He isn't relinquishing power easily. This is not like Egypt. The Libyans are facing death. Many have been killed. Qaddafi's civility and humanity are absent, and we know this. The Libyans are facing an intense fear campaign of words and guns as a means of suppressing their democracy wish.
Qaddafi has been accumulating massive amounts of oil wealth. You would think he could walk away from it at this point, sated to the heavens with billions of dollars. The man has certainly used his position as a world stage in which his eccentricity is uniquely displayed to say the least.
There has to be a sub story here. Libya has Africa's largest oil reserve. This can only mean that big oil has its big long arm in this thing at least up to and including the shoulder.
CS Monitor: Libya protests spread as barrier of fear crumbles
“My sense that the regime’s willingness and eagerness to use not only extreme violence but all sorts of horrific tactics, shooting with the intent to kill, tricking people into a sense of safety and coming near the gates of buildings and then shooting them, hiring mercenaries to attack people and to go to protesters’ houses and damaging their property and so on … is working against it..."
Libya, a country of about 7 million people, has Africa’s greatest oil reserves, although that wealth has not been shared beyond Qaddafi’s family and a coterie of loyalists.
2 comments:
Libyans know that if they get rid of Mummar they'll have the OIL, so does Mummar, so he's more then willing to kill as many of them as necessary to hold on. In Egypt it's a far different equation ( no oil). As for the OILY cartels they'd prefer "stability," which is code for the existing murderous regime. No surprise there. Richard Cheney and his ilk are fascists and prefer guys like themselves to run things.
Yes that is the story. A human life is worth next to nothing in this scenario. Its so cut and dry its disgusting.
You would think that if the USA were really the arbiters of democracy that we would have all kinds of military in there helping the Libyans. The real story is just the opposite. Big oil wants the regime and big oil tells US what to do.
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