Libya

[NeedSomeAnswers]

So what does everyone think will happen in Libya ? it looks increasingly likely that the western developed nations may intervene. If they do what will it be ?

The main options seem to be;

- Invade.
- Attempt to introduce a No fly Zone
- hand some guns & equipment to the rebels.
- send in a hit squad to take out gaddafi.
- send in some UN peace keepers troops to hang around and get shot at.
- talk loudly and angrily about the deterioration bemoaning the impotence of the
UN, whilst at the same time secretly siphoning off all there oil.

No a great bunch of options to be honest but has anybody got any better ideas ?

[FunkyDexter]

All of the above except invade. There's no way that's happening after Iraq and Afghanistan. But we're already standing around talking about how impotent the UN are. We'll almost certainly set up a no fly zone. We've already sent in a diplomatic to talk to the rebels and, given that it was apparently being protected by SAS troops I'm willing to bet it was carrying more than a box of chocolates. And it won't be long before you see blue helmets over there. Actually, we probably won't bother assassinating Gadaffi because, what's the point now?

I was waiting for someone to post a question about this in World Events. I'd kept meaning to myself but never quite got round to it. Possibly the single most important chain of events since the collapse of the Berlin wall and it's taken us weeks to bring it up.

The point that's struck me but which nobody seems to be mentioning: Isn't this pretty much the manifestation of the neo-con dream. Insyall a democracy in Iraq and it'll spread throughout the region. Of course, I think they were hoping it would spread to Iran rather than Egypt but even so... maybe they were right.

[MarMan]

Innocent people are getting killed. That's the part I do not like.

"send in a hit squad to take out gaddafi" + his sons and whoever would try to fill the vacuum would, in my opinion, cause the least harm to people who deserve no harm. But its a mess.

"Attempt to introduce a No fly Zone" - for the jets, easy. for the helicopters, impossible. It would stop gaddafi from lobbing bombs at cities.

"hand some guns & equipment to the rebels" I'm all for helping someone help themselves. Would that really be helping them? Only they can decide no matter what it may look like to us. More bullets = more death.

I think for future generations, the sooner the country moves away from a dictator, the better. It just won't be better immediately.

[NeedSomeAnswers]

The point that's struck me but which nobody seems to be mentioning: Isn't this pretty much the manifestation of the neo-con dream. Insyall a democracy in Iraq and it'll spread throughout the region.

I thought the Neo-Con dream had more to do with keeping oil supplies safe ?

I haven't seen many republican coming forward saying they are particularly happy with what's going on in Libya and Egypt & Tunisia e.t.c as they may have been run by dictators but at least they were our dictators.

Libya maybe different i would have thought the republicans would be happy to see the back of Gaddafi more than any of the other leaders.

"send in a hit squad to take out gaddafi" + his sons and whoever would try to fill the vacuum would, in my opinion, cause the least harm to people who deserve no harm. But its a mess.

This would be the nicest solution, but i have the feeling that it would also be incredibly difficult and we would probably make a mess of it.

"Attempt to introduce a No fly Zone" - for the jets, easy. for the helicopters, impossible. It would stop gaddafi from lobbing bombs at cities.

Yes i agree, although i wonder on its own if it will do much good.

"hand some guns & equipment to the rebels" I'm all for helping someone help themselves. Would that really be helping them? Only they can decide no matter what it may look like to us. More bullets = more death.

This is what i am not sure about. The Rebels are heavily out armed by Gaddafi's troops. Given time now it seems that left alone Gaddafi has enough Fire-power to take out the Rebels. So if we dont want to invade, do we put some special forces dudes in with the Rebels and give them some heavy weapons ?

There is going to be lots of death either way revolutions are more often bloody than not.

[FunkyDexter]

I thought the Neo-Con dream had more to do with keeping oil supplies safe ?

Fair enough. For the cynical among us I should have said "declared dream".

