repressed, and the people disliked our foreign policy of arming Hussein so he could butt heads with Iran almost as much as they disliked Hussein. Our "regime change" was a unilateral push by the American military, costing some two trillion dollars and counting, that ended in the deaths of more civilians than Hussein's entire reign and resulted in a power vacuum that ended up in a civil war/ethnic cleansing between the Sunni and Shiite sects in the country, to say nothing of how all the stops were released when it came to the Kurds, that slowed down only when districts started looking very monolithic demographically.

Egypt was something of a velvet revolution and all we did was (belatedly) give lip service to the revolutionaries and suggest that Mubarak step down, which resulted in goodwill to the States for not turning it into another Iraq.

Libya was already in a civil war when we started paying attention to it, was fought on the ground entirely by Libyan revolutionaries, and we got the result we wanted - Qaddafi gone and goodwill towards the States for not turning it into another Iraq - in said civil war at the relatively cheap cost of one billion dollars' worth of small arms and bombs (and, funny enough, France was the first NATO country to drop them).

Pretty much the lion's share of ill will towards the United States in the Middle East revolves around when we directly invade and when we give Israel carte blanche to ignore world and Arab opinion. Yes, changing that impression will take decades, not weeks, but acting in good faith - and not, for instance, throwing Turkey under the bus when they complain about Israel's bloodthirsty response to the Gaza flotilla, and not, for instance, throwing Egypt under the bus when they expel Israel's consuls for the same reason, and not, for instance, throwing Palestine under the bus by blocking their UN request for recognition of statehood - is a great way to start on that path.
23-10-2011, 01:44 AM
Rii

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nalano

Libya was already in a civil war when we started paying attention to it, was fought on the ground entirely by Libyan revolutionaries, and we got the result we wanted - Qaddafi gone and goodwill towards the States for not turning it into another Iraq - in said civil war at the relatively cheap cost of one billion dollars' worth of small arms and bombs (and, funny enough, France was the first NATO country to drop them).

I'm not saying it was the wrong thing to do, all I'm saying is that it's yet to be demonstrated that the results will serve US interests. I personally think they will, but insofar as the United States has traditionally conceived its interests (where 'not being hated by everyone' barely rates a mention even post-9/11) that's far from certain. Qaddafi persecuted Islamists too.
23-10-2011, 09:18 AM
Xercies

Nah it definitely serves the US interests in one field, the new Libyan government will be very happy to sell oil to them at maybe a friends rate because they helped, probably the same with Britain. It doesn't really matter what anything else happens. Sure it might benefit them more that the new Libyans start you know helping around the area maybe, but that's just a nice bonus on top of the oil reward.
23-10-2011, 01:09 PM
Joseph-Sulphur

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rii

No, supporting the revolution was a calculated decision. I'm talking about the United States' hostility towards Libya before that.

France (not being possessed of the United States' irrational dislike for Qaddafi) had been negotiating to sell Rafales to Libya before all this Arab Spring stuff started. Now that would've made for some interesting PR footage.

Lots of western leaders (especially Tony Blair) were cosying up to Gaddafi over the past decade. That doesn't make it hypocritical to fight him when he starts ordering airstrikes on protesting civilians.

Quote:

Not really, no. The policies, implications and so on are matters of decades, not weeks. It wasn't immediately apparent just how much of a disaster Iraq would turn out to be for America either.

Oh right, I thought you actually had some reasoning to back your point up, as opposed to 'It'll all go wrong in the long term, because Iraq'.

Quote:

I think the citizens in the region would be satisfied if the United States (and, yes, the rest of the west) merely ceased actively supporting the regimes in question. The United States doesn't record >90% unfavourables in polls of the Arab world and Middle East because it refuses to let Joe Arab Citizen starve -- indeed we know from Iraq in the 90s* that the west has no problem with doing exactly that when it feels like it.

