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Qaddafi’s Death: Barbarism and Hypocrisy
I never mourn the death of a dictator.
Good riddance to Muammar Qaddafi, who terrorized his people for 42 years.
But neither do I cheer summary executions of anyone, no matter how brutal.
Just as the United States was wrong to rub out an unarmed Osama bin Laden, so, too, the Libyan rebels were wrong to murder the captured Qaddafi.
You can see the rebels parading Qaddafi around still alive.
You can see them bouncing his head up and down after he’s apparently dead.
The answer to barbarism is not more barbarism.
Amnesty International is right to ask for an investigation into Qaddafi’s death.
Nor do I applaud President Obama’s triumphalism.
“Without putting a single U.S. service member on the ground, we achieved our objectives,” he said. This may yet prove to be a precedent for future U.S. bombing wars, where a subsequent President will illegally attack another country with impunity, and will get away with it because he hasn’t put ground troops in harm’s way. During this Libya War , the Obama Administration used the lack of a threat to our service members as a justification for not invoking the War Powers Act.
President Obama crowed that the Libya War demonstrates “the strength of American leadership across the world.” Rather, it shows that might makes right.
And the hypocrisy of the U.S. position could hardly be greater. In 2003, the Bush Administration rehabilitated Qaddafi, who became an ally of the United States in the “war on terror.” In fact, the CIA used Qaddafi’s intelligence service to torture detainees that the U.S. sent over to Libya.
The CIA “rendered” eight or nine detainees to Qaddafi’s intelligence service, and sent questions along with for the torturers to ask, according to Human Rights Watch, in an interview with Democracy Now.
The CIA may even have had agents present during some of the questioning.
In 2008, Condoleezza Rice visited Qaddafi in Libya.
The next year, Obama shook his hand, and John McCain offered him arms.
When it was convenient for Washington to support Qaddafi, it did so.
When it was convenient to attack him, it did so.
But the Obama administration didn’t attack Bahrain when it cracked down on people fighting for democracy against that kingdom. No, Washington even let Saudi Arabia, another kingdom, invade Bahrain to help put down the nonviolent uprising.
For the people of Libya, long oppressed by Qaddafi, this is a day of liberation.
But it is no vindication of U.S. policy.
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113 Comments so far
Show AllThank you for this article. Expose the drones. I feel sorry for any leader in any country that has oil.
"The answer to barbarism is not more barbarism"
Enough said.
That famous scene in Lawrence of Arabia where Lawrence orders the massacre of the Turks and Sherif Ali sadly rebukes him was in my mind all day yesterday:
LAWRENCE
No prisoners! No prisoners!
ALI
God. God! God!! Aurens! Enough! Enough! Make them stop! Aurens!
[AT SCENE OF MASSACRE]
BENTLEY
Major! Major Lawrence! Jesus wept! Jesus wept!
ALI
Does it surprise you, Mr Bentley? Surely, you know the Arabs are a barbarous people. Barbarous and cruel. Who but they! Who but they!
BENTLEY
[To Lawrence] Oh, you rotten man. Here, let me take your rotten bloody picture for the rotten bloody newspapers.
In fact, some recent reports and videos indicate quite strongly that Gaddafi was initially taken prisoner and then brutally murdered AFTER his capture. (See http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article29470.htm for example.) Even the word 'barbarous' hardly seems adequate.
On the other hand, I suppose it was more merciful than repeated waterboarding sessions he might have endured in more 'civilized' hands. Guess they didn't want to extract any of the information he might reveal.
To elaborate on your comment, RV. "Civilization" has greatly eluded the human race. Where is the "civilization" in pushing buttons to bomb distant lands & people, destroying them and maiming their unborn as is happening as a result of the depleted uranium, etc. Yes, these people behaved abominably, but so have we. At least they have to live with seeing it in their minds, in their dreams, etc. They can't escape it and pretend they're "civilized."
Note that in the film, it is Lawrence who commands the Arab rebels to engage in brutal retaliation, and it is the Arabs who are again orientalized as Sherif Ali darkly remarks.
Or as the Russian Envoy to NATO tweeted today, “The faces of the leaders of ‘world democracies’ are so happy, as if they remembered how they hanged stray cats in basements in their childhoods.”