I'm generally against getting involved in foreign countries but this feels to me like something we really should be doing something about. I'm still not sure invading would be a good idea (or welcome) but the rebels and the leagure of Arab Nations have called for a No Fly zone and that's legitimacy enough for me. I'm really quite angry that we don't seem to be doing anything at all about this, meanwhile Gadaffi's troops have retaken all the major cities except Benghazi.

[MarMan]

I'm still not sure invading would be a good idea (or welcome) but the rebels and the leagure of Arab Nations have called for a No Fly zone and that's legitimacy enough for me.

I agree. If non-Arab countries feel a no fly zone would help AND the Arab League agree, (really?), then it seems like something should be done.

[abhijit]

So what does everyone think will happen in Libya ? it looks increasingly likely that the western developed nations may intervene. If they do what will it be ?

The main options seem to be;

- Invade.
- Attempt to introduce a No fly Zone
- hand some guns & equipment to the rebels.
- send in a hit squad to take out gaddafi.
- send in some UN peace keepers troops to hang around and get shot at.
- talk loudly and angrily about the deterioration bemoaning the impotence of the
UN, whilst at the same time secretly siphoning off all there oil.

No a great bunch of options to be honest but has anybody got any better ideas ?

Leaving them alone would be a good option, IMHO.

[DeanMc]

I agree with abhijit, people are still dying the world over from hunger but that doesn't seem so important. Let Libya sort Libya out. Who is to say the rebels wont install a similar regime.

[MarMan]

@abhijit & @DeanMc You may be right, only time will tell what the best choice to make is.

There is a lot of food that is wasted because no one wants to pay to ship it to where the people need it.

But I don't like bad people. I am completely biased against them. But then someone on this site pointed out that a "bad person" is only an opinion. Fortunately there is a substantial number of people in the world who share my opinion that gadaffi is a "bad person". All that does is booster my belief, which is neither right nor wrong, but can lead to good or bad results. I hate to see innocent people bombed, shot, spit on or go hungry. So an incomplete summation would be:

Bomb gadaffi, possiblly (probably, but not definite) kill some innocent people.
Leave Libya alone and probably watch innocent people die.

I'm sorry, I may be wrong, but I think shoving a missle down gadaffi's throat would be an improvement. Putting his head on a pike may work out also.

[LaVolpe]

...but I think shoving a missle down gadaffi's throat would be an improvement. Putting his head on a pike may work out also.

May be no need for this. By the UN temporarily preventing Libya's military from squashing the opposition, the opposition will most undoubtedly grow stronger. As it gains strength, both in numbers and weaponary, less and less people will be pro-Gadhafi . Once highly ranked military leaders jump the fence towards Free-Libya, Gadhafi may have no choice but to flee or risk murder/execution by the hand of his own people.

But there are many variables and many potential outcomes assuming the UN does not authorize ground forces. It is possible the opposition doesn't organize and arm sufficiently to do the job. It is possible Gadhafi backs off for a year or two and then swarms back in. It is possible Libya splits into two countries (east & west). So many other scenarios are possible. For us non-Libyans, we can only wait and see which scenarios play out. The UN leveled the battlefield a bit, but it's still in the hands of the Libyans -- both sides.

[MarMan]

Gadhafi may have no choice but to flee

I think that would be the best choice to reduce the loss of life as much as possible. Actually I just thought of something. Since a lot of his assets are frozen I believe it would be wise to offer him all his wealth back if he promises (and his sons) to retire. Then have UN backed elections. But that would only work with a sound mind, and he is (this is another belief of mine) a madman.

[LaVolpe]

...I think that would be the best choice...

May not be his best choice. If he flees, it will have to be to a country that will protect him. Otherwise, the world court will be tracking him down to prosecute him for crimes against humanity. Definitely don't release his wealth... it will only go to bad use resulting in killing of more innocents - be it Americans, Europeans, and anyone else his new protectorate deems worthwhile.

