Why did NATO target Gaddafi for elimination?

[OKDem08]

First of all, Gaddafi was on the verge of creating a new banking system that was going to put the IMF, World Bank and assorted other Western bank-sters out of business in Africa. No more predatory Western loans used to cripple African economies, instead, a $42 billion dollar African Investment Bank would be supplying major loans at little or even zero interest rates.

Libya has funded major infrastructure projects across Africa that have begun to link up African economies and break the perpetual dependency on the Western countries for imports have been taking place.

What seems to have finally tipped the balance in favour of direct Western military intervention was the reported demand by Gaddafi that the USA oil companies, which have long been major players in the Libyan petroleum industry, were going to have to compensate Libya to the tune of tens of billions of dollars for the damage done to the Libyan economy by the USA instigated “Lockerbie Bombing” sanctions imposed by the UN in Security Council throughout the 1990s into early 2000s.

more at source:
http://www.ugandacorrespondent.com/articles/2011/08/libya-nato%e2%80%99s-war-lies-worse-than-iraq-war-lies/

[Tx4obama]

1. Gaddafi went on TV and said he was going to massacre the people in Benghazi

The rebels in Benghazi REQUESTED the UN to enact a No-fly-zone.
NATO enacted the N-F-Z.

There is NO need for a conspiracy theory.

[RaleighNCDUer]

2. And backing that up, of course, are the repeated interventions in

Darfur, in the Congo, in Syria, and all those other places where we attacked to keep despots from killing their own people.

[EFerrari]

6. Bahrain, occupied by the Saudiis,

torturing medical personnel who treated protesters, AJ English cone of silence.

[Prometheus Bound]

7. Because Al Jazeera's owners sent troops to support the Bahrain crackdown.

I once did a search of the AJ English website to see if there was any record of that, but couldn't find any articles reporting it.

[EFerrari]

9. Qatar gave the "rebels" their first oil contract

and it is the Little Joe Cartwright of the bombing of Libya. Did very well, is being patted on the back by all the bigger guys.

[Hart2008]

44. Qatari flag flew over Qaddafi palace at Bab-Al-Aziziya before being removed for pictures.

See my post here for the photos:

Qatari flag flew over Qaddafi palace at Bab-Al-Aziziya before being removed for pictures:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1827159

This shows that the propaganda about this being a completely home grown revolution aren't quite true, and that story needs to be reported. Now the Libyan Revolutionary Council wants foreign troops to collect weapons. In the U.S., only Dennis Kucinich has been asking for an investigation of our involvement in this coup.

[phasma ex machina]

11. Greenback loving Sauds can do no wrong. The Sauds and the City of London (with its sidekick America)

are BFF.

[EFerrari]

12. Just so. n/t

[Prometheus Bound]

3. He did not say that. Just did a quick Google.

In an address Thursday evening, Qaddafi proclaimed that the "hour of decision has come" and that his regime would begin "tonight" to put an end to the rebellion.

"The matter has been decided ... we are coming," he said, calling in by telephone to state TV and addressing the people of Benghazi. "There is amnesty for those who throw away their weapons and sits in their house ... No matter what they did in the past, (it's) forgiven," he said.

But for those who resist, he said, "there will be no mercy or compassion."

Qaddafi says his forces would "rescue" the people of Benghazi from "traitors" and warned them not to stand alongside the opposition.

"This is your happy day, we will destroy your enemies," he said. "Prepare for this moment to get rid of the traitors. Tomorrow we will show the world, to see if the city is one of traitors or heroes ... Don't betray me, my beloved Benghazi."

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/03/17/libyan-rebels-ready-stand-benghazi/#ixzz1WIT7LdBo

[RaleighNCDUer]

13. Seems to me that quote specifies that he was targetting a few thousand

armed rebels, not 650,000 civilians.

It was twisted to be interpreted as an urgent call to stop a massacre of civilians, which was never going to happen.

The propaganda worked.