Great quote from the Russian envoy. Celebrating barbarism should help sow the seeds of democracy in Libya. Presumably Western leaders who participated in Gaddafi's downfall feel this will be perceived as a success for them, but I'm not so sure. Those video images make people feel bad (people who don't enjoy hanging cats, anyway) and I think those negative feelings, especially given that people distrust the wisdom and altruism of our wars anyway, will be transferred to all the triumphalist little men and women taking their bows today. Meanwhile, at home people apparently have a postive response to OWS, so that's encouraging.
Does Obama ride a motorcycle? He'd be wise to reconsider.
Obama has surpassed Bush in barbarity. At least Saddam was captured, fed, and cleaned up before being given a televised trial (no matter how much of a kangaroo court). Obama just kills people he once shook hands with, allowing a barbarity to take place without comment, and then orders more remote control bombing.
Why Obama's worse:
At least under Bush, the professional left wasn't reduced to acrobatic feats of sycophantic gushing and grovelling.
These 'progressive' talking heads for Obama are in 100% re-election campaign mode... The way they see it/tell it, Obama personally located and took out bin Laden in the most heroic of fashions, got a great healthcare bill passed, took on the corruption on Wall Street, won the People's Revolution in Libya and ended the war in Iraq.
At least under Bush, liberals and progressives seemed to 'get it' and could be proud to tell the truth. Now the truth haunts them, and serves as simply another reminder that their job all along was selling stuff, and re-electing corrupt Democrats. Truth-telling was just window-dressing.
BHO just cuts to the chase. Bush liked putting on shows. No real difference between them. They're both murderers, aren't they?
saddam wasnt captured
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2011/10/20/george-w-bush-the-mission-accomplished-fiasco/
gadaffi wasnt so bad
his people had a better standard of living than america today, free health, free electricity, virtually free fuel, free education, better literacy..
the illegal invasion was based on lies, without any evidence
http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/97116.html
http://www.laguerrehumanitaire.fr/english
i wouldnt trust a rothchild as far as i could kick him
It's worse than that, but at least the CIA and Blackwater now have an entirely appropriate ally in the NTC, most of whose leaders appeared on US terrorist lists.
And surprise can no longer be claimed. Hamid Karzai, who never appears without Senator Kerry of Massachusetts, the main war profiteer, peering over his shoulder, has openly declared that when the USA declares war on Pakistan, which can not be long delayed, Afghanistan will side with Pakistan, against the USA.
Tally ho! At least the two sides are unmistakably clear now. And forty to fifty countries developing drones, by gift, imitation, or theft, and Pakistan only the first to install a drone launcher on a navy vessel.
http://wahyusamputra.blogspot.com/2011/10/thecolonel.html
Thank you for the information ceti... Until now I didn't know Obama may have been present when Gaddafi was captured.
I did notice that Gaddafi had suffered a serious head wound and a sholder wound from the hours long firefight along the road before he was hauled out of the roadway drainage culvert he finally crawled into and was hiding in... A very sad end for a once powerful ruler of a country who had billions of dollars to spend for his pleasure.
It has not as yet been reported where the bullet from the sholder wound ended up in Gaddafi's body, only that he died on the way to the hospital in an ambulance from loss of blood and the doctor said he may have suffered a heart attack.
Not confirmed, but a 69 year old good ol boy who is seriously wounded, scared shitless from a long firefight, finally crawling into a dirty ditch, then being hauled around, yelled at, spit on and kicked, fearing for his sons, losing his blood, he could easily suffer a heart attack... Then too, some young mad kid could have shot him in the liver... Who will ever know?
One of Gaddfi sons was also captured alive and died about 40 minutes later... He too had been seriously wounded during the firefight on the roadway... Gaddafi's other son had a bullet hole in the leg and was reported to be under guard in a hospital.. That report on the son in the hospital has not been confirmed
Anyway, if Obama was there, he should have stopped the young freedom fighters, Libyans, from being brutal with their beloved dictator Gaddafi and his son...It is somewhat difficult to understand the brutality as Gaddafi was so well loved by his people. I imagine there will be a state funeral with a lot of weeping Libyan citizens,,, Maybe all of them? _ Tragic... Maybe some of the people from Lockerbe, Scotland can attend.