[MarMan]

Definitely don't release his wealth... it will only go to bad use resulting in killing of more innocents - be it Americans, Europeans, and anyone else his new protectorate deems worthwhile.

Good point. I stand corrected.

[abhijit]

@abhijit & @DeanMc You may be right, only time will tell what the best choice to make is.

There is a lot of food that is wasted because no one wants to pay to ship it to where the people need it.

But I don't like bad people. I am completely biased against them. But then someone on this site pointed out that a "bad person" is only an opinion. Fortunately there is a substantial number of people in the world who share my opinion that gadaffi is a "bad person". All that does is booster my belief, which is neither right nor wrong, but can lead to good or bad results. I hate to see innocent people bombed, shot, spit on or go hungry. So an incomplete summation would be:

Bomb gadaffi, possiblly (probably, but not definite) kill some innocent people.
Leave Libya alone and probably watch innocent people die.

I'm sorry, I may be wrong, but I think shoving a missle down gadaffi's throat would be an improvement. Putting his head on a pike may work out also.

Deciding who's bad is a very tough call. There's a bumper sticker somewhere that shouts " Kill them All! Let G-D sort they out". I am not sure if that's a very sensible solution. Inherently all people have a survival mechanism built into them. This mechanism will force you into making decisions that will be probably be termed as "bad" by others, but will in fact be good for you. It is wrong to be selfish, but that's what has been keeping humans alive for centuries.

At some point of time these "innocent people" will rise and do whatever is necessary to get rid of whatever / whoever they deem is evil. The key to this is that they need to do it by themselves without the hand-holding. If anyone has to put his head on a pike or send a missile down his throat let it be the "junta".


Note: junta (also spelled as janta) is a hindi word which means "people" or "crowd". Also used to indicate "crowd" or "the kind of people" at some place.

[Shaggy Hiker]

The current situation has some interesting parallels to the Barbary coast war that created the US Navy and Marine Corps. In that one, we fought a series of inconsequential actions, embargoes, and so forth against the ruler of Tripoli. Eventually, an enterprising guy started an uprising based around the rulers brother (in that case, but it was still a rebellion in eastern Tripoli, which is now Libya). The rebels moved west towards the city of Tripoli, gaining a bit of ground against outposts, which scared the leader into making some concessions. At that point, the US abandoned the rebels, and the ruler of Tripoli re-conquered the whole country.

[MarMan]

Deciding who's bad is a very tough call.

I agree. It also depends on which society you belong to. And there any not many that support killing innocent women and children to preserve your wealth while you are already wealthy. Flat out lying is also considered bad in most cultures. Let us assume satan (the devil) is real, then those would be good traits. Just bad traits for a society that is not based on evil. Of course that could be considered my opinion. It just happens to be shared by a large portion of the people on this planet. Which could be considered a "de-facto definition".

And if his bahavior is due to mental illness, then he has no right to govern anyone. (my opinion).

At some point of time these "innocent people" will rise and do whatever is necessary to get rid of whatever / whoever they deem is evil. The key to this is that they need to do it by themselves without the hand-holding. If anyone has to put his head on a pike or send a missile down his throat let it be the "junta".

I agree with this statement also. They ARE trying to do it by themselves. And they ARE getting slaughtered. Example: If you keep sending out the weak kid to stand up to the bully then, in a situation like Libya, they will come back with a black eye, then a bloody nose, then missing teeth; permanently scarred for life, physically and possibly mentally. When a little intervention could have gone a long way. So what do they do? Take abuse their whole life? Drop out of school? Or get help?

Basically it depends on how much abuse you don't mind other people getting. Some people have been abused and don't want it to happen to others, some have been and figure if they had to go through it so should anyone else. Others have never been abused but still oppose it while others can not even grasp the concept therefore don't really know the distress others can be in. What is right? All of them depending on who you ask.