[Prometheus Bound]

16. Yes, when I did my search, I saw many news sources put only: "there will be no mercy or compassion"

They left out the rest. Blatant propaganda, but like you said, it worked.

[Tx4obama]

15. Wow, Fox News as a 'source'? Really?

Your Fox News article is from March, go back further to February.


----

23rd February 2011


SNIP

He called on supporters to take to the streets and attack protesters, who he described as misguided youths and 'drug addicts' fomented by Islamic fundamentalists.

He said: 'You men and women who love Gaddafi ... get out of your homes and fill the streets. Leave your homes and attack them in their lairs.

SNIP

The furious tirade also warned armed demonstrators, those 'who spy for other countries' and 'anyone who undermines the constitution' would face death: 'I am a fighter, a revolutionary from tents ... I will die as a martyr at the end.

'I have not yet ordered the use of force, not yet ordered one bullet to be fired ... when I do, everything will burn.'

SNIP

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1358972/Libya-protests-Gaddafis-rambling-TV-address-Ill-die-martyr.html

[Prometheus Bound]

20. Wow! Daily Mail as a 'source'? Really?

Actually the source I posted was AP. Perhaps you didn't notice.

[Tx4obama]

21. You used an article from the wrong month. His threats were in February, not March.

Go do a search for the speech and you can listen to 'his words', if you don't trust website articles.
I listened to the speech at the time it was given.

[Tx4obama]

26. See comment #24 for more links/sources. n/t

[pinboy3niner]

17. Gaddafi's tanks actually penetrated the city 3/19 following indiscriminate arty and tank shelling

iirc, about 92 people were killed, mostly civilians. Al Jazeera's James Bays and CNN's Arwa Damon were both there at the time, doing live reports.


Bays gave several reports describing how, after shelling Benghazi late Friday night and early Saturday morning (March 18 and 19) with tanks and heavy artillery, Gaddafi forces "punched through" (his words) opposition defenses to enter the city Saturday morning, entering and firing on residential neighborhoods.


Damon's reports Saturday showed footage of the damage in those neighborhoods that morning from shelling, heavy caliber weapons and small firearms before government forces and their tanks either were repelled or withdrew to a short distance outside the city. (Several government tanks were captured by the opposition and were displayed in the city.)


(Edited to correct subject line date from 3/20 to 3/19)

[arikara]

22. faux as an unbiased source?

n/t

[Prometheus Bound]

41. The source is AP. Perhaps you missed that. Let me google it for you.

AP in Washington Post
In an address Thursday evening, Gadhafi proclaimed that the "hour of decision has come" and that his regime would begin "tonight" to put an end to the rebellion.

"The matter has been decided ... we are coming," he said, calling in by telephone to state TV and addressing the people of Benghazi. "There is amnesty for those who throw away their weapons and sits in their house ... No matter what they did in the past, (it's) forgiven," he said.

But for those who resist, he said, "there will be no mercy or compassion."

Gadhafi says his forces would "rescue" the people of Benghazi from "traitors" and warned them not to stand alongside the opposition.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/17/AR2011031700831.html

AP in philly.com
In an address Thursday evening, Gadhafi proclaimed that the "hour of decision has come" and that his regime would begin "tonight" to put an end to the rebellion.

"The matter has been decided . . . we are coming," he said, calling in by telephone to state TV and addressing the people of Benghazi. "There is amnesty for those who throw away their weapons and sit in their house. . . . No matter what they did in the past, forgiven," he said.
http://articles.philly.com/2011-03-18/news/29142306_1_moammar-gadhafi-arab-league-rebel/2

AP in YNET
In an address Thursday evening on state TV, Gaddafi said his forces will begin the assault on Benghazi, proclaiming "the matter has been decided ... we are coming."

He says there would be amnesty for those "who throw their weapons away," but for those who resist "there will be no mercy or compassion."