Oh give over, I'm not talking about selling food to these countries for fucks sake. I'm talking about the diplomatic horsetrading that you have to engage in to get anything done in that region. So on one hand you don't want the USA to be the world's policeman, but on the other hand you want the USA to cease all diplomatic relations with non-democratic countries? Considering how important the Middle East is that isn't going to happen.
Joe Arab Citizen hated the USA long before Iraq, due to the USA's constant support for Israel but more importantly because Joe Arab Citizen is extremely religious, uneducated and easily manipulated by Mullah's serving their own agenda. A widespread belief in the Arab world is that the USA is controlled by a sinister Jewish conspiracy which is also trying to destroy Islam, partly through Pokemon.
23-10-2011, 03:41 PM
Taidan

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joseph-Sulphur

A widespread belief in the Arab world is that the USA is controlled by a sinister Jewish conspiracy which is also trying to destroy Islam, partly through Pokemon.

Iruno, sounds quite feasible to me.
23-10-2011, 05:08 PM
Nalano

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rii

I'm not saying it was the wrong thing to do, all I'm saying is that it's yet to be demonstrated that the results will serve US interests. I personally think they will, but insofar as the United States has traditionally conceived its interests (where 'not being hated by everyone' barely rates a mention even post-9/11) that's far from certain. Qaddafi persecuted Islamists too.

"I'm not saying it was the wrong thing to do, I'm just saying it was the wrong thing to do."

Yes, oh great swami.

Anyway, apropos of nothing, I don't understand articles like this. "It was a mistake to kill Qaddafi," like we should have a say in the matter.

Now, I'm not saying the rebels were thinking about it at the time, but if they actually thought, "do we do him now or take him to the Hague," they'd probably have shot him a few more times in the face to make sure.

Yeah, let's show our support for this populist uprising by making sure the guy who's been killing them all these years gets to live a bit longer while northern Europeans - who, of course, always had North Africans' best interests at heart - deliberate over how civilized they can be to a mass-murderer.

How very paternalist.
23-10-2011, 09:34 PM
Taidan

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nalano

Now, I'm not saying the rebels were thinking about it at the time, but if they actually thought, "do we do him now or take him to the Hague," they'd probably have shot him a few more times in the face to make sure.

Yeah, let's show our support for this populist uprising by making sure the guy who's been killing them all these years gets to live a bit longer while northern Europeans - who, of course, always had North Africans' best interests at heart - deliberate over how civilized they can be to a mass-murderer.

How very paternalist.

When I read that lot, the first thing I heard in reply was Alan Rickman berating you using a bad German accent.
24-10-2011, 08:45 AM
Xercies

Quote:

Joe Arab Citizen is extremely religious, uneducated and easily manipulated by Mullah's serving their own agenda. A widespread belief in the Arab world is that the USA is controlled by a sinister Jewish conspiracy which is also trying to destroy Islam, partly through Pokemon.

Wide sweeping generalisation on a place and people.
24-10-2011, 01:52 PM
Joseph-Sulphur

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xercies

Wide sweeping generalisation on a place and people.

It's a fact that most Arabs have pretty crazy views on Jewish influence on the world, and are extremely religious (by western standards).
24-10-2011, 02:40 PM
kataras

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joseph-Sulphur

It's a fact that most Arabs have pretty crazy views on Jewish influence on the world, and are extremely religious (by western standards).

Eh I don't agree... Religiosity varies according to country in the middle east, for example Lebanon is not so religious as Syria, even though they re next to each other etc. It might be a more traditional area but France is a very traditional country and it is supposed to be secular officially. So I guess that's very subjective.

But I think the main point of all this is that this is a 'revolution' run by spooks and Western military (remember the SAS who got caught in the beginning? At the same time France was promised the exploitation of more than 50% of the country's oil if they win) and fought by tribes who oppose Gaddafi because they have their own power plans... (quite a few people on the Council were closely connected to the Gaddafi regime for years). It is not like what was going on in Tunisia and Egypt. It's for financial and geopolitical gain pure and simple, just like every other decision the US or UK or France take... Supporting a dictator or his enemies is only a matter of strategy, no matter how they choose to frame it later, I think. Eventually, It might backfire on the US, just like their support of the Afghans vs the Soviets did in the long run. Or maybe it won't, depends on the agenda of the Council and how their western 'allies' play them.
24-10-2011, 04:08 PM
Anthile

