In 2009 alone, European governments -- including Britain and France -- sold Libya more than $470 million worth of weapons, including fighter jets, guns and bombs. And before it started calling for regime change, the Obama administration was working to provide the Libyan dictator another $77 million in weapons, on top of the $17 million it provided in 2009 and the $46 million the Bush administration provided in 2008.
Meanwhile, for dictatorial regimes in Yemen, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, U.S. support continues to this day. On Saturday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton even gave the U.S. stamp of approval to the brutal crackdown on protesters in Bahrain, saying the country’s authoritarian rulers “obviously” had the “sovereign right” to invite troops from Saudi Arabia to occupy their country and carry out human rights abuses, including attacks on injured protesters as they lay in their hospital beds. "
from : " Instead of Bombing Dictators in Libya and Around the World, Stop Selling Them Bombs If the bitter lesson of Iraq and Afghanistan has taught us anything, it's that wars of liberation exact a deadly toll on those they purportedly liberate." by Medea Benjamin and Charles Davis at Alternet.org, March 23, 2011
The simple and elegant and practical way to stop these dictators, monarchs, generals from oppressing their own people we should first stop selling them billions in arms they don't really need.
This solution is we are told unacceptable to the United States and other arms dealers because they are dependent on the lucrative profits involved in selling armaments.
The other reasons for propping up these dictators or authoritarian rulers include ensuring them as friendly allies who will cater to the wishes and whims of the United States and other Western Nations and their international corporations.
We are told that what's good for Western Corporations and the Western elites is all that really matters and so the subjugation of other supposedly sovereign states is in the interest of the Multinational Corporations, the Arms manufacturers and Arms dealers is what is most important.
Secondly given the influence the United States and European countries have over these various oppressive regimes they should use this leverage to get them to improve their human rights record ie stop torturing prisoners, stop arresting people for criticizing the governments , alow for a free press and Media and the right to protest and freedom of speech and freedom of association.
The problem the United States and other Western Nations and multinationals have is that real democracy is messy at times and unpredictable which leads to some uncertainty and possible instability which the Western interest see as an issue -so they prefer states which are fairly stable with a government which provides continuity and no unwanted surprises.
So American or Western nations prefer stability and continuity over democracy and human rights.
While claiming to champion human rights and democracy the USa has had no problem with selling arms and trading with the most brutal of dictators if the price is right.
There are some hopeful signs that the opposition to Qaddafi is united and is creating a temporary government .
Qaddafi should be pressured into accepting this Interim Government as at least playing a mediation role in negotiating a cease fire .
"Libyan Rebels Form "Interim Government" " by Interpress Service at Truthout, March 23, 2011
Tripoli/Benghazi (IPS/Al Jazeera) - Libya's pro-democracy fighters have formed an "interim government" even as forces backing the country's leader, Muammar Gaddafi, press ahead with attacks against them.
Heading up the new government as an interim prime minister is Mahmoud Jibril, who had been working as a representative to foreign powers.
He is best known on the international stage for meeting Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, which led to France diplomatically recognising the rebels' transitional council as the sole representative of the Libyan people.
Opposition spokesman Nisan Gouriani told Al Jazeera: "The provisional national council is a legislative body, but we need an executive body to take control and provide an administration."
He said the rebels' "position has been very clear from the beginning - that Libya is one unit".
"Our capital is Tripoli and will forever be Tripoli," he said. "We are striving to liberate the western parts of the country, and Tripoli, and keep the country united. We would like to emphasise this over and over again."
The rebels had been wary of calling their nascent administration in their Benghazi stronghold an interim government, seemingly cautious of signifying a split in the country.
"But they remain committed to one Libya," said Al Jazeera's James Bays, reporting from Benghazi. "They want the people of Libya to remain united, just without Gaddafi."
Why I Support President Obama's Decision to Invade Libya By Ed Schultz at Huff Post March 23, 2011
The president's base is angry because we're firing millions of dollars of missiles at Libya instead of investing in America's infrastructure.
On the other side -- the Republicans are hammering the president not because he is not invading the entire Middle East, but because he's not doing it the way they would want to do it.
President Obama has decided on a more focused, realistic approach. He's trying to give the rebels, those who want democracy, a fighting chance at just that and trying to stop Gaddafi -- this is the human thing to do -- from slaughtering his own people.
Please take note that since we started this mission, Gaddafi hasn't been killing civilians, his own people. Does the president get credit for that? Does the coalition get credit for that?
This president, President Obama, has made his choice. And it is his leadership. He inherited Iraq. He inherited Afghanistan. And now, he has made a decision to invade Libya.