Gaddafi says his forces would "rescue" the people of Benghazi from "traitors" and warned them not to stand alongside the opposition. "The people will see tomorrow if the city if one of traitors or heroes ... Don't betray me, my beloved Benghazi."
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4044011,00.html

Toronto Star
“The matter has been decided . . . we are coming,” he said. “There is amnesty for those who throw away their weapons and sits in their house . . . No matter what they did in the past, (it’s) forgiven,” he said.

But for those who resist, he said, “there will be no mercy or compassion.”

Gadhafi says his forces would “rescue” the people of Benghazi from “traitors” and warned them not to stand alongside the opposition.

“This is your happy day, we will destroy your enemies,” he said. “Prepare for this moment to get rid of the traitors. Don’t betray me, my beloved Benghazi.”
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/955407--crowds-of-benghazi-protesters-cheer-un-resolution

[EFerrari]

4. No, that's wrong. He said he would show traitors no mercy.

Before you start knocking other people, at least get your own story straight.

[scheming daemons]

5. Yes, yes... Gaddafi is a misunderstood "hero".....

:eyes:

The lengths people will sometimes go to in order to defend a dictator.

[Tx4obama]

27. You are in the wrong month. Go back to February 2011.

See links in comment #24.

[applegrove]

8. +1

[EFerrari]

10. Link? Thanks.

[Distant Observer]

14. This falsehood is repeated, and repeated and repeated -- even with US Senate testimony against it

Prepared statement by

Richard N. Haass

President

Council on Foreign Relations



Before the

Committee on Foreign Relations

United States Senate

First Session, 112th Congress



Hearing on Perspectives on the Crisis in Libya



Mr. Chairman:



Thank you for asking me to appear before this committee to discuss recent U.S. policy toward Libya. Let me make
two points at the outset. First, my statement and testimony reflect my personal views and not those of the Council on
Foreign Relations, which as a matter of policy takes no institutional positions. Second, I will address today’s topic
from two perspectives: first, the lessons to be learned from recent U.S. policy toward Libya, and second, my
recommendations for U.S. policy going forward.



Analysis must be rigorous. In two critical areas, however, I would suggest that what has been asserted as fact was in
reality closer to assumption. First, it is not clear that a humanitarian catastrophe was imminent in the eastern Libyan
city of Benghazi. There had been no reports of large-scale massacres in Libya up to that point, and Libyan society
(unlike Rwanda, to cite the obvious influential precedent) is not divided along a single or defining fault line. Gaddafi
saw the rebels as enemies for political reasons, not for their ethnic or tribal associations. To be sure, civilians would
have been killed in an assault on the city – civil wars are by their nature violent and destructive – but there is no
evidence of which I am aware that civilians per se would have been targeted on a large scale. Muammar Gaddafi’s
threat to show no mercy to the rebels might well have been just that: a threat within the context of a civil war to those
who opposed him with arms or were considering doing so.



Armed intervention on humanitarian grounds can sometimes be justified. But before using military force to save
lives, we need to be sure of the threat; the potential victims should request our help; the intervention should be
supported by significant elements of the international community; the intervention should have high likelihood of
success at a limited cost, including the cost to our other interests; and other policies should be judged to be inadequate.
Not all of these conditions were satisfied in the Libyan case. Such an assessment is essential if we are asking our


troops to put their lives at risk, if we are placing other important interests at risk, and if we are using economic and
military resources that puts our future more at risk.



Second, it was (and is) not obvious that what happened or happens in Libya would or will have significant
repercussions for what happens elsewhere in the region. Libya is not a particularly influential country; indeed,
Gaddafi’s isolation in no small part explains why it was possible to get Arab League and UN support for a resolution
supporting armed intervention. The dynamics in Syria or Bahrain or Egypt, not to mention Iran, Iraq, and Saudi
Arabia, will be determined mostly by local factors and forces and not by what happens in Libya.



