Libya: Whats Next?

[Charles_Main]

So the Bastard is dead, and that is Great. Kudos to Obama, and everyone involved for getting his ass.

Now, Are we going to stay Involved or just let events run their course?

My Predictions if we do not make a substantial effort to stop it is this.

Libya has 13 Major Tribes and 3 Distinct Regions. I don't think we have seen the end of the fighting. Libya is another country put together by Colonial Powers, that has no real reason to be a country, nothing that Unites them as a people, there is in fact a lot of conflict and Rivalry among the Tribes, and a Huge Difference between the 3 Regions of the Country. The Oil the Country has is all on one Area. It is hard to see them different Factions not fighting over control of the Oil and the Country.

I Predict the end result will be either Libya Split into more than once Country, or Libya United By Force by one Groups Oppressing the others. I give the chances of a stable Democracy coming out of this, with out Massive engagement by the west, about .000001%.

 

[Old Rocks]

Chances of any country in which there is a low level of education becoming a democracy are low. I don't think that most Libyans want us or the europeans deciding there future. And, given past efforts to control the course of other nations politics, I say let the Libyans decide the fate of Libya. They put up the fight that ousted Gaddafi, they deserve a chance at real self determination.

 

[FactFinder]

What's next? They will bumble about between tribes and attempt to elect a leader. The West will try to install the former princes but the people/rebels may reject that and then God forbid, The Islamic Brotherhood may come into power. In the meantime we should mind our business. Let them do what they will. It is their country. Why should we give a crap. Noone yet has provided even an unreasonable answer.

 

[ladyliberal]

I Predict the end result will be either Libya Split into more than once Country, or Libya United By Force by one Groups Oppressing the others. I give the chances of a stable Democracy coming out of this, with out Massive engagement by the west, about .000001%.

A reasonable prediction in the short run. Stable democracies take time, though. I think in the long run (many decades) the odds of a stable democracy are much higher.

 

[Charles_Main]

I Predict the end result will be either Libya Split into more than once Country, or Libya United By Force by one Groups Oppressing the others. I give the chances of a stable Democracy coming out of this, with out Massive engagement by the west, about .000001%.

A reasonable prediction in the short run. Stable democracies take time, though. I think in the long run (many decades) the odds of a stable democracy are much higher.

Maybe, But like I said, the People of libya do not really have any Reason to stay United.

 

[waltky]

Yea, well he didn't deserve a normal Muslim burial `cause he wasn't a good, peaceful Muslim...

Libyan official says Gadhafi buried at dawn
– Longtime Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi, his son Muatassim and a top aide were buried in an Islamic ceremony at dawn Tuesday in a secret location, with a few relatives and officials in attendance, officials said.

The burial closed the book on Gadhafi's nearly 42-year rule and the 8-month civil war to oust him, but did not silence international calls for an investigation into whether the widely despised tyrant was executed by his captors. Meanwhile, a government spokesman said an explosion rocked a fuel depot near Gadhafi's hometown of Sirte on Monday and that there were casualties. Col. Ahmed Bani said the blast is being treated as an accident, but that an investigation has been launched. A human rights researcher, Tirana Hassan, said that while in Sirte on Monday, said she saw 11 people with severe burns arrive at the city's Ibn Sina hospital. Nurses said the injuries were from the blast.

The bodies of Gadhafi, Muatassim and former Defense Minster Abu Bakr Younis were removed overnight from the commercial freezer in Misrata where they'd been on display for four days. They were then buried at dawn Tuesday, according to Ibrahim Beitalmal, a spokesman for the military council in Misrata. Bani also confirmed the burial. In a text message, Beitalmal said Islamic prayers were read over the bodies and that relatives and members of the local and military councils of Misrata attended the funeral. Beitalmal could not immediately reached by phone Tuesday to provide further details. On Monday, Beitalmal said the three would be buried in unmarked graves to prevent vandalism. Presumably, the location would also be kept hidden to prevent it from turning into a shrine for Gadhafi loyalists. International organizations asking to see the burial site would be given access, Beitalmal said.

The three bodies had been held in cold storage in Misrata since the dictator and members of his entourage were captured near his hometown of Sirte on Thursday after their convoy came under attack by NATO. For days, Misratans had lined up to see the bodies, donning surgical masks to cover the stench from the bodies. Over the weekend, Libya's chief pathologist, Dr. Othman el-Zentani, performed autopsies on the three bodies and also took DNA samples to confirm their identities. El-Zentani has said Gadhafi died from a shot to the head, and said the full report would be released later this week, after he presents his findings to the attorney general.