One thing I do know is a FACT: If I were over there watching my family, friends or fellow countrymen getting slaughtered, I would be pleased with any help I could get. Even if someone brought me a wheel barrow full of rocks I can throw before I die, I would be grateful.

Another FACT: I prefer to see people being grateful than dead. But not everyone shares that belief.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Another FACT: I prefer to see people being grateful than dead. But not everyone shares that belief.

Yeah, the Grateful Dead were a bit controversial, though I'm not quite sure how they got into this discussion.

[FunkyDexter]

<Groan> Shaggy, your puns are getting worse. Which is quite an achievement really.

I keep seeing the 'It's none of our business' argument and it's true, it is none of our business. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't get involved. If an old guy falls down in front of me it's none of my business, but that doesn't stop me being an arse if I just walk past and don't help him up.

Perhaps a better metephor would be if the old guy was being beaten up as then there would be some risk to me as a result of helping. But, frankly, I like to think of myself as the sort of person who'd be willing to accept that risk if I could save the old fella a lump or two. I like to think I can hold my nation up to the same standards as I do myself and I'm glad that, in this case, I can - even if we did leave it a bit late.

Also, the 'well we didn't stop Mugabe' argument irritates me a bit as well. Failing to act in one situation where we should have does not justify failing to act in another. Two wrongs don't make a right. Of course, you might not think we should have acted against Mugabe and that then opens a sensible debate but arguing that we can't intervene now because we didn't intervene then just doesn't hold water for me.

As for how you define whether someone's 'bad' enough to merit military action that is, of course, highly subjective. However, in this case, Gadaffi's own people are saying he's bad enough, his neighbours are saying he's bad enough, hell, his own mother's probably starting to look a bit embarrassed by her son's behaviour by now. Action is justified in this case because all the relevant parties are asking for it.

[Xanith]

What I want to know is where is all of the people claiming about this being a war over oil? People couldn’t help themselves falling all over that argument when the Iraq war was going on.

Also why are we not going into Yemen? Iran? Syria? Bahrain? The Middle East and Africa is on fire with innocent civilians getting slaughtered all over the place. Why do we care so much about Libya?

There is no clear defined plan about what to do in Libya; all of the stated goals seem to change depending on who you are talking too. Obama and the US have pretty much abdicated all responsibility choosing to follow instead of leading, despite having the great majority of military assets being from the US. If that is the case then the US shouldn’t be investing its blood and treasure for such an action, especially when it has 0 impact on the security and interests of the United States.

X

[szlamany]

Libya is one of the largest sources of light sweet crude - oil that turns into more petroleum and more easily.

That is why Libya is important at all to the international community.

That was obvious to me from day 1.

[MarMan]

Also why are we not going into Yemen? Iran? Syria? Bahrain? The Middle East and Africa is on fire with innocent civilians getting slaughtered all over the place. Why do we care so much about Libya?

Good question. I will speculate that for two reasons:

1. A lot of people don't like gadaffi
2. There is a lot of support for this mission

I should clarify my earlier statements. I am for this because I don't like people getting killed. Wherever it is. I am not saying that is the only or main reason driving all the other nations, although I believe it plays a role. I think their dislike for gadaffi (lowercase intentional) is a big part of it. I believe oil has little to do with it because everyone buys oil from everyone no matter who they are mad at (as far as I know, please correct me if I am wrong). I think shipping costs play more a role as to where oil goes then who hates who.

[szlamany]

Do you really think that oil has little to do with it? He has been insane for decades (with all the assorted atrocities) and allowed to be - for just that reason - and that reason alone.

[szlamany]

from a quick web search

But Libya is big enough to make a difference, and the turmoil is not taking place in a vacuum. It is happening against a backdrop of unrest throughout the region -- and rising demand for oil from developing countries.

Even though Saudi officials pledged this week to ramp up their production to fill any shortfall, no one knows if Qaddafi will be the only Middle East oil autocrat in danger of being toppled.

