Posted on 04/02/2014 12:59:02 PM PDT by Academiadotorg
The Libyan civil war did more harm to the country, its people, economy and its neighbors in North Africa when NATO intervened at the behest of U.S. President Barack Obama, concluded a University of Texas-Austin professor Alan Kuperman. He gave his remarks at the libertarian think tank Cato Institute.
Associate professor of public affairs Alan Kuperman is an associate professor of public affairs and he criticized NATO’s intervention in the Libyan civil war. The civil war pitted rebels against government forces loyal to dictator Muammar Qaddafi.
Kuperman was grateful to Obama for outlining the definition of success in Libya for the public in order to provide a framework for analysis. He quoted Obama’s own words in outlining success in Libya, which Obama said was based on the need to:
“Protect civilians Stop the killing Facilitate “transition to a legitimate government that is responsive to the Libyan people” Avert “strains on the peaceful –yet fragile – transitions in” neighboring states Prevent “repressive leaders conclud[ing] that violence is the best strategy to cling to power””
As with all foreign policy decisions, Kuperman pointed out that Obama and other decision-makers had to make “progress toward these objective that would make these costs worthwhile.” However, no progress could be seen in the aftermath of the Libyan civil war when he compared possible situations with and without intervention, which he called “net impact.” And although it was based on a “counterfactual,” it still provides an important picture of the foreign policy decision to intervene in Libya.
He briefly gave a summary of the civil war and how the eastern-based rebels had driven all the way to the pro-Qaddafi western parts of Libya. Qaddafi had “initially responded with non-lethal force,” but that quickly disappeared when the rebels “made fairly rapid” progress in gaining territory. Kuperman felt that the narrative of targeting civilians was a non-issue because Qaddafi forces were targeting the militants and “not the civilian population.” In the civil war, before the NATO intervention, “in none of those towns was there a bloodbath” where there were clashes between the two sides.
Kuperman predicted that the death toll, without an intervention, would have resulted in about 1,100 deaths and would last about six months. But, with the intervention, the civil war lasted much longer. He said, “Instead of six weeks, the war lasted 36 weeks. Rather than having 1,100 dead, there were in a range of 8,000-11,000 dead” by a variety of U.S. and Libyan estimates.
To make matters worse, Kuperman found that the civil war led to “a lot of negative consequences” such as “a lot of reprisal killings,” “a lot of ethnic cleansing” and “crimes against humanity.” He said, “Benghazi is a disaster, including the tragic killing of ambassador Chris Stevens” and without Qaddafi, “al-Qaeda types are flourishing in Libya.”
The country of Libya has seen its oil output fall to one-sixth of what it used to produce and “the government is not functioning.” At one point, the prime minister was kidnapped, was released and fled the country. Also, Kuperman felt that the destabilization of Libya “caused the destruction of the best democracy in Africa: Mali.” After “we overthrew Qaddafi [the pro-Qaddafi militants] fled back to Mali…the largest safe haven in the world for al-Qaeda.” The formerly shining example of African democracy, Mali, soon became a battleground for al-Qaeda fighters.
When addressing if the NATO intervention deterred other dictators from waging war on their own people, Kuperman was not encouraged by his research. After the intervention, “it sure doesn’t look like” Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was deterred from escalating the civil war in his country. In addition, the Egyptian government was overthrown by the country’s military and was not fazed by the NATO intervention in neighboring Libya.
In evaluating Obama’s own guidelines of success, Kuperman was not flattering. Regarding the protection of civilians and civilian life, he said, “No, it increased the death toll by eightfold” and “it lengthened the war by six times.” Obama’s other goal was to establish a legitimate government, but Kuperman said, “There’s no legimitate government and it is not responsive to the Libyan people.” Instead, “it led to the demise of the best democracy in North Africa” in Mali, and no dictator was intimidated by the NATO intervenion. In Kuperman’s words, “Assad went ahead and did what he was going to do.”
He seemingly hedged his answers and questioned, “Maybe it’s too soon to tell” but he still felt that “the NATO intervention in Libya was an abysmal failure.”
This is about as close as we’ve come to finding accuracy in academia in quite some time.
Mission accomplished for the NWO Globalists.
The outcome was obvious before Obama went in—illegally, against a sovereign nation, without consulting the American people or seeking approval by congress. His “authority” was NATO and the UN.
Kaddafi was a troublemaker earlier, but he had long since split with the Muslim fanatics—who disapproved of him—and instead had allied himself with black Africans.
As usual, Obama allied himself with the Muslim fanatics and against our national interest. Why anyone failed to recognize that is a mystery to me—even with our lying press.
You can put FAILED behind any of Zero’s programs!
author Alan Kuperman
http://www.usip.org/experts/alan-kuperman
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/author/alan-j-kuperman
http://thebulletin.org/bio/alan-j-kuperman
http://louisproyect.org/2011/04/16/alan-j-kuperman-useful-idiot/
The Culture of Death, doing what it does best.
What a basket of vipers. Most interesting. Thanks for linking that.
Can we expect Obama allowing Taiwan to become Chinese? American space research to be abolished? The chance to become energy independent thwarted? Meanwhile, half the American public has become dependent on the government.
Obama is strangling the economy with truckloads of new regulations. He picks and chooses what laws to enforce, weakening American rule of law and fomenting racial division.
Is calling him “The Manchurian President” too far a comparison?
Yes. Kaddafi went to that Arab Muslim conference, hoping to take over as leader of the movement. Instead, he was reviled and made fun of because of his strange garb and his girl security guard.
So, he decided to become the leader of a pan-African movement, Arabs and blacks working together, instead of Arabs trying to conquer and enslave blacks. He hired many black Africans to work in the oil fields, and he had many projects like the one you reference, to improve the lives of those in the region. Most Arabs really hated that.
Yes, the Saudis would have killed him on the spot if they could have. He was speaking facts and making reasoned arguments.
And NATO was used to destroy the infrastucture of a country, the carcass of which is now being fought over by the fanatics. Gaddafi offered to share the technology of the Great Underground River project with Egypt. Couldn’t have that, not with Mubarak and his 30 year peace with Israel. Now Egypt cannot feed itself, and tourism is nil. Are we awake yet?
It gave the fanatics an excuse to slaughter the foreign african workers:
excerpt
During the civil war, African migrant workers suffered the worst of the violence. Racist hatred was fueled against them by a myth spread most notably by Al Jazeera that African migrant workers in Libya were actually Gaddafi’s hired mercenaries. This racist violence was wrought with a vengeance against the 35,000 citizens living in the city of Tawergha. The Tawerghans were forcibly removed from their homes, a few were executed, and the rest were sent away never allowed to return. Their crime was their supposed support for Gaddafi. Vijay Prashad in Arab Spring, Libyan Winter writes of one incident that took place in the days before the bombings began, when protesters executed 50 “African Mercenaries” at a police station in the province of Cyrenaica. During the bombings, NATO showed no compassion towards the African migrant workers. Horace Campbell, in Global NATO and the Catastrophic Failure of Libya writes, “More than 900 Africans drowned in the Mediterranean Sea, trying to escape the fighting in Libya. In one spectacular incident, two survivors reported the tragic story of a boat carrying 72 African immigrants that ran into difficulty trying to reach the Italian port of Lampedusa. The Africans on board, including women and children, were left to drift in the Mediterranean for sixteen days after a number of European military units apparently ignored their cries for help. Two of the nine survivors claimed this included a NATO ship. Despite alarms being raised with the Italian coast guard and the boat making contact with a military helicopter and a warship, no rescue effort was attempted.” This wanton disregard for human life is emblematic of the entirety of the NATO intervention. It was a horrific affair with tens of thousands massacred. In the letter published by U.S. President Barack Obama, French President Nicholas Sarkozy, and British President David Cameron, the three announced that they “would not rest” until, “the Libyan people can choose their own future.” During the fall of Gaddafi’s capital of Tripoli, mobs of barely armed Gaddafi supporters, ordinary citizens of the Libyan city of Tripoli, rallied to defend Gaddafi’s compound Bab al-Aziza. There they were attacked by the full might of NATO’s arsenal. Some 63 bombings were undertaken targeting the supporters at the compound in a single 24-hour period. Apache gunships and drones were used to attack this mass of what were technically “combatants” so that now “the Libyan people can choose their own future.”
~~~
WHAT IS NATO NOW?
It was Sarkozoy's willingness to be involved that shocked me. Proof I guess, that being a NATO member means having no principles what-so-ever.
NATO committed war crimes.
http://www.theoccidentalobserver.net/2012/02/the-war-crimes-of-nato-in-libya/
This article appeared on Feb. 06, 2012 in the Swiss online journal Alles Schall und Rauch and was written by Freeman.
Like all illegal wars exclusively pulled off by NATO, the one against Libya has triggered mass murder. Reports from human rights organizations show that the United States, NATO and their vassal “rebels” committed the worst possible war crimes, culminating in the cold-blooded murder of Muammar Qaddafi. Interviews conducted with victims and witnesses in Tripoli, Zawiya, Sibrata, Khoms, Zliten, Misrata and Sirte Tawergha give ample proof that NATO deliberately bombed civilian targets, causing numerous deaths and injuries. This included schools, hospitals, government buildings, food stores and homes. The rebels meanwhile indulged in systematic torture, abuse and revenge killings among Gaddafi sympathizers, while “Black” immigrants were literally butchered.
EXCERPT
After NATO shoved the Muslim narco-terrorist state of Kosovo down Serbia’s throat I realized that we (the people of America and Europe) are all a hair’s breadth away from our own governments going Stalin-Mao on us.
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