MORE

 

[waltky]

Guess dis pretty well sums it up...

Summary of the American and International Press on the Libyan Revolution
27/10/2011 - NATO postpones formal decision to conclude Libya mission due to consultations with UN, Libya

NATO unexpectedly postponed a definite decision to end its bombing campaign in Libya as consultations continued Wednesday with the U.N. and the country’s interim government over how and when to wind down the operation. Last week, the alliance announced preliminary plans to phase out its mission on Oct. 31. NATO’s governing body - the North Atlantic Council, or NAC - was expected to formalize that decision Wednesday. Air patrols have continued in the meantime because some alliance members were concerned that a quick end to NATO’s seven-month operation could lead to a resurgence in violence.

On Wednesday, spokeswoman Carmen Romero said NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen was consulting with the United Nations and Libya’s National Transitional Council. “The NAC will meet with partners on Friday to discuss our Libya mission and take a formal decision,” she said, adding that there was an “ongoing process” in the U.N. Security Council. US Defence secretary Leon Panetta said Tuesday that some of Libya’s leaders had called for NATO to continue its mission “during this interim as they try to establish some new governance.” And at the United Nations, Libya’s deputy UN ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi asked the Security Council on Wednesday to hold up on lifting the no-fly zone and ending its authorisation to protect civilians.

However, a NATO official who could not be identified under standing rules, said the alliance had not received any formal request from the Libya’s transitional government to prolong its air and naval patrols past the end of the month. NATO’s 26,000 sorties, including 9,600 strike missions, destroyed about 5,900 military targets since they started on March 31. These included Libya’s air defences and more than 1,000 tanks, vehicles and guns, as well as Muammar Al Qathafi’s command and control networks. The daily airstrikes enabled the rebels’ ragtag forces to advance and take Tripoli two months ago. On Sunday, Libya’s interim rulers declared the country liberated, launching the oil-rich nation on what is meant to be a two-year transition to democracy.

In Qatar, Libya’s interim leader Mustafa Abdul-Jalil attended an international planning conference Wednesday with representatives of Gulf states and Western powers that participated in the Libyan operation. The meeting is expected to focus on how the allies could help the new authorities bring stability to the nation. Qatar, a leading Arab backer of the uprising to topple Al Qathafi’s regime, contributed warplanes to the NATO-led air campaign and helped arrange a critical oil sale to fund the former rebels. The United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Sweden also joined in the NATO war effort.

Muammar Al Qathfi's Family Reportedly to Sue NATO

See also:

What Libya has inherited from Moammar Gaddafi
October 27`11 - Young men in fatigues hang around outside the offices of the Transitional National Council, carrying rifles and flashing V (for victory) signs at visitors. Inside, older men in leather jackets sit on sofas drinking tea, while temporary officials cope with clashing appointments and race up and down the hallways. It’s just how one imagines the Smolny Institute, Lenin’s St. Petersburg headquarters, in 1917: amateur, enthusiastic, disorganized, rumor-filled and slightly paranoid, all at once. In Smolny, though, there were no ringing cellphones to add to the general cacophony.

And at least the Russian revolutionaries were operating within what had been a functioning society. By contrast, Libya’s late dictator, Moammar Gaddafi, has left an unprecedented, even weird, vacuum in his wake. Post-revolutionary Libya is truly a desert, not only in the geographic sense but in the political, economic, even psychological senses too. Look, by contrast, at Libya’s post-revolutionary neighbors. Egypt has a sophisticated economy, a middle class, foreign investors and an enormous tourist industry, not to mention a long history of financial interactions with the rest of the world. Tunisia has a highly educated and articulate population, which has long been exposed to French media and political ideas. More than 90 percent of Tunisians voted in the country’s first free elections last weekend. Outside observers proclaimed the voting impeccably fair.

Libya, by contrast, has neither a sophisticated economy nor an articulate population, nor any political experience whatsoever. There were no political parties under Gaddafi, not even fake, government-controlled political parties. There were no media, nor even reliable information, to speak of. Libyan journalists were the most heavily controlled in the Arab world, hardly anyone has Internet access,and there is no tradition of investigative reporting. During four decades in power, Gaddafi destroyed the army, the civil service and the educational system. The country produces nothing except oil, and none of the profits from that oil seem to have trickled down to anybody. Some 60 percent of the population works for the government, but they receive very low salaries — a few hundred dollars a month — in exchange. There is hardly any infrastructure, outside of a few roads. There is hardly any social life, since so many young people were too poor to marry. There wouldn’t be any public spaces to enjoy social life even if it existed: Trash is scattered along the undeveloped beaches, and old plastic bags blow back and forth across weed-clogged city parks.