As a country, we really don't have much of a stomach for this right now and a lot of us are torn because of all of our needs here at home.
But remember -- and this needs to be pointed out -- there have been no lies told, no fear games played on the American people by President Obama and his administration.
I find it very interesting how conservatives are just picking away at President Obama. But the Republican Party -- the party that steamrolled America into two wars -- has suddenly discovered a barrage of reasons to oppose a Democratic president's military action.
Why?
Because he didn't do it their way? He didn't go far enough? He actually had a coalition?
I'm with the president on this one, and I think if it is defined the way he says it is -- limited in scope -- this actually could be a situation where we don't hear from Gaddafi for a long, long time.
So, what I think is going to happen is that we're going to have a Libya with Gaddafi. He might survive this. And then we're going to have a country with rebels who want democracy. This is all about democracy.
This is all about people in Libya wanting the simplicity of freedom.
I'm with the president on this one. As I said, I think he deserves the benefit of the doubt.
It's your call, Mr. President. This is one American who's with you.
Is it a means of further distracting the public from the fact that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and Pakistan continues with no end in sight.
Is it a means to distracting the public from the fact that Obama has still not taken action against the Bush Regime and its war crimes and crimes against humanity specifically the torture and abuse of thousands of POWs / Enemy Combatants that US to muddy the waters refer to those captured as detainees . In their Orwellian world merely changing the word used to describe POWs or Enemy Comatants is enough for those incarcerated to be denied protection under the Geneva Conventions and other International Agreements.
Obama after just a few months after becoming president assured the military, the CIA, FBI and any Americans involved in the abuse and torture or even murder of these "Terrorist Suspects" would never have to face charges from any international body because all such organizations have no jurisdiction over the USA.
This appears odd since the US managed to get a green light on its attack on Libya by pressuring the United Nations, NATO and the EU to give theUS a legal veneer for its war mongering . So the United Nations and other international bodies and agreements can be used to interfere in the domestic affairs of a sovereign nation but have no jurisdiction over the USA or some of its allies including Israel, Saudi Arabia , Pakistan
So now is the US intent on a full scale war against Qaddafi.
As discussed here previously interference in Libya's uprising should have begun with meetings with Qaddafi and the opposition leaders to first try to come to some sort of agreement or compromise.
While at the same time there should have been negotiations concerning a cease fire.
Even now instead of just demonizing Qaddafi the UN and USA shoul begin talks with Qaddafi to reassure him that the UN and Usa are not out to conquer and occupy Libya.
actual humanitarian aid and insisting that Qaddafi allow human rights groups and humanitarian organization to operate freely in Libya.
This would include the Red Cross and or Red Crescent, Human Rights Watch , Doctors without Borders etc.
These and other steps should have been implementd before dropping bombs and tomahawk Missiles on Libya.
Gadhafi's military: Trained and armed by Uncle Sam by Justin Elliott at Salon.com, March 23, 2011
The United States has trained the Libyan military in recent years and American manufacturers have sold the Gadhafi regime military equipment, putting the U.S. in the strange situation of bombing a foreign force that it helped build up.
The extent and nature of all the training is not clear, but State Department figures show that the sale of millions of dollars worth of aircraft parts to Libya was approved in recent years -- ironic, in hindsight, given the current focus on Gadhafi's air force. The cooperation highlights how quickly America's Libya policy has shifted as well as the sheer reach of U.S. military training programs. In fiscal 2009, the U.S. spent at least $536 million on training military personnel from 159 countries.
The backdrop for the cooperation between the American and Libyan militaries was improving relations between the two countries generally, following the announcement in 2003 by President Bush that Moammar Gadhafi had agreed to give up "weapons of mass destruction" programs. When John McCain visited Tripoli in the summer of 2009, Gadhafi's son Muatassim pressed a receptive McCain on getting military supplies. McCain, according to a diplomatic cable describing the meeting, spoke of the cooperation between the two militaries:
"[McCain] encouraged Muatassim to keep in mind the long-term perspective of bilateral security engagement and to remember that small obstacles will emerge from time to time that can be overcome," the cable says. "He described the bilateral military relationship as strong and pointed to Libyan officer training at U.S. Command, Staff, and War colleges as some of the best programs for Libyan military participation."
The writer below and others question the merits of attacking lLibya . Well why Libya why not Pakistan or Saudi Arabia Compares the attack on Libya to the first and second Gulf War , Kosovo and so on in which the public through the quisling media pushed for war before and they are doing it again.