“Libya is the first major oil exporter to be actually affected by the protests,” said Jim Burkhard, managing director of the global oil group at IHS CERA, an energy consulting firm based in Cambridge, Mass. “If you add into that this historic change in the Middle East, then you have greater anxiety about rising oil prices.”

[Shaggy Hiker]

I don't think the US or the UN security council would have acted on their own. Once they got the Arab League request, then they had a situation they could work with. You won't see Arab League support for intervention in Iran, Syria, or Bahrain. We might see support for somet6hing in Yemen, but that is a country like Egypt in that the government could fall through protest alone. We certainly wouldn't have done anything in Libya if Murmuring Gadly had simply fled the country.

[NeedSomeAnswers]

What I want to know is where is all of the people claiming about this being a war over oil? People couldn’t help themselves falling all over that argument when the Iraq war was going on.

People were saying it because there was quite a bit of truth in it.

In Iraq if you see what has happened to there oil fields since the War (opened up to Western companies) it is difficult to argue.

In Libya, i think we would be naive to think that none of the international leaders has thought about the oil in Libya, but there is a distinct difference between the two wars.

In Libya there was a popular uprising that was being crushed by the regime, and Gaddafi's troops where visibly attacking there own people and were about to descend on a city (Benghazi) of around a million people. If left alone it could well have been genocide. Oh and also we got a UN resolution which we also didn't get in Iraq.

In Iraq we had some reports that Saddam had WMDs he wasn't using them and he wasn't attacking his own people at the time. If he had been doing any of those thing then there would have been a whole lot more justification for going to war in Iraq.

Also why are we not going into Yemen? Iran? Syria? Bahrain? The Middle East and Africa is on fire with innocent civilians getting slaughtered all over the place. Why do we care so much about Libya?

You do have a point, Yemen looks like it will sort itself out, as the military have defected to the rebels and if the current ruler does go to war then it will be against his own military.

The others and several other countries Burma, North Korea e.t.c you could ask why we dont do anything, some of the answer are political. Bahrain is best buddies with Saudi Arabia and we have very close links with them and the US even closer, Iran would be a bloodbath and very difficult to countenance.

Personally i think that more should have been done in countries like Burma, and Bahrain and Zimbabwe. I suspect Politics got in the way of us intervening.

Libya is one of the largest sources of light sweet crude - oil that turns into more petroleum and more easily.

To be fair Libya's oil fields are not in the same League as Iraq's, they are in no way anywhere near as big, certainly not big enough to start a war over, especially as many western countries already had contracts to extract oil in Libya.

[szlamany]

I think Libya is like 2% of world wide production - not a big number - they are probably the smallest of the "big oil producers".

I never said "start a war over oil reserves in Libya" - I more or less meant we ignored an docile-evil-bad-guy because sleeping with him felt good in the overall game-of-world-wide-oil-consumption and the game-of-Risk we keep playing in the middle east...

...not that libya is even near those hot spots...

Tripoli should be a resort on the Mediterranean - I guess that's what Gadfly thought it was all along...

[NeedSomeAnswers]

I never said "start a war over oil reserves in Libya" - I more or less meant we ignored an docile-evil-bad-guy because sleeping with him felt good in the overall game-of-world-wide-oil-consumption and the game-of-Risk we keep playing in the middle east...

Yes very true, we (the so-called developed countries) do that a lot, if the tyrant in charge of a big oil producing nation is friendly to us and doesn't try and commit genocide we tend to leave them well alone. In fact we tend to finance them to stop terrorism, which often comes back to haunt us.

[FunkyDexter]

That's because being a tyrant isn't sufficiently 'evil' to justify going to war. Declaring that you're going to massacre about half a million of your own people and then making a damn good effort to follow though on it is.

