I looked around. The best I could find is some footage of some explosion off a road in the middle of the desert “near” the city of Breda. While the smoke is rising you can hear the sound of a jet engine.
Ok. Let’s assume that this is indeed a bomb/missile strike by the Libyan Air Force. I would say that since a) there are no civilian areas to be seen anywhere in the footage b) the road is filled with armed anti-Gaddafi forces here is what this footage is really showing:
Some jet pilot loyal to Gaddafi apparently detected the movement of anti Gaddafi forces on the highway and attempted to strike them. The pilot missed by a big margin (due to incompetence, faulty equipment or deliberately) and then left.
What does al-Jazeera do with this footage? It titles it “Jets dropping bombsin and around Libya’s eastern town of Brega” (notice the plural and the location). The reporter then says that the university was particularly targeted and that he spoke to a doctor who told him that 20 people where killed.
First, if what I saw in the footage is what they are referring to, then its really trivial to the point of being boring. There is nothing at all in international humanitarian law, in the law of war, the universal human rights, the Geneva Conventions or any other international legal instrument which bans the proportional use of military means against combatants. Nothing at all.
The alleged bombing of the Brega university is less clear, but until we have evidence that the strike was either grossly disproportional or deliberately targeted a civilians there is no basis to accuse the Libyan regime of anything. Yes, most people do not know that, but “collateral damage” as such has never been outlawed by any legal instrument.
Now, please, before somebody start thinking that I am pro-Gadaffi or anti opposition, I would like to make clear once more that I am in no way defending Gadaffi or denying that atrocities are committed by his forces. ALL I am saying is that I see no evidence of that, so far.
I monitored the entire war in Bosnia and Croatia as a professional military analyst with access to intel briefings every morning and I know all too well how the international media is only too willing to parrot any US strategic psyop nonsense as long as it sells. Think about it, the al-Jazeera reporter near Brega just made a handsome income by showing exactly what? A plume of smoke over the desert. For all I know, he could have added the sound of the jet engine himself.
I need to caution you all here: not only is the corporate Ziomedia totally and absolutely unreliable, most reporters are lazy at best and pathological liars at worst; they might show you 3 year old military training footage and call it “Gadaffi forces murdering peaceful civilians”. Then, in a situation of de-facto civil war, false flag operations are inevitable. Again, in Bosnia, there were so many totally fabricated stories (like the Serbian concentration camps in Bosnia) and false flags attacks (for example in infamous “Markale massacre“) which the corporate Ziomedia swallowed without any critical investigation that we should expect more (other examples of such propaganda are the “Timisoara massacre” in Romania, the “baby-incubator atrocity” in Kuwait or the “Racak massacre” in Kosovo).
The other scary thing is that al-Jazeera is constantly airing interviews of Libyans who are demanding that a no-fly zone be imposed upon Libya. Why is al-Jazeera airing only such interviews even though, at least as far as I know, all Libyan opposition movements or leaders are very much opposed to this kind of ‘help’.
Maybe it’s my own past psychological traumas and bitter disappointments, but all this brings me a lot of very unpleasant flashbacks about the war in Croatia, Kosovo and, in particular, Bosnia. The fact that I dislike Gadaffi just about as much as I disliked Milosevic makes the resemblance even more eerie.
One more thing. Who is this former Justice Minister for Gadaddi who has now re-branded himself as a Libyan patriot? You know, the guy in the little red hat you see making grand statements about Libya’s future? (Sorry, I really did not catch his name)
The way I see it, in a repressive regime, the Minister of Justice is just about the worst rubber-stamping and torturing SOB possible. So how did this guy suddenly end up being paraded around on the idiot box as some kind of ‘opposition leader’?!
All this leaves me with a knot in my stomach, a sickening feeling of “deja vu”, and a bad aftertaste in my mouth.
Please tell me that I am over-reacting, that my fears are unfounded, that Libya will not turn into a “2nd Bosnia” and that there is no cause to suspect the worst!
Can you?
The Saker
PS: one more thought: why are the self-righteous buffoons at the World Court seriously declaring that they are going to investigate Gadaffi and his regime when the Zionist state has bombed Palestinian civilians for many years without any such investigations? What about the Turkish Air Force bombing the Kurds? That kind of hypocritical crap – again – reminds me very painfully of all the “humanitarian theater” which was orchestrated by the US and Europe during the war in Bosnia.