American policymakers erred in calling explicitly early on in the crisis for Gaddafi’s removal. Doing so made it far
more difficult to employ diplomacy to help achieve U.S. humanitarian goals without resorting to military force. It
removed the incentive Gaddafi might have had to stop attacking his opponents. The call for Gaddafi’s ouster also put
the United States at odds with much of the international community, which had only signed on to a humanitarian and
not a political mission when voting for UN Security Council resolution 1973. It increased the odds the intervention
would be seen as a failure so long as Gaddafi remained in power. And, as I shall discuss, requiring Gaddafi’s removal
actually makes it more difficult to effect the implemention of UN Security Council Resolution 1973 and stop the
fighting.



Multilateralism is not a reason for doing something. Multilateralism is a mechanism, no more and no less, for
distributing burdens. It can add to the legitimacy of an action; it can also complicate policy implementation. Such
pros and cons need to be assessed. But multilateral support does not make a policy that is questionable on its merits
any less so. To think otherwise is to confuse ends and means.

[Tx4obama]

18. All you have to do is watch Gaddafi's rambling speech he gave in February

to hear what HE said.

[Amonester]

19. "It was a fake" in 5... 4... 3... 2... 1... (n t)

[RaleighNCDUer]

28. And so suddenly, the guy who has been an inveterate liar for 40 years

should now be believed without question.

You never heard of overblown political rhetoric?

The FIRST thing you must learn about politics is watch what they do, not what they say.

(edit for typo)

[phasma ex machina]

23. "The fall of a tyrant and sponsor of terrorism is a great day for freedom-loving people around the

world. But the path to democracy in Libya is not complete, and we must make wise choices to ensure that our national interests are protected," Ms. Palin wrote in a piece published on her Facebook wall.

[Amonester]

29. palin doesn't give a sh*t about the Libyan people

Do you really believe carRbou baRbie has any 'sincere sentiments' for Libyans?

[phasma ex machina]

30. What's your beef with CFR getting a Palin prop for its Amen! corner? nt

[Tx4obama]

33. Sarah Palin does NOT write all that crap that is on her FB page.

She has a ghostwriter.

[OKDem08]

25. Saudi Arabia is a repressive monarchy as well but not a hint of

intervention there: I think we all know why.

[Tx4obama]

24. More LINKS regarding Gaddafi's threats

February 2011

http://wsws.org/articles/2011/feb2011/liby-f23.shtml

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/africa/110222/gaddafi-speech-genocide-libya

[RaleighNCDUer]

31. And know what i notice there?

Those reports were from late February, and by the time NATO intervened in lat March there had been NONE of the slaughters that these reports warned about - the wholesale massacres of thousands, even tens of thousands...the 'house to house' seach by Kaddafi mobs with machetes (come on, really? Machetes? In Libya?).

Over that month there were about 3000 anti-Kadaffi forces and civilians killed. And about 1500 pro-Kaddafi forces killed. Regrettable, tragic, yes, but the Katyn Forest it was not.

You have been successfully propagandized.

[bhikkhu]

32. Here's how it really started:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41794067/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/t/battle-benghazi-how-protesters-seized-city/#.TlnZ3ixWPUA

...and I can't believe we're still having this argument.

You should also note that Libyan oil has been nationalized for a very long time. In 2004 when sanctions were lifted, the oil majors all swept in imagining that Libya might be a new Saudi Arabia, and make everyone rich. After plenty of exploration and contracts, no big new fields were to be found, though enough production was there to make it worth their while to stick around. One drawback was that Gadhafi drove hard bargain - the profit split between state and producer was negotiated at 90/10.

Once Gadhafi is gone, the NTC has reassured the world that all existing contracts will be honored, and once repairs are complete things should be back to business as usual in the oil sector - minus one bloody nutjob at the top.

[pinboy3niner]

35. Thanks--see also Post #17 on the shelling and tank attack on Benghazi nt

[Distant Observer]

34. Gaddafi may have been losing it, but his Libya was never as repressive as many of US Allies in

in the region.

Libya was not on the Human Rights Watch list of "countries that use torture" as were many countries that the US has good relations with in the HRW 2004-2005 survey, including: China, Egypt, Indonesia, Iraq, Israel, Malaysia, Morocco, Pakistan, Russia, Turkey, Uganda, and Uzbekistan.