The difference between Iraq/Yemen and Libya is legitimacy. In the case of Iraq we lacked the international legitimacy to justify an invasion because so much of the UN and Arab world objected to it. I personally think we lacked the moral legitimacy as well but that's a different debate. Equally, the Arab league is not currently calling out for us to intervene in Yemen or Bahrain. They were calling for us to act in Libya.

It's starting to look like Tunisia might be about to go the same way though.

[honeybee]

@abhijit & @DeanMc You may be right, only time will tell what the best choice to make is.

There is a lot of food that is wasted because no one wants to pay to ship it to where the people need it.

But I don't like bad people. I am completely biased against them. But then someone on this site pointed out that a "bad person" is only an opinion. Fortunately there is a substantial number of people in the world who share my opinion that gadaffi is a "bad person". All that does is booster my belief, which is neither right nor wrong, but can lead to good or bad results. I hate to see innocent people bombed, shot, spit on or go hungry. So an incomplete summation would be:

Bomb gadaffi, possiblly (probably, but not definite) kill some innocent people.
Leave Libya alone and probably watch innocent people die.

I'm sorry, I may be wrong, but I think shoving a missle down gadaffi's throat would be an improvement. Putting his head on a pike may work out also.

Deja vu, whatever the spelling is. I heard the same arguments against Saddam Hussein back when Dubya, Powell and Tony Blair announced Iraq had WMDs.

Why Libya? Why not Tibet? Why not Myanmar? Why not North Korea? Why not China for that matter?

O
I
L

PS: Libyan oil is 'sweet', which means purer. And that means it can be refined at much cheaper costs.

.

[honeybee]

I agree. It also depends on which society you belong to. And there any not many that support killing innocent women and children to preserve your wealth while you are already wealthy. Flat out lying is also considered bad in most cultures. Let us assume satan (the devil) is real, then those would be good traits. Just bad traits for a society that is not based on evil. Of course that could be considered my opinion. It just happens to be shared by a large portion of the people on this planet. Which could be considered a "de-facto definition".

And if his bahavior is due to mental illness, then he has no right to govern anyone. (my opinion).



I agree with this statement also. They ARE trying to do it by themselves. And they ARE getting slaughtered. Example: If you keep sending out the weak kid to stand up to the bully then, in a situation like Libya, they will come back with a black eye, then a bloody nose, then missing teeth; permanently scarred for life, physically and possibly mentally. When a little intervention could have gone a long way. So what do they do? Take abuse their whole life? Drop out of school? Or get help?

Basically it depends on how much abuse you don't mind other people getting. Some people have been abused and don't want it to happen to others, some have been and figure if they had to go through it so should anyone else. Others have never been abused but still oppose it while others can not even grasp the concept therefore don't really know the distress others can be in. What is right? All of them depending on who you ask.

One thing I do know is a FACT: If I were over there watching my family, friends or fellow countrymen getting slaughtered, I would be pleased with any help I could get. Even if someone brought me a wheel barrow full of rocks I can throw before I die, I would be grateful.

Another FACT: I prefer to see people being grateful than dead. But not everyone shares that belief.

Yeah, but there are societies which don't really mind if the innocent being slaughtered are from another society. And it's nice to see you turning your personal opinions into defacto crap within a matter of a sentence. That art was sorely missing.

What about Gaddafi? Definitely if he were watching his family, his friends' families, his employees' families or fellow countrymen getting slaughtered, he too would be pleased with any help he could get. And mind you, if you dig deeper, you will find the US of A delivered more than a wheelbarrow full of rocks to Gaddafi.


