Clearly Qadafi is going to do the full Tiananmen Square on his people, and yet Europe is not doing anything because 9-10% of their oil was coming from Libya.
It's ridiculous, Libya's own ambassadors are resigning