If I've successfully navigated around the sarcasm, the suggestion that brutality is understandable and indicates what a heinous dictator Gaddafi was is an interesting one.
Does that mean that the official story about what happened on September the 11th 2001 is an acceptance by those who accept it of how bad the US was?
It was not necessary to filter TrouserAttack,,,It was 100% sarcasm.
No need to (*assume*) any brutality is (condoned) either... In the height of a pitched battlle with people being shot at in a firefight, body pumping adrenalin at a peak, it is understandable,,, but not (condoned),,, that some young men who are not well trained militarily or under any strong chain of command would do things that are criminal, unjust and unfair.... Hey; it happens with well trained men in battle... The criminal Lt Calley for just one example! He should have been put in prison for life.
There also is no (proof) so far that Gaddafi was murdered,, a lot of assumptions are flying about it and he may have been murdered... He certainly was not well treated by his captors.... Woner why? .
That same "found hiding in a ditch..or hole..." was the same lie told about Saddam. PATHETIC. While the lie about the "hiding in a hole" has continued to this day...what has been ignored by the MSM is that as a result of the invasion of Iraq...it was reported that over a MILLION Iraqi civilians died. Libyans before the invasion of US/NATO had the highest living standard of any African country. The so-called reason for the invasion was supposedly to prevent the murdering 6000 Libyans. Civilians did not fare well in Libya. As a result of the US/NATO invasion...it was reported as of September that 50,000 Libyan civilians had died. Do Americans really care? Who knows how many Libyan soldiers were killed. What we do know is that the "freedom-loving" rebels executed hundreds of African immigrants. Seems like they had a thing about Africans.
Yep, spot on BBFmail....That is exactly why the vast majority of Libyans are weeping and wailing and are totally Pissed off at NATO forces, the UN and especially Obama and want their beloved leader Gaddafi back.
You can be sure they will find the last living Gaddafi son and put hin on his father's throne, rebuild Gaddafi's green high walled fortress in Tripoli and continue on with their wonderful way of life in the best run country in Arfica.
Oh; that "lie" about Gaddafi hiding in the roadway culvert where it was filmed by several witnesses? __ Yeah; those were staged films made in a Hollywood studio by Disney Inc with cell phone video cameras.
Hillary just offered the Libyans "democracy," the "rule of law," and several million dollars three days ago. LOOK OUT LIBYANS.
The correct form of its name is "Killary."
Or maybe Hitlerary.
Give it time. It's still a wannabe.
It might be fun to join in with all of you brain damaged GOPers present here, buttt,,,, that's not my perogative.
How many here are for Rick Perry, the gay Paree? __ Funny, gotta love it..... Personlly; I'm writing in Keith Olbermann, or maybe some good lookin cocktail waitress from Las Vegas.
Actually, I'm writing in Bradley Manning.
By any chance is Bradley a good lookin Vegas cocktail waitress?
No.
We came. We saw... He died. Ironic that the Nazi bitch should quote Julius Caesar (with a sinister twist). Can America's Imperialism be any more transparent? Yet still, my "hillary" friends don't see through the facade. Wake up America, the 99% don't rejoice when a man's life is taken. And though I might like to, I promise I will not sing "Ding Dong the Witch is Dead" should Hillary's expiration (God forbid) precede my own, because I am part of the 99% who cares about the 100%.
Sadly, this isn't a 99%er issue. A solid majority of Americans indeed does cheer when "the wicked witch" is killed. We're an appallingly bloodthirsty and violent culture, and will probably remain so until we're devastated so thoroughly that we actually learn otherwise. Took Germany two world wars to learn the same lesson, you know . . . so much for the culture of Beethoven and Goethe.
You say of a solid majority,,, ("We're an appallingly bloodthirsty and violent culture").
Is that a fact? __ None of my family members,, friends,, neighbors and aquaintences are like that... I have seen some people who are... Perhaps you are speaking for yourself, your family and your friends corvo? .
Actually, I was thinking of you. :-)
But I'm not the vast majority and if we ever did meet and hoist a few, I bet we'd probably like one another,,, because I'm not like that .
It's all about the oil.
The U.S. and its NATO flunkies saw an opportunity to intervene in a civil war and secure better oil deals. Anyone who thinks it has to do with 'liberating the people of Libya' is smoking state department crack.