PPS: yet another addendum: before some politically correct ‘humanitarian’ accuses me of white-washing genocidal dictators (or something else of a similar ilk) let me pre-empt this accusation by saying the following: false flag operations and disinformation campaigns only work when they are credible. Look at the folks targeted in the ones I listed above: Milosevic, Ceausescu, Saddam – not exactly the kind of folks one would put beyond committing atrocities. The false flags worked because their target was a known killer. Ditto for 9-11, by the way. If the USA had accused Luxembourg of it nobody would have believed it. But when the US accused al Qaeda it worked perfectly. Even the 100% baseless accusation that Saddam was supporting al Qaeda was largely accepted. And if the Brits had decided to accuse Gandhi of eating babies or worshiping Satan and everybody would have laughed. My point? If Gaddafi is so easily targeted by strategic psyops (assuming that this is what is going on) it is because he is an unsavory character in pretty much the same league as Milosevic, Ceausescu or Saddam.
Oh, and before I forget: to those who today idealize Gaddafi like other idealized Saddam, Milosevic or Ceausescu in the past, I would say this: being anti-imperialist or the target of a psyop campaign does not automatically make you a good person, much less so a hero. IMHO, Saddam, Milosevic and Ceausescu were all bloodthirsty maniacs, and I strongly believe that Gaddafi is every bit as evil as they were.
No. The regime is not the target of a massive disinformation campaign. The Libyan people are the targets of Gaddafi’s massive disinformation campaign. He is staging rallies (some with only 5-10 people) for CNN and his own state media, for example.
The notion that Al-Jazeera is being used by American psyops is a bit of a stretch, to put it mildly. Historically, the network is very skeptical of anything the U.S. puts out (which is why the U.S. bombs their headquarters and shoots their journalists every chance they get). It is highly unlikely they’ve decided to kiss and make up.
As for the title you are referring to, it’s possible that they got reports from residents about other bombers, it’s possible they have print correspondents working there who saw more than one jet, it’s possible there was a lot of other things going on there that was not captured by the clip you saw.
Former regime officials switching sides are just so many rats jumping off a stinking ship. Yesterday’s “communist” party boss became the new capitalist in charge of newly privatized industries all over the Eastern Bloc as you’ll recall. Whether or not they will survive the people’s justice after the dictator is overthrown and the country stabilized remains to be seen.
Lastly, there is obviously a difference of opinion within the ranks of the revolutionaries on the question of aid from the U.S. Most, I think are against it, based on the video you posted, and this: http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=24090 Some are for it out of sheer desperation. They have no air force to combat the dictator’s, and he is obviously unwilling to back down, so they will have to overcome him by force of arms. This is no easy task, given that rebel strongholds are in the east, very far geographically from Tripoli and separated by open desert. Any assault would be spotted by his spies and it’d be a slugfest to say the least.
Bottom line: the psyops campaign here is being waged by Gaddafi. The West doesn’t need to create propaganda to turn people against him when he’s busy doing that himself.
@ProletarianRenegade: first, welcome to the blog! and second, thanks for your comment which has many interesting points upon which I would like to follow up. You write:
The notion that Al-Jazeera is being used by American psyops is a bit of a stretch, to put it mildly
I agree. But could it be that somebody ELSE is using al-Jazeera? I mean, al-Jazeera most definitely has a political agenda. It opposes Fatah (as do I) , it opposes Mubarak (as do I) and it opposes Gaddafi (as do I). I like the way they are gunning for US puppets, but what I wonder is how come they are doing so, going after these guys.
And then there is another possibility: al-Jazeera is not voluntarily or consciously collaborating with the US propaganda, but the US is skillfully feeding it what it wants. This is what happened in the case of Bosnia. To mindlessly parrot anything anti-Serbian was in the Zeitgeist and so the media did it.
Could that not be happening to al-Jazeera today?
And explain to me this: as far as I can tell, nobody in the Libyan opposition wants a US or NATO military intervention. Yet, ALL you see on al-Jazeera are folks demanding it. Does that not set off your baloney-detector?
As for the title you are referring to, it’s possible that they got reports from residents about other bombers
True. Also, since I made the original post al-Jazeera has shown some footage of bomb craters consistent with what a 200kg bomb would do. But nothing from inside Breda, at least so far.
Former regime officials switching sides are just so many rats jumping off a stinking ship. Yesterday’s “communist” party boss became the new capitalist in charge of newly privatized industries all over the Eastern Bloc as you’ll recall.