[Tx4obama]

36. Gaddafi's Libya SHOULD HAVE BEEN on the Human Rights Watch List

Now that all the proof of torture, underground prisons, the starving of prisoners, the disappearing of people, etc is coming out - it is evident that someone dropped the ball by not putting Gaddafi/Libya on the watch list!

[Distant Observer]

50. Of course. LET'S QUICKLY RE-WRITE HISTORY. USA! USA!

[Dokkie]

37. Qaddafi was good for Africa

and bad for the neo colonist and the world bankers and that is why he had to go. I am glad some people are wise enough to see it

War is and always going to be a racket as long as big corporations stand to profit from it

[Odin2005]

39. Gadagoofy is a brutal psychopathic thug.

Just like his buddy Mugabe.

[pinboy3niner]

40. Good like this?

But Colonel Qaddafi’s involvement in sub-Saharan Africa, said J. Peter Pham, editor of the Journal of the Middle East and Africa, has been “nothing short of catastrophic.”


His meddling in Sudan’s Darfur region and arming of Arab militias there helped lead to the rise of the notorious janjaweed, armed groups that have terrorized civilians for years. His support of the former strongman Charles Taylor in Liberia added to the bloodshed and mayhem in that country. His backing of various rebel factions across the Sahara has destabilized Mali, Chad, Niger, Mauritania, Burkina Faso and others, allowing Al Qaeda to grab a foothold in the vast, unpatrolled deserts.


In the 1970s and 1980s, he recruited thousands of Africans into his Islamic Legion, an experimental Muslim army that failed on the battlefield in places like Chad and then sent so many young men drifting back to their home countries embittered — and heavily armed.


The various African wars that Colonel Qaddafi helped stir up “took hundreds of thousands of lives and displaced millions, and their ripple effects continue to this day,” Mr. Pham said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/16/world/africa/16mali.html?_r=2

[Distant Observer]

45. Be assured, there is a certain type of prejudice that cannot be overcome with facts. C'est la vie

[Odin2005]

38. Unrec for pimping a brutal dictator.

[Starry Messenger]

42. recommend

[Fumesucker]

43. Unrec for pimping a brutal dictator who isn't *our* dictator..

The only dictators you are allowed to pimp are those supported by the US government, like in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

Get with the program.

[bluestate10]

46. Because his is a dumbass, a killer and guilty of crimes against humanity. nt

[malaise]

47. Ding ding we have a winner

Imperialists gone mad

[Emelina]

48. Small population, lots of oil, not in debt to IMF...

What a perfect target for a psychopathic set of leaders:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MZCHjGkTPg

When are leaders all take on the Machiavelli way of looking at politics, and the British Empire way of looking at other nations, then of course they were going to serve up Libya on a platter.

[sofa king]

49. Also logistics. But especially oil.

Libya is within the logistic grasp of NATO, meaning that they can ship personnel, materiel, ammunition, food, fuel, and above all fresh water to that place with relative ease.

Most of the other Arab nations are not within NATO's easy reach, with the highly important exception I note below.

But if you ask me, the big kicker is the oil. Right now, we have a ruthless dictator killing his own people to quell yet another facet of the pan-Arabic revolt, in Syria. Assad is in an even worse strategic position than Q was, as his nation is in a position to be blitzkrieged from all directions by superior forces which are already massed within a hundred miles or less of the Syrian border (including the US forces in Iraq, which will never leave for this very reason). One of those jump-off points is from Turkey, which is actually a NATO signatory!

But it's not going to happen, I think because Syria doesn't have any oil worth stealing. So the revolution there will be crushed.

I think anyone who insists on relying on the "because Q is an a-hole" explanation needs to explain why Libya became the target of invasion when a directly comparable event is occurring on NATO's very border, and is being totally ignored. Oil seems to be the most obvious factor in NATO's decision.