Libya and Iraq turning into "black holes"

Gumer Isayev, Middle East expert and faculty professor at St. Petersburg State University, talks to Gazeta.ru about causes behind the conflict in Libya, Jamahiriya, the Green Book, and Russia’s stand in regard to the Libyan conflict.

West Takes Advantage of the Situation

Q: Being an expert on the Middle East, how do you assess the recent events in Libya? What’s actually happening there, is it a “clash of civilizations”, a “crusade’, an attempt to protect democracy in Libya, or an attempt to overthrow Gaddafi’s regime orchestrated by some countries, or perhaps a war for Libya’s natural resources, or still something else?

A: Any attempts to explain the events in Libya drawing on the abstract concepts produced by the West – such as for instance the “clash of civilizations” – are doomed to fail just as much as the attempts to come up with a strictly rational explanation. Revolutions, overthrows, and uprisings are irrational by nature and often develop in an unpredictable manner which does not fit any conventional theories. The events in Libya unrolled rapidly and were shaped by a number of factors, and while both Egyptian and Tunisian presidents gave up quite quickly, Muammar Gaddafi made it clear right away that he will fight to the end. Consequently, the internal uprising against Gaddafi which started in February developed into armed aggression against Libya by March, and God knows what it will be like by April…

Obviously, the “uprising” in Libya was inspired by popular unrest in the neighboring Arab countries.
But unlike the peaceful protests in Tunisia and Egypt, Libya’s uprising was armed, and quite possibly relied on some external support.

The revolution bug appears to have bitten a large number of Arab countries, but in Libya it seems to have developed into an acute condition. There are witnesses who confirm that the uprising was pre-planned, that groups of youths attacked police and local authorities’ buildings in different towns at the same time. But the crucial role was played by the fact that Gaddafi secured the support of a large share of the population, especially in the country’s capital and in the West. There were no massive protests in Tripoli, and the rebellious East has demonstrated the breakaway ambitions of Cyrenaica that Libyan Jamahiriya had already dealt with before (although the number of rebels there did not exceed a few thousand). Gaddafi wisely waited out the critical phase and went on to some successful attempts to re-unite the country but faced serious counteraction from the West.

The attempt to overthrow Gaddafi by “global effort” has been quite cynical.
Libya’s business partners, including Italy, France and other European countries, which until recently were signing multi million dollar contracts with Gaddafi now all of a sudden claimed his regime to be illegitimate and openly took the rebels’ side. It’s no secret that Gaddafi has ceased to be a thorn the West’s side over the last decade as he gave up a number of notorious projects related to development of weapons of mass destruction, let the U.S. oil companies in on the Libyan market, paid compensation for the Lockerbie bombing, and started liberalizing the domestic economy. Nevertheless, the colonel didn’t entirely “mend his ways”: the Americans got hold only of a small share of Libya’s oil reserves; the Lockerbie bombing, though paid for, was never admitted guilt for, and the project to privatize the state oil production company also fell through. Gaddafi was actively promoting the idea of African unity and a single currency pegged to gold, and he heavily criticized the West’s policies in Asia and Africa. Removal of sanctions in 2003 stimulated economic growth and turned Libya in a rapidly developing economy capable of making Gaddafi’s dream come true i.e. turning Libya into the leading power of the region.

Therefore it is not about Gaddafi’s Western partners suddenly becoming appalled at his being cruel to the rebels. Western powers simply took advantage of the situation, i.e. a temporary weakness of the Libyan leader, to back up the uprising.

An unstable situation in Libya is in the European and U.S. hawks’ opinion better than a strong and ambitious Gaddafi. That is why the desperate West started to stir up the almost gone fire of the civil war. And whereas for the United States, this war would be across the ocean, Europe might harvest some big problems ensuing from it in the very near future. And this tells us that in fact European leaders followed their U.S. counterparts.

Q: How do you explain the fact it wasn’t the U.S. but France who was the first to bomb Libya? Is it simply part of the West’s overall campaign against Gaddafi’s regime, or maybe France has its own interests and accounts to square?

A: The United States is already running two wars, in Afghanistan and Iraq. The incumbent president, Barack Obama, came to power surfing a wave of anti-war sentiment in American society. He positioned himself as a man to dramatically change U.S. foreign policy and withdraw the troops from Iraq. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in anticipation of his achievements. Therefore Obama hardly stands a chance of convincing the voters that the United States must get involved in yet another war. According to recent polls, the majority of Americans do not support the idea of the U.S. intervening with Libya’s affairs in any way. Voters won’t forgive their president any more losses. It was no coincidence that as soon as a report of an F-15 fighter aircraft being shot down was released, Robert Gates hurried to make a statement that the active phase of the operation is nearing its end. The U.S. fear getting involved in a war for the same reason Germany had to give up aggression. They fear the public reaction. But that seems to be of no concern to Sarkozy who was never hiding the special nature of his relations with the United States.

While the U.S. is biding in the shade, Sarkozy is willing to do the dirty work and take the risks as he has nothing to lose.

The French president’s ratings are quite low, and he badly needs a “little glorious victory.” Neither is Sarkozy concerned with the fact that destabilizing Libya will send off new waves of illegal immigrants straight to France. “After us, the deluge” – this famous French by-word aptly characterizes the president’s demeanor.

Under current circumstances, it would be appropriate to recall the events of 1956 when the U.K., France, and Israel attacked Egypt attempting to win back the Suez Canal nationalized by Gamal Abdel Nasser Hussein. The initiative belonged to Israel while France and the U.K played peace-makers while breaking into Egypt’s territory. The United States stayed out of this, not wishing to mar their reputation with the Arab world.

Q: The fact that the Libyan conflict has been broken into by the Western powers means that it’s altogether a different story than that in Tunisia or Egypt. Can we say that Libya is going through what Afghanistan and Iraq did? Can we draw parallels between Muammar Gaddafi and, for instance, Saddam Hussein?

A: The recipe for intervening with internal affairs of countries in disfavor is basically the same. The parallels with Iraq are obvious. Aggression was preceded by a media attack whose goal was to justify the necessity to overthrow the ruling regime. In case of Iraq, Hussein’s regime was accused of secretly developing weapons of mass destruction, and the media unrolled a massive misinformation campaign. It only takes to recall Colin Powell flashing photographs of Iraq’s alleged secret WMD facilities and mobile laboratories to media cameras.

In case of Libya, the focus was made on “bloodthirstiness” of the regime, and the story of dealing cruelly with peaceful protesters circled the world. The global community was thus prepared for the news of air strikes and bombings.

As soon as it became clear that insurgents have lost the battle, the UN Security Council was called up to pass Resolution 1973 whose ample wordings in their essence granted freedom to the anti-Libyan coalition and resulted in the country being bombed. On top of all the similarities with the situation in Iraq, one more thing might get similar – the end result. Libya may cease to exist de facto, the way Iraq did. And both Libya and Iraq would degrade into “black holes.”