Bottom line: the psyops campaign here is being waged by Gaddafi.
Well, Saif al Islam is clearly a very media savvy guy. He is also good looking, clearly intelligent and very articulate. But could it be that BOTH sides are trying their best to win the PR war but that the anti-Gaddafi side is just far more powerful in this exercise? One example: Saif al Islam gave what I consider an excellent interview (from his point of view) to al-Jazeera. And what did al-Jazeera do? They immediately showed footage of Saif al Islam haranguing his troops with an assault rifle in his hands thereby suggestion “the guy talks about peace, but look at his real aggressive personality”. Do you think al-Jazeera did that out of a concern for objectivity or to better diffuse any doubts the audience might have and to “score” once more against the Gaddafi regime? I mean, for *days* al-Jareera was reporting about chaos in the capital until the regime stuck them into a helicopter to prove that the capital was peaceful and then they were VERY sore loosers about that. All they could say is that “the docks are empty”. They might as well have added “the trash is not collected” or “public buses are late”. That was SO lame…
The West doesn’t need to create propaganda to turn people against him when he’s busy doing that himself.
Yes, there can be no doubt at all that a big chunk of the Libyan population truly hates the man. The way he lost control of most of Libya in just a few days says it all. And yet… …and yet there is also a large percentage of folks who support him. Somebody is fighting for him, right? And I don’t think that saying that its only 10-15 folks paraded in front of CNN which tells the whole story here.
Those are all excellent points, Saker. In deciding whether there is a psyop campaign against MQ, I would consider the following:
1) The opposition ALWAYS has an incentive to exaggerate their enemies’ brutality. If there is confusion about the situation, it is easier to do.
2) Who exactly benefits from MQ’s overthrow? I don’t see much for the US to gain. He was already largely compliant with imperial demands. Tony Blair and Silvio Berlusconi seemed to really like the guy. That’s a powerful endorsement from some serious imperial players. MQ’s fall would only add to pressure on other remaining US puppets. It would solidify Egypt’s continued pressure on the military junta. It encourages the Bahraini protesters to endure even more Saudi wickedness. It would indicate that even the use of military force will not save an unpopular regime from a motivated public.
3) OTOH, Arab public opinion is VERY pro-opposition. MQ has few fans in the Arab world. Are they capable of a psyop campaign? Absolutely. (If you loose at chess enough, eventually you learn how to win) I don’t think any Arab government planned this, but every man/woman on the street understood what to do: talk about every bad thing MQ ever did…even if he didn’t actually do it. AJ is doing EXACTLY what the Arab public wants it to do.
4) I’m sure that MQ’s misdeeds in this uprising are exaggerated. But they are not inveted out of thin air. I’m sure his security forces used live ammo VERY liberally. I’m sure he did bring in foreign mercs. If he killed only 600 Libyans rather than the 6000 estimated, that is still double Egypt’s dead in a country 1/12th the size.
In short, **at least** half of what we are hearing will probably turn out to be false. Any serious observer of events has to proceed under the assumption that SOMEONE is trying to mislead him/her. Even when the story reinforces you’re sympathies, (as it clearly does mine in this case) be skeptical.
P.S., March 11 is supposed to be Saudi Arabia’s day of rage. I don’t want to elevate expectations, the rapid succession of falling dictators gives the impression that revolution is easy, when in fact it as almost impossible.
But if there was ever a chance to overthrow the world’s worst government (IMHO, worse than North Korea) this is it. Let us all say a prayer for the Saudi people.
I doubt anyone is “using” Al-Jaazera. The revolutionary forces are still fairly disorganized and disparate; they can’t control their messaging as tightly as the regime. For example, this article (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/27/AR2011022702406.html) talks about how some regime official defected and proclaimed himself the leader of the rebel government. The rebels are not really equipped to micromanage the press at this point in time.
This article (http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/world/8938945/gaddafi-defiant-as-west-flexes-military-muscle/) says the revolutionary council is debating whether or not to ask for “United Nations” airstrikes, so there is some support for outside intervention. The council’s spokesman says he doesn’t consider U.N. airstrikes to be foreign intervention(!!), so Al-Jazeera picking this up and running with it doesn’t surprise me. It also makes the story more interesting, gripping, to think that this could get even messier. It’s the kind of thing that sells papers, and that’s their business, isn’t it?