Nature abhors a vacuum, and of course, in the absence of an army, militias may step into the breach: At the moment, some 27 of them, from cities all over Libya, have taken up residence in Tripoli compounds and spray-painted their names on the barricades. In the absence of regulatory bodies, newborn newspapers may well fall into the hands of business and political groups with foreign or old-regime connections too. When I met the deputy chairman of the TNC, Abdel Hafiz Ghoga, we discussed another “Russian” scenario: Newspapers start out enthusiastic and free, as they did in Moscow in the 1990s, but are gradually bought up by business conglomerates — until eventually they return to government control. The same fate could await new political parties. And yet Libya’s unprecedented vacuum also offers unprecedented opportunities. One Libyan journalist — the editor of a brand-new magazine, which he has personally financed and staffed with volunteers — points out that none of his journalists ever learned to write regime propaganda, and all of them are therefore committed to telling “the truth.” The nonexistent economy and the absence of political institutions also means that there aren’t any entrenched interests that will set themselves against change, as they have done in Egypt. There aren’t even any well-organized Islamists, as there are in Tunisia.

On top of all that, Libya has the largest oil reserves in Africa, and — depending on who is counting — some $250 billion in foreign currency reserves. Much of the money Gaddafi never spent on his people is now sitting in the bank. In fact, I can’t think of another group of revolutionaries, at any time in history, who found themselves in quite such a fortunate situation. Usually, revolutions are born out of national bankruptcy. The first task of a new regime is to fill the state’s coffers. The second task is to tear down the institutions of the old regime. Libya’s task — how to spend its money wisely, and how to build new institutions from scratch — is both easier than anyone else’s and harder at the same time. And no, I’m not going to predict what will happen next.

Source

 

[Sallow]

I Predict the end result will be either Libya Split into more than once Country, or Libya United By Force by one Groups Oppressing the others. I give the chances of a stable Democracy coming out of this, with out Massive engagement by the west, about .000001%.

A reasonable prediction in the short run. Stable democracies take time, though. I think in the long run (many decades) the odds of a stable democracy are much higher.

Maybe, But like I said, the People of libya do not really have any Reason to stay United.

Sure they do. They've been a country for quite some time. And they "united" as a country to get rid of Gaddafi. Messy as it was, they did most of the fighting. That will make a huge difference.

 

[francoHFW]

Fear mongered whiners and dittoheads. Libyans are pretty educated, just fought together, this is the information age. I predict you will look like idiots, won't admit to your history, and would have let BOOOOSH ruin the Arab Spring on p. 8 if you had had your way. Tories!! tyvm lol Obamahh...support the magic negro.

 

[Sallow]

Fear mongered whiners and dittoheads. Libyans are pretty educated, just fought together, this is the information age. I predict you will look like idiots, won't admit to your history, and would have let BOOOOSH ruin the Arab Spring on p. 8 if you had had your way. Tories!! tyvm lol Obamahh...support the magic negro.

There will probably be lots of bumps in the road till they get it right. Hopefully they will seek help on the formation of a government. But it shouldn't be forced upon them.

 

[Iridescence]

Chances of any country in which there is a low level of education becoming a democracy are low. I don't think that most Libyans want us or the europeans deciding there future. And, given past efforts to control the course of other nations politics, I say let the Libyans decide the fate of Libya. They put up the fight that ousted Gaddafi, they deserve a chance at real self determination.

Indeed, we should, as not only a nation, but individuals in support of our nation, come to know why we are not accredited with the Libyans... It isn't that we should desire to decide their fate more than they, themselves could, however, it is perhaps because there are unfounded depths to their culture that may come to be survival keys to our own... soon.

 

[Iridescence]

I Predict the end result will be either Libya Split into more than once Country, or Libya United By Force by one Groups Oppressing the others. I give the chances of a stable Democracy coming out of this, with out Massive engagement by the west, about .000001%.

A reasonable prediction in the short run. Stable democracies take time, though. I think in the long run (many decades) the odds of a stable democracy are much higher.

Maybe, But like I said, the People of libya do not really have any Reason to stay United.

This is interesting... as they may be united on levels far beyond appearances.

What is it, exactly, that we, as Average Americans, think we are pressing forward with in shoving democracy in the face of those that have been established way before 'us'? Perhaps that should be a thread...