Just out of curiousity, I ran a search: Here's what Wikipaedia says:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muammar_Gaddafi

On 1 September 1969, a small group of junior military officers led by Gaddafi staged a bloodless coup d'&#233;tat against King Idris while he was in Turkey for medical treatment. His nephew, the Crown Prince Sayyid Hasan ar-Rida al-Mahdi as-Sanussi, was formally deposed by the revolutionary army officers and put under house arrest; they abolished the monarchy and proclaimed the new Libyan Arab Republic.[15]

A plan was organised by David Stirling to use mercenaries to restore the monarchy after he was approached by a member of the royal family. Stirling was the founder of the British Special Air Service in 1941. The mercenaries were to "spring" 150 political prisoners from Tripoli jail as a catalyst for a general uprising. The mercenaries were to slip away quietly, unseen by the media, as the locals took over. It was called the "Hilton Assignment" as an ironic comment on the comfort level at the jail. Stirling was fairly confident that the plan was achievable and politically acceptable but he was warned off at a late stage by the British Secret Intelligence Service, allegedly because the United States Government felt that Gaddafi was sufficiently anti-Marxist to be worth protecting.[16][17]

Further down...

Fathi Eljahmi was a prominent dissident who was imprisoned from 2002 until his death in 2009 for calling for increased democratization in Libya. Human Rights Watch did not call for investigation in the death and avoided criticism of human rights in Libya.[22]

In 2003 Libyan official Najat al-Hajjajia was selected to chair the United Nations Human Rights Commission. Reporters Without Borders (RWB) stated, "Censorship, arbitrary detention, jailings, disappearances, torture; at last the UN has appointed someone who knows what she’s talking about". The commission subsequently banned RWB from its meetings.[23][24]

And further ...

On 15 May 2006, the U.S. State Department announced that it would restore full diplomatic relations with Libya, once Gaddafi declared he was abandoning Libya's weapons of mass destruction program. The State Department also said that Libya would be removed from the list of nations supporting terrorism.[38]

.

[MarMan]

One thing I did notice all these people who get humanitarian aid confused with oil don't mention Afganistan. They must have secret oil buried under the ground that we are trying to get. The troops there must be trying to get secret hidden oil no one knows about instead of hunting bad guys.

To pick two battles (Iraq and Libya) out of many because only those two illustrate your point (they are the only two that have oil worth mentioning) is letting your own biasness cloud your judgement. To get to the truth you must consider all facts, not just the ones that suit your opinion.

[szlamany]

One thing I did notice all these people who get humanitarian aid confused with oil don't mention Afganistan. They must have secret oil buried under the ground that we are trying to get. The troops there must be trying to get secret hidden oil no one knows about instead of hunting bad guys.

That was the "game-of-Risk" comment I made - ever play that game?

Being friends with "every other country" in a row means you have a place to watch your enemies...

Or are they are all enemies...

[MarMan]

I like Risk. I also like Axis and Allies. Good games both. In A & A your allies can't turn on you. In Risk they must sooner or later, so I would say they are all your enemies, just sometimes friendly ones .

Axis and Allies (they made a computer version, then a version II called Iron Blitz) is the closest thing I've found to a board game of command and conquer.

[NeedSomeAnswers]

Why Libya? Why not Tibet? Why not Myanmar? Why not North Korea? Why not China for that matter?

Come on Honey Bee, you can do better then that :0)

Why not Tibet or China, well that pretty obvious who would want to go to War with the most populous nation on the world, and soon to be the richest, and by going to war in Tibet you effectively go to war with China.

No-one in the right minds, would want to go to war with China.

North Korea, (like China) has nuclear capability and they are run by a bloke who comes across as not altogether sane, certainly mad enough the use his nuclear weapons indiscriminately if attacked.

MyanMar just isn't politically important enough, not a good reason i admit, and there are a number of other countries you could list as well like Zimbabwe, or Bahrain were for various political reasons the west has not intervened. You could make a case for intervention in many of them.

O
I
L

PS: Libyan oil is 'sweet', which means purer. And that means it can be refined at much cheaper costs.

Yes but as i stated above Libya does not have anywhere near the oil reserves of Iraq certainly not enough to go to war over, and also western countries already have extensive oil contracts in Libya if they had just stood to one side then after Gaddafi had won the oil would still be flowing.