I don’t know much about their coverage of the Yugoslav civil war, but it’s not surprising to me that they might side with the Bosnian Muslims.
From the reports I’ve been reading, the capital has quieted down a lot since the regime started machine gunning the opposition in the streets. Gaddafi goon squads also rampaged house to house beating people, so it’s no surprise to me that the capital is quiet.
A revolution and civil war are very fluid situations, especially when you’re not talking about regular armies, but an increasingly militant and politicized people on the one hand and an increasingly brutal and ruthless regime on the other (led by a deranged man, no less). The streets may be filled with revolutionaries one day and the next it’s a graveyard because of the repression, media blackout, etc.
Who is fighting for Gaddafi? African mercenaries (that’s a big indicator of how thin his support is if he can’t even bribe his own people to kill for him), war criminals, the secret police, his tribe, and others who have personally benefitted from his personal patronage machine. The army isn’t reliable because he made sure they were under-equipped for decades for fear that they might oust him in a coup the way he did the king; as a result, they disintegrated fairly rapidly and joined the revolution.
His regime is a lot like Saddam Hussein’s post-1991. An increasingly narrow social base led to a “tribalization” of Iraq’s politics; here it’s the same thing, where everything was built around loyalty to Gaddafi. At least in Egypt, Mubarak’s base of power was the military, and he built up the military for many years. In Libya, the army was seen as a potential threat and neglected; real power lay in the hands of his family, entourage, and his personal following. That’s why he can’t even take a single city or town outside of Libya. The regime literally lives and dies with him; it has no independent existence of its own.
My take on all these events are simpler than what you guys have.
While the whole domino effect revolutions are not necessarily organized and managed by the US-EU, the US-EU doesn’t certainly try to stop them. So, what happened all of a sudden that the masters fell out of love with there long time dictators? Why no more support for them? It’s simple. The dictators and people around them have gotten rich. All the money sits in the banks.
The system needs money to save itself. Well, there you go. You remove the dictators and take their money, take the natural resources out of their control too and make sure the natural resources are accessible even more than they used to be (because you don’t have one greedy man owning it all now).
These events reminds me of a serpent (the system) swallowing it’s tail. :)
I certainly have no love for Gaddhafi. Nor do I love or respect any kind of dictators, or even empire leaning governments, whether they are in the guise of Democracies, Autocracies, or what ever else.
Vineyard asks….Is the Libyan regime the target of a massive disinformation campaign by the West?
Has oil rich Iran been the target of a massive disinformation campaign by the oil thirsty, Zionist controlled West, in the ongoing attempt to try and overthrow it’s present anti-Zionist government?
Yes….
Was the Saddam’s anti-Zionist regime a target of a massive disinformation campaign by the oil thirsty, Zionist controlled West to help justify it’s attack and subsequent invasion of oil rich Iraq? And was Saddam actually involved with committing 9/11?
Yes to the first question …. and No to the second….
Was the anti-Zionist Taliban regime a target of a massive disinformation campaign by the West to help justify the attack and subsequent invasion of a major oil pipeline candidate Afghanistan? Was the Taliban actually involved with committing 9/11?
Yes to the first question… And No to the second….
Let’s see is Libya oil rich?
Yes
And is the Libyan leader anti-Zionist and pro-Palestinian?
Yes
Has Libya been falsely accused of committing any crimes in the past?
It does seem the Lockerbie bombing may have been a false flag operation to hold against Libya…..
Now, I would like to warn the Shias who read your blog, do not let your hatred of Ghaddafi, due to the disappearance of a beloved Imam Al Sadr under his regime; just like your hatred of Saddam and his massacres of your Shia brethren, allow you to lose clear sight of the pro-Zionist, oil thirsty Western based empire, and it’s unDemocratic plans for the region…
And just to add to my points more, where is the condemnation of the Bahrain regime on the massacre of civilians there, or the sanctions by the oil thirsty, pro-Zionist Western based empire and it’s puppet U.N. security council?
Now, would we like to see Gadhaffi go? Yes….
Would we like to see the Bahranian regime go? Yes…..