So. Gaddhafi is dead. Bin Laden has croaked. Saddam is gone too. Looks like only Kim Jong Il is left on the list.
24-10-2011, 04:11 PM
Joseph-Sulphur

Quote:

Originally Posted by kataras

Eh I don't agree... Religiosity varies according to country in the middle east, for example Lebanon is not so religious as Syria, even though they re next to each other etc. It might be a more traditional area but France is a very traditional country and it is supposed to be secular officially. So I guess that's very subjective.

Well some of the Sunnis in Lebanon aren't very religious, but the Shiites who support Hezbollah are much more conservative, and far less secular.

Quote:

But I think the main point of all this is that this is a 'revolution' run by spooks and Western military (remember the SAS who got caught in the beginning?

Those men were arrested as they were trying to actually make contact with the rebels. It's ridiculous to say that the revolution was 'run' by Western spooks when they needed to send a secret force to actually make contact with the (already established) interim rebel government.

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At the same time France was promised the exploitation of more than 50% of the country's oil if they win) and fought by tribes who oppose Gaddafi because they have their own power plans... (quite a few people on the Council were closely connected to the Gaddafi regime for years).

I'd like to see a source which supports that claim about France, and I'd be especially surprised if this was promised before France actually started bombing Gaddafi's troops. You seem to be forgetting the nature of the beginning of Western intervention in the war, Gaddafi's army was hours away from entering Benghazi. Sarkozy and Cameron had to do a lot of last-minute wrangling to get the USA into the war, and even so French jets were over Libyan airspace long before the US and UK destroyed the Libyan air-defence network with Tomahawks and stealth bombers.

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It is not like what was going on in Tunisia and Egypt. It's for financial and geopolitical gain pure and simple, just like every other decision the US or UK or France take...

Again, this is incredibly patronising towards the Libyans themselves. So because their revolution is supported militarily by the west they can't be the ones determining their own future? It just has to be cynical western politicians manipulating them?

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Supporting a dictator or his enemies is only a matter of strategy, no matter how they choose to frame it later, I think.

As I said earlier on in this thread I'm not a fan of the idea that by dealing with a dictatorship diplomatically we are 'supporting' them. The fact is that completely isolating governments like Gaddafi's usually doesn't work. The West correctly saw that ostracizing Gaddafi Reagan-style wasn't going to help anything, by giving him the option of rejoining the international community we got him to stop financing terrorism and trying to develop nuclear weapons. I find it irritating that people who on one hand are happy to denounce any western involvement in a revolution as sinister manipulation also denounce anything short of complete isolation of such dictators, even though this policy does nothing but hurt the civilians who live there (see the sanctions against Iraq in the '90s).

Quote:

Eventually, It might backfire on the US, just like their support of the Afghans vs the Soviets did in the long run. Or maybe it won't, depends on the agenda of the Council and how their western 'allies' play them.

Ah yes, it seems that nowadays any involvement by the West more substantial than hand-wringing and scolding from the sidelines is automatically equated with having the Taliban turn on us after defeating the Russians. It's ironic how supposed peace advocates end up siding with dictatorships such as Russia, China and Iran who block any UN action more severe than a resolution expressing condemnation out of fear that the world might notice the skeletons in their closet.
I also think its pretty pathetic that you're suggesting that the only way the new Libyan government won't be a radical Islam Taliban-style theocracy is if the West succeeds in 'playing' them... Again, how patronizing is that? Give them a fucking chance.
24-10-2011, 04:32 PM
Ian

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anthile

So. Gaddhafi is dead. Bin Laden has croaked. Saddam is gone too. Looks like only Kim Jong Il is left on the list.

Given that he's the only one (by many) deemend crazy enough to actually push the button if it came to it, do North Korea actually have the weapons to attack long-range? I've no idea if that's the sort of thing that's been whipped up by the media to make them/him seem scarier and more dangerous than is actually the case.

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