Libya: Murder and Plunder Masquerading as “Humanitarian Intervention”
By Orwellwasright March 23, 2011
March 23, 2011 "Information Clearing House" -- On March 20th 2003 Western forces launched their “Shock and Awe” attack on Iraq, heavily bombarding Baghdad and elsewhere, massacring hundreds if not thousands of innocent men, women and children. On March 20th 2011 the very same forces attacked Libya, beginning what many believe will be yet another mass slaughter.and again reminds us that questioning someones sense of justice and morality of any who dare be against attacking Qaddafi but given recent history it is only right to ask these questions
What is obvious to all but the most duped and apathetic is that once again we have another war launched by the imperialist powers thinly veiled as a “humanitarian intervention”, dressed up as a mission of peace driven by the use of heavy bombardment and murder, where the truth lies diametrically opposed to the propaganda being pushed by the mainstream media. Nothing is what it seems; the lies and deceptions are as Orwellian as ever. The similarities with Iraq go well beyond the date of the opening salvo – indeed, there are many consistencies between the current attack on Libya and numerous other military interventions and acts of aggression carried out by the US, NATO and their allies in recent years.
The propaganda currently being pumped out by the mainstream media, led by the usual suspects in the American corporate press and the liars and sycophants over at the BBC, is essentially a re-run of the Iraq invasions and Kosovo: a largely fabricated case for humanitarian intervention based on violence stoked by special forces troops and covert operations, with the consistent demonisation of the leader recast as a mass murdering tyrant to justify a heavy saturation bombing campaign in the name of human rights and justice. Any historical context that might cast the so-called “Allies” in a negative light – for instance large-scale sales of weapons to the new enemy figure – is carefully omitted from the narrative.
...the accusation of being a Qaddafi sympathizer. Those who make such accusations are guilty of obfuscation and missing the broader point. Certainly, Qaddafi is no angel – likewise Slobodan Milošević and Saddam Hussein were guilty of despotism, crimes against humanity and more. But those who make such charges miss the irony of their rhetoric, given that they support the unbridled use of violence by far more powerful military forces against largely civilian populations, leading to death tolls that far exceed those committed by the puppet dictators they seek to overthrow. That these dictators and despots committed their own atrocities with weapons supplied by Western nations is never mentioned, for doing so would lay bare their hypocrisy. “We must kill to avoid killing,” is the ideology they promote, oblivious to the inherent contradiction that lies within.
Instead of Bombing Dictators in Libya and Around the World, Stop Selling Them Bombs If the bitter lesson of Iraq and Afghanistan has taught us anything, it's that wars of liberation exact a deadly toll on those they purportedly liberate. by Medea Benjamin and Charles Davis at Alternet.org, March 23, 2011
When all you have is bombs, everything starts to look like a target. And so after years of providing Libya’s dictator with the weapons he's been using against the people, all the international community – France, Britain and the United States – has to offer the people of Libya is more bombs, this time dropped from the sky rather than delivered in a box to Muammar Gaddafi's palace.
...While much of the media presents an unquestioning, sanitized version of the war -- cable news hosts more focused on interviewing retired generals about America’s fancy killing machines than the actual, bloody facts on the ground -- the truth is that wars, even liberal-minded “humanitarian” ones, entail destroying people and places. Though cloaked in altruism that would be more believable were we dealing with monasteries, not nation-states, the war in Libya is no different. And innocents pay the price.
If protecting civilians from evil dictators was the goal, though -- as opposed to, say, safeguarding natural resources and the investments of major oil companies -- there’s an easier, safer way than aerial bombardment for the U.S. and its allies to consider: simply stop arming and propping up evil dictators. After all, Libya's Muammar Gaddafi reaped the benefits from Western nations all too eager to cozy up to and rehabilitate the image of a dictator with oil, with those denouncing him today as a murderous tyrant just a matter of weeks ago selling him the very arms his regime has been using to suppress the rebellion against it.
In 2009 alone, European governments -- including Britain and France -- sold Libya more than $470 million worth of weapons, including fighter jets, guns and bombs. And before it started calling for regime change, the Obama administration was working to provide the Libyan dictator another $77 million in weapons, on top of the $17 million it provided in 2009 and the $46 million the Bush administration provided in 2008.
Meanwhile, for dictatorial regimes in Yemen, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, U.S. support continues to this day. On Saturday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton even gave the U.S. stamp of approval to the brutal crackdown on protesters in Bahrain, saying the country’s authoritarian rulers “obviously” had the “sovereign right” to invite troops from Saudi Arabia to occupy their country and carry out human rights abuses, including attacks on injured protesters as they lay in their hospital beds
And so it goes,
GORD.
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