But not to be replaced by a pro-Zionist, pro-oil thirsty Western puppet government…
@ya’ll ( as they say in Floria): first thank you all for your interesting comments and for participating in this brainstorming. I have to say that I am still deeply puzzled. Today, Russian TV showed footage of Saif al Islam using a 4×4 to drive with a British reporter all over the city of Tripoli. Now, as far as I know, they went out without a heavy escort, and they left their cars to chat with folks on the street. Could that all have been carefully stages. Yes, absolutely. Maybe the reporter got a massive bribe for being part of that. And yet, I wonder. Could Saddam, Ceausescu or Mubarak drive around the streets of their capitals and stop anywhere a reporter would let tell them?
Now, let’s talka about my friend Mustafa Abdel-Jalil. Why did this gentlemen decide to defect ONE MONTH AGO? Because somehow, like Saint Paul on the road to Damascus, he felt the Presence of God and he understood that he was serving the wrong master? Or was it because being a former Interior Minister he had the best possible info as to what was going on and he knew that he could do what so many of the worst Soviet apparatchiks (Kravchuk, Aliev, etc.) did: rebrand himself overnight and turn from secular torturer to religious hero? I wonder, was this guy a CIA/Mossad asset all along, or is he just a prostitute with a wonderful sense of what the next client will want?
@Lysander: But if there was ever a chance to overthrow the world’s worst government (IMHO, worse than North Korea) this is it. Let us all say a prayer for the Saudi people.
and what do we see? a pan africanist..while the rebels are racists…
‘Al Jazeera reports that Black African workers now live in fear in the rebel-held territories in Libya. Some of them have been attacked by mobs, others have been imprisoned, and some of their homes and workshops have been torched. “Many African workers say they felt safer under the Gaddafi regime,” says Al Jazeera’s Jacky Rowland, reporting from Benghazi. http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2011/furuhashi020311.html
they are not revolutionary forces but counter revolutinary:
‘The conflict in Libya is not a revolution, but a counter-revolution. The struggle “is fundamentally a battle between Pan-African forces on the one hand, who are dedicated to the realization of Qaddafi’s vision of a united Africa, and reactionary racist Libyan Arab forces who reject Qaddafi’s vision of Libya as part of a united Africa.” The so-called Black African “mercenaries” are misnamed. “As a result of Libya’s support for liberation movements throughout Africa and the world, international battalions were formed” which are part of the Libyan armed forces.’
so do prole renegades support racist counter revolutions?
William Bowles agrees with you.
http://www.countercurrents.org/bowles030311.htm
Also worth reading
http://www.countercurrents.org/fryett030311.htm
No. The regime is not the target of a massive disinformation campaign. The Libyan people are the targets of Gaddafi’s massive disinformation campaign. He is staging rallies (some with only 5-10 people) for CNN and his own state media, for example.
The notion that Al-Jazeera is being used by American psyops is a bit of a stretch, to put it mildly. Historically, the network is very skeptical of anything the U.S. puts out (which is why the U.S. bombs their headquarters and shoots their journalists every chance they get). It is highly unlikely they’ve decided to kiss and make up.
As for the title you are referring to, it’s possible that they got reports from residents about other bombers, it’s possible they have print correspondents working there who saw more than one jet, it’s possible there was a lot of other things going on there that was not captured by the clip you saw.
Former regime officials switching sides are just so many rats jumping off a stinking ship. Yesterday’s “communist” party boss became the new capitalist in charge of newly privatized industries all over the Eastern Bloc as you’ll recall. Whether or not they will survive the people’s justice after the dictator is overthrown and the country stabilized remains to be seen.
Lastly, there is obviously a difference of opinion within the ranks of the revolutionaries on the question of aid from the U.S. Most, I think are against it, based on the video you posted, and this: http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=24090 Some are for it out of sheer desperation. They have no air force to combat the dictator’s, and he is obviously unwilling to back down, so they will have to overcome him by force of arms. This is no easy task, given that rebel strongholds are in the east, very far geographically from Tripoli and separated by open desert. Any assault would be spotted by his spies and it’d be a slugfest to say the least.
Bottom line: the psyops campaign here is being waged by Gaddafi. The West doesn’t need to create propaganda to turn people against him when he’s busy doing that himself.
@ProletarianRenegade: first, welcome to the blog! and second, thanks for your comment which has many interesting points upon which I would like to follow up. You write:
The notion that Al-Jazeera is being used by American psyops is a bit of a stretch, to put it mildly
I agree. But could it be that somebody ELSE is using al-Jazeera? I mean, al-Jazeera most definitely has a political agenda. It opposes Fatah (as do I) , it opposes Mubarak (as do I) and it opposes Gaddafi (as do I). I like the way they are gunning for US puppets, but what I wonder is how come they are doing so, going after these guys.