The irony is that Qaddafi dismantled his fledgling nuclear weapon's program at the urging of the West and then made efforts at rapprochement with the U.S.
The lesson for any third world country with oil (or perceived as an annoyance by the U.S.) is that they better develop nuclear weapons lickety-split.
Saddam didn't have em' -- so that's precisely why the Bush Administration decided to invade Iraq.
Kim Jong-il has nuclear weapons and he's made everyone aware that he's just crazy enough to nuke Seoul if the U.S. f***s with him.
So he will be left alone for the moment.
The comments of Israeli military historian Martin van Creveld are interesting in light of Qaddafi's death.
In a September 2003 interview in Elsevier, a Dutch weekly, on Israel and the dangers it faces from Iran, the Palestinians and world opinion van Creveld stated:
"We possess several hundred atomic warheads and rockets and can launch them at targets in all directions, perhaps even at Rome. Most European capitals are targets for our air force…. We have the capability to take the world down with us. And I can assure you that that will happen before Israel goes under."
So the Israelis will nuke Europe before going quietly.
In the August 21, 2004 edition of the International Herald Tribune van Creveld added,
"Had the Iranians not tried to build nuclear weapons, they would be crazy."
Because both Israel and the U.S. would like to destroy Iran as a regional power and the only way they will be safe is if they can take out Tel Aviv on their way out the door.
If Qaddafi had nuclear weapons do you think NATO would have dared bomb Tripoli or that he would have been executed like a mad dog on the streets of Sirte?
The U.S. respects only violence and the threat of violence. Everything else is hot air.
Gotta love Martin van Creveld. Yeah, he's a total monster, but he's one magnificent loose cannon.
Thank you. Well stated. No doubt any country observing "the leader of the free world" has come to the same conclusion.
Well you're right to say that this was about Oil; I think that's clear to most.
However, what many are unaware of was that this incursion had more to do with the manner in which Qaddafi wanted to go about his transactions with Oil. His plan was to unite Africa with a common currency called the Gold Dinar, which would be backed by Gold. This means instead of trading oil and oil shares in US Dollars, it would be traded in gold and this is something we literally could not afford.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuqZfaj34nc
Saddam did the same thing when he decided to sell Iraqi Oil in Euros instead of Dollars. This of course would destroy the US energy market and our currency manipulation over OPEC.
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Iraq/Iraq_dollar_vs_euro.html
As far as your comment that:
"The lesson for any third world country with oil (or perceived as an annoyance by the U.S.) is that they better develop nuclear weapons lickety-split."
This is something worthy of debate. Do you think what you are proposing is the answer? I would posit that our military wants countries to BELIEVE they need nuclear weapons, when in fact this will be the pretense for invasion. A good example would be the same desire for the police to see the OWS'ers become violent; it gives them a pretense for invasion. I think Iran is smarter than that, and has studied their Art of War. Let's just hope the people of Iran gain control of their rogue Gov't before something bad happens.
The point of RandyG's comment was that the countries without nuclear weapons (Iraq, Libya) get invaded, while those that do (North Korea) don't. The pretense for invasion is whatever the rogue U.S. government says it is.
You wrote,,,("Well you're right to say that this was about Oil; I think that's clear to most".).
Most who? __ I wonder if you could convince the vast majority of Libya's citizens of that far right winger opinion? ____ The vast majority (most) Libyans who through rebel spokespersons asked the UN for assistance,,, or likely none would have been offered or authorized.
Bravissimo! The crazies have indeed taken over--MIGHT MAKES RIGHT. The laws may not be just, but the bankers haven't broken any laws so SUCK IT, 99%!!! It's a world gone mad. STOP THE INSANITY! How? The 99% rises up and snuffs out the problem, quickly, quietly, painlessly, almost as if nothing happened; and then takes care of ALL the remaining 100%. It's so simple, it's brilliant.
It is the right--the DUTY--of every American to take back this country from multi-national corporate interests who would exploit us. WE ARE THE 99% and we're on to you 1%.
The real reason western capitalists wanted Gaddafi gone?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuqZfaj34nc
Yup ^^^ WATCH THIS VIDEO AND SHARE IT WITH YOUR FRIENDS!!
The Libyans now have the "rule of law" to quote Hillary. Yeah, they now have our law and our order instead of Qaddafi's law and order.
They also have 'our' surface to air rocket launchers, and more.................Looks like we will be needing to invade Libya all over again...........
"Qaddafi’s Death: Barbarism and Hypocrisy"
___________________
Ironically, this is indeed an entirely appropriate headline for this piece, though perhaps not in a way intended by the author or headlne copy-editor.
Rothschild strikes me as a progressive-liberal intellectual Munchkin, so it's entirely predictable that he tries to have it both ways: crooning "Ding, Dong, the Dictator Is Dead!" from his mouth, but from the other end of the alimentary canal hypocritically emitting flatulent denunciations of the Amerikan Imperium & Friends' appalling meddling and mischief that occasioned the termination with extreme prejudice.
It's a waste of time trying to point this out to liberal hawks strung out in sweet post-orgasmic satisfaction-- the special kind that only intercourse that's a little bit dirty confers-- but the popular and convenient position of rejoicing in the ostensibly positive result, but still condemning its antecedent causes and the methods that accomplished it, is a flawed and fallacious rationalization at best.
Because what gets lost or hidden in all that straightforward righteous satisfaction is the scurrilous and rotten Principle of Expediency actually supporting the position: the end justifies the means.
Excellent insight.
Murder never makes me feel good. The end justifying the means is definitely a deep seated belief that needs to be challenged. If not......Goodbye human beings.
Should be, the means justify the ends. The opposite is a moral dead end.
Obedient Servant
Like you, I've watched too many of these "Ding Dong the Wicked Witch is Dead" celebrations -- the glorious and decisive "fall of the Taliban" in Afghanistan in November 2001, and L. Paul Bremer's triumphal "Ladies and Gentlemen: We got him!" upon the capture of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad in December 2003, and Barack Obama's ice-cold swagger over whacking an unarmed Osama bin Laden in May 2011 -- so, this latest edition culminating in the bloody, brutal, barbaric, lynching of Muammar Gaddafi only serves to compound the enormous revulsion I feel over American foreign policy and practice regardless of which party controls the White House.
Jonathan Turley -- self-described libertarian -- offers an excellent and unambiguous reaction to the appalling display of blood-feud "justice" in "liberated" Libya:
The Gadhafi Video: Where Is The Outrage?
http://jonathanturley.org/2011/10/21/the-gadhafi-video-where-is-the-outrage/
Matthew Rothschild is seriously deluded if he believes that "For the people of Libya, long oppressed by Qaddafi, this is a day of liberation." The recent history of our interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq suggest a chaotic future marked by violent contests for power and shares of the spoils among emboldened and heavily-armed militias representing a complex variety of ethnic, tribal, religious, and geographic divisions that will surely explode in a long and complicated and bloody civil war.
Still, the liberal "progressive" talk-radio and MSNBC TV hosts are ejaculating in unison over the airwaves, so eager are they to play cheerleader for Obama over the very policies and practices for which they decried and vilified Bush not so long ago. Their praise is as selective as their "outrage" and based not on critical analysis but on Democratic Party hackery and partisan zeal for Obama's 2012 re-election.
Obama and the Democrats -- and their pom-pom waving shills in the liberal "progressive" media -- have demonstrated beyond any doubt that tribal affiliations are not limited to South Asia, North Africa, and the Middle East.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
All perfectly stated, and thank you for the link. From the article: "the treatment of Gadhafi ... should shock the conscience."
Americans have for some time now been shocked out of even having much of a conscience. We've become what we've been led to become: a nation of sociopaths, and sycophants to sociopaths.
"Be careful when you fight monsters, lest you become one."
—Friedrich Nietzsche
Sarah, and OS: you Cats remind me why I still bother reading CD. The comments are much better than the articles from the apologetic wing of the Dem party and the professional class of pundits who do their bidding by proxy and misdirection. Keep the fires alive...
My sediments exactly.
Lately I've been 'acting up' in the presence of those who express delight in news of the Colonel's demise: I heartily agree with them and put on my best deranged expression while saying: "Yeah, but you know it's not quite as exhilarating as when we bombed the living f#@k out of his infant daughter all those years ago: that was so awesome!"