[honeybee]

Yep a case for intervention could be made in many countries, but then, such decisions are always motivated by greed and not by some grand vision of world peace. So intervention is only made where there are substantial gains to be made. Yeah, who cares about Myanmar and who cares about Tibet. The US-China relationship has now become similar to the tail wagging the dog.

Back to a good old question: Who decides if a country should undergo regime change? What would the US term other elements funding a coup to overthrow Barak Obama? Enemy combatants? Or something worse? And then the US has the guts to go and help overthrow another government? I mean whom are you kidding?

Ah, and the US is actually funding the biggest terrorist state today, Pakistan!

[Shaggy Hiker]

The US-China relationship has now become similar to the tail wagging the dog.

Not quite. They hold a huge chunk of our debt, and they have a huge amount of money wrapped up in holding that huge chunk of our debt. This is actually beginning to appear more like the zen koan about two students observing a flag. The first said that the flag was moving. The second said that the wind was moving. The master came by and stated that the mind was moving.

Back to a good old question: Who decides if a country should undergo regime change? What would the US term other elements funding a coup to overthrow Barak Obama? Enemy combatants? Or something worse? And then the US has the guts to go and help overthrow another government? I mean whom are you kidding?

Ah, and the US is actually funding the biggest terrorist state today, Pakistan!

The victor writes the history. Always has been, always will be. The actions are all situational rather than idealistic (though some of the arguments put forward can be idealistic), and only history will attempt to take a stab at whether the actions were even pragmatic, let alone right.

[dilettante]

Just to throw more oil on the fire, maybe http://afghanistan.cr.usgs.gov/oil.php and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghanistan_Oil_Pipeline

[honeybee]

Not quite. They hold a huge chunk of our debt, and they have a huge amount of money wrapped up in holding that huge chunk of our debt. This is actually beginning to appear more like the zen koan about two students observing a flag. The first said that the flag was moving. The second said that the wind was moving. The master came by and stated that the mind was moving.

I have never really understood the zen philosophy, so I didn't understand the analogy either. Over the years, the tone of criticism from the US to the China has certainly mellowed down a lot. So maybe the dog has put its tail between its legs...

@NSA, your argument actually proves that the US is simply picking its wars based on convenience and gains to be made, not on the basis of some idealistic principles. Which doesn't surprise me, of course.

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[NeedSomeAnswers]

@NSA, your argument actually proves that the US is simply picking its wars based on convenience and gains to be made, not on the basis of some idealistic principles. Which doesn't surprise me, of course.

Libya is not a War between the US and Libya though, Yes they have supported it but they have not been greatly involved in the actual action, that has been the French, the UK and even Qatar amongst others.

Yep a case for intervention could be made in many countries, but then, such decisions are always motivated by greed and not by some grand vision of world peace. So intervention is only made where there are substantial gains to be made. Yeah, who cares about Myanmar and who cares about Tibet.

So do you think there was no case for going to into Libya then apart from Oil?

And as for China, would you fancy India going to War with China ?

[honeybee]

Thankfully India has never 'gone' to war with another country, as far as I can trace its history. Yes, it has defended itself, sometimes successfully and sometimes unsuccessfully. So howmuchever I fancy India going to war with any other nation, it won't be happening real soon.

Do you think there's any case other than oil? Because if you do, you would have to answer why the US is simply silent on Tibet or Myanmar. I haven't heard any US president threaten China or Myanmar with sanctions, I haven't heard any UNO or NATO resolutions authorizing the use of force to stop the human rights violations in Tibet or Myanmar.

Libya is not a war between the US and Libya? Why was there a talk of who would be leading the coordination and the overall management? If the US merely participated, why would there be talks of the command being transferred from the US to the NATO?

Here's an update for you:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12902450

If it's not really between the US and Libya, why is Obama making such statements? These should come from either the NATO or the UN. And arming the rebels is not really part of the UN resolutions, is it?

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