And then there is another possibility: al-Jazeera is not voluntarily or consciously collaborating with the US propaganda, but the US is skillfully feeding it what it wants. This is what happened in the case of Bosnia. To mindlessly parrot anything anti-Serbian was in the Zeitgeist and so the media did it.
Could that not be happening to al-Jazeera today?
And explain to me this: as far as I can tell, nobody in the Libyan opposition wants a US or NATO military intervention. Yet, ALL you see on al-Jazeera are folks demanding it. Does that not set off your baloney-detector?
As for the title you are referring to, it’s possible that they got reports from residents about other bombers
True. Also, since I made the original post al-Jazeera has shown some footage of bomb craters consistent with what a 200kg bomb would do. But nothing from inside Breda, at least so far.
Former regime officials switching sides are just so many rats jumping off a stinking ship. Yesterday’s “communist” party boss became the new capitalist in charge of newly privatized industries all over the Eastern Bloc as you’ll recall.
Quite true, and I wrote about that here: http://vineyardsaker.blogspot.com/2011/02/libyan-fatcats-turn-their-coats-in-usa.html
Bottom line: the psyops campaign here is being waged by Gaddafi.
Well, Saif al Islam is clearly a very media savvy guy. He is also good looking, clearly intelligent and very articulate. But could it be that BOTH sides are trying their best to win the PR war but that the anti-Gaddafi side is just far more powerful in this exercise? One example: Saif al Islam gave what I consider an excellent interview (from his point of view) to al-Jazeera. And what did al-Jazeera do? They immediately showed footage of Saif al Islam haranguing his troops with an assault rifle in his hands thereby suggestion “the guy talks about peace, but look at his real aggressive personality”. Do you think al-Jazeera did that out of a concern for objectivity or to better diffuse any doubts the audience might have and to “score” once more against the Gaddafi regime? I mean, for *days* al-Jareera was reporting about chaos in the capital until the regime stuck them into a helicopter to prove that the capital was peaceful and then they were VERY sore loosers about that. All they could say is that “the docks are empty”. They might as well have added “the trash is not collected” or “public buses are late”. That was SO lame…
The West doesn’t need to create propaganda to turn people against him when he’s busy doing that himself.
Yes, there can be no doubt at all that a big chunk of the Libyan population truly hates the man. The way he lost control of most of Libya in just a few days says it all. And yet… …and yet there is also a large percentage of folks who support him. Somebody is fighting for him, right? And I don’t think that saying that its only 10-15 folks paraded in front of CNN which tells the whole story here.
Do you?
Those are all excellent points, Saker. In deciding whether there is a psyop campaign against MQ, I would consider the following:
1) The opposition ALWAYS has an incentive to exaggerate their enemies’ brutality. If there is confusion about the situation, it is easier to do.
2) Who exactly benefits from MQ’s overthrow? I don’t see much for the US to gain. He was already largely compliant with imperial demands. Tony Blair and Silvio Berlusconi seemed to really like the guy. That’s a powerful endorsement from some serious imperial players. MQ’s fall would only add to pressure on other remaining US puppets. It would solidify Egypt’s continued pressure on the military junta. It encourages the Bahraini protesters to endure even more Saudi wickedness. It would indicate that even the use of military force will not save an unpopular regime from a motivated public.
3) OTOH, Arab public opinion is VERY pro-opposition. MQ has few fans in the Arab world. Are they capable of a psyop campaign? Absolutely. (If you loose at chess enough, eventually you learn how to win) I don’t think any Arab government planned this, but every man/woman on the street understood what to do: talk about every bad thing MQ ever did…even if he didn’t actually do it. AJ is doing EXACTLY what the Arab public wants it to do.
4) I’m sure that MQ’s misdeeds in this uprising are exaggerated. But they are not inveted out of thin air. I’m sure his security forces used live ammo VERY liberally. I’m sure he did bring in foreign mercs. If he killed only 600 Libyans rather than the 6000 estimated, that is still double Egypt’s dead in a country 1/12th the size.
In short, **at least** half of what we are hearing will probably turn out to be false. Any serious observer of events has to proceed under the assumption that SOMEONE is trying to mislead him/her. Even when the story reinforces you’re sympathies, (as it clearly does mine in this case) be skeptical.
P.S., March 11 is supposed to be Saudi Arabia’s day of rage. I don’t want to elevate expectations, the rapid succession of falling dictators gives the impression that revolution is easy, when in fact it as almost impossible.
But if there was ever a chance to overthrow the world’s worst government (IMHO, worse than North Korea) this is it. Let us all say a prayer for the Saudi people.
I doubt anyone is “using” Al-Jaazera. The revolutionary forces are still fairly disorganized and disparate; they can’t control their messaging as tightly as the regime. For example, this article (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/27/AR2011022702406.html) talks about how some regime official defected and proclaimed himself the leader of the rebel government. The rebels are not really equipped to micromanage the press at this point in time.
This article (http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/world/8938945/gaddafi-defiant-as-west-flexes-military-muscle/) says the revolutionary council is debating whether or not to ask for “United Nations” airstrikes, so there is some support for outside intervention. The council’s spokesman says he doesn’t consider U.N. airstrikes to be foreign intervention(!!), so Al-Jazeera picking this up and running with it doesn’t surprise me. It also makes the story more interesting, gripping, to think that this could get even messier. It’s the kind of thing that sells papers, and that’s their business, isn’t it?
I don’t know much about their coverage of the Yugoslav civil war, but it’s not surprising to me that they might side with the Bosnian Muslims.
From the reports I’ve been reading, the capital has quieted down a lot since the regime started machine gunning the opposition in the streets. Gaddafi goon squads also rampaged house to house beating people, so it’s no surprise to me that the capital is quiet.
A revolution and civil war are very fluid situations, especially when you’re not talking about regular armies, but an increasingly militant and politicized people on the one hand and an increasingly brutal and ruthless regime on the other (led by a deranged man, no less). The streets may be filled with revolutionaries one day and the next it’s a graveyard because of the repression, media blackout, etc.
Who is fighting for Gaddafi? African mercenaries (that’s a big indicator of how thin his support is if he can’t even bribe his own people to kill for him), war criminals, the secret police, his tribe, and others who have personally benefitted from his personal patronage machine. The army isn’t reliable because he made sure they were under-equipped for decades for fear that they might oust him in a coup the way he did the king; as a result, they disintegrated fairly rapidly and joined the revolution.
His regime is a lot like Saddam Hussein’s post-1991. An increasingly narrow social base led to a “tribalization” of Iraq’s politics; here it’s the same thing, where everything was built around loyalty to Gaddafi. At least in Egypt, Mubarak’s base of power was the military, and he built up the military for many years. In Libya, the army was seen as a potential threat and neglected; real power lay in the hands of his family, entourage, and his personal following. That’s why he can’t even take a single city or town outside of Libya. The regime literally lives and dies with him; it has no independent existence of its own.
My take on all these events are simpler than what you guys have.
While the whole domino effect revolutions are not necessarily organized and managed by the US-EU, the US-EU doesn’t certainly try to stop them. So, what happened all of a sudden that the masters fell out of love with there long time dictators? Why no more support for them? It’s simple. The dictators and people around them have gotten rich. All the money sits in the banks.
The system needs money to save itself. Well, there you go. You remove the dictators and take their money, take the natural resources out of their control too and make sure the natural resources are accessible even more than they used to be (because you don’t have one greedy man owning it all now).
These events reminds me of a serpent (the system) swallowing it’s tail. :)
Zerkes
I certainly have no love for Gaddhafi. Nor do I love or respect any kind of dictators, or even empire leaning governments, whether they are in the guise of Democracies, Autocracies, or what ever else.
Vineyard asks….Is the Libyan regime the target of a massive disinformation campaign by the West?
Has oil rich Iran been the target of a massive disinformation campaign by the oil thirsty, Zionist controlled West, in the ongoing attempt to try and overthrow it’s present anti-Zionist government?
Yes….
Was the Saddam’s anti-Zionist regime a target of a massive disinformation campaign by the oil thirsty, Zionist controlled West to help justify it’s attack and subsequent invasion of oil rich Iraq? And was Saddam actually involved with committing 9/11?
Yes to the first question ….
and No to the second….
Was the anti-Zionist Taliban regime a target of a massive disinformation campaign by the West to help justify the attack and subsequent invasion of a major oil pipeline candidate Afghanistan? Was the Taliban actually involved with committing 9/11?
Yes to the first question…
And No to the second….
Let’s see is Libya oil rich?
Yes
And is the Libyan leader anti-Zionist and pro-Palestinian?
Yes
Has Libya been falsely accused of committing any crimes in the past?
It does seem the Lockerbie bombing may have been a false flag operation to hold against Libya…..
Now, I would like to warn the Shias who read your blog, do not let your hatred of Ghaddafi, due to the disappearance of a beloved Imam Al Sadr under his regime; just like your hatred of Saddam and his massacres of your Shia brethren, allow you to lose clear sight of the pro-Zionist, oil thirsty Western based empire, and it’s unDemocratic plans for the region…
And just to add to my points more, where is the condemnation of the Bahrain regime on the massacre of civilians there, or the sanctions by the oil thirsty, pro-Zionist Western based empire and it’s puppet U.N. security council?
Now, would we like to see Gadhaffi go?
Yes….
Would we like to see the Bahranian regime go?
Yes…..
But not to be replaced by a pro-Zionist, pro-oil thirsty Western puppet government…
@ya’ll ( as they say in Floria): first thank you all for your interesting comments and for participating in this brainstorming. I have to say that I am still deeply puzzled. Today, Russian TV showed footage of Saif al Islam using a 4×4 to drive with a British reporter all over the city of Tripoli. Now, as far as I know, they went out without a heavy escort, and they left their cars to chat with folks on the street. Could that all have been carefully stages. Yes, absolutely. Maybe the reporter got a massive bribe for being part of that. And yet, I wonder. Could Saddam, Ceausescu or Mubarak drive around the streets of their capitals and stop anywhere a reporter would let tell them?
Now, let’s talka about my friend Mustafa Abdel-Jalil. Why did this gentlemen decide to defect ONE MONTH AGO? Because somehow, like Saint Paul on the road to Damascus, he felt the Presence of God and he understood that he was serving the wrong master? Or was it because being a former Interior Minister he had the best possible info as to what was going on and he knew that he could do what so many of the worst Soviet apparatchiks (Kravchuk, Aliev, etc.) did: rebrand himself overnight and turn from secular torturer to religious hero? I wonder, was this guy a CIA/Mossad asset all along, or is he just a prostitute with a wonderful sense of what the next client will want?
GUYS, LETS CONTINUE THIS DISCUSSION ON THE LATEST POST ABOUT LIBYA (whichever it is), ok? So let’s now go unto this post http://vineyardsaker.blogspot.com/2011/03/exactly-what-i-feared.html and continue there
@Lysander: But if there was ever a chance to overthrow the world’s worst government (IMHO, worse than North Korea) this is it. Let us all say a prayer for the Saudi people.
Agreed!
yes it is
lets take a look from another perspective:
http://dissidentvoice.org/2011/03/libya-getting-it-right-a-revolutionary-pan-african-perspective/
and what do we see? a pan africanist..while the rebels are racists…
‘Al Jazeera reports that Black African workers now live in fear in the rebel-held territories in Libya. Some of them have been attacked by mobs, others have been imprisoned, and some of their homes and workshops have been torched. “Many African workers say they felt safer under the Gaddafi regime,” says Al Jazeera’s Jacky Rowland, reporting from Benghazi.
http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2011/furuhashi020311.html
Brian
lets take a look at Gadaffis Green Book….who agrees this is the work of a mad man?
In Qaddafi’s Green Book it states: “The house is a basic need of both the individual and the family, therefore it should not be owned by others.” This dictum has now become a reality for the Libyan people.
http://dissidentvoice.org/2011/03/libya-getting-it-right-a-revolutionary-pan-african-perspective/
does the Renegadeproletarian agree?
Brian
they are not revolutionary forces but counter revolutinary:
‘The conflict in Libya is not a revolution, but a counter-revolution. The struggle “is fundamentally a battle between Pan-African forces on the one hand, who are dedicated to the realization of Qaddafi’s vision of a united Africa, and reactionary racist Libyan Arab forces who reject Qaddafi’s vision of Libya as part of a united Africa.” The so-called Black African “mercenaries” are misnamed. “As a result of Libya’s support for liberation movements throughout Africa and the world, international battalions were formed” which are part of the Libyan armed forces.’
so do prole renegades support racist counter revolutions?
brian
http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/libya-getting-it-right-revolutionary-pan-african-perspective
so do prole renegades support racist counter revolutions?
Of course not. That’s why I’m 100% against Gaddafi who is racist against Berbers.
So much for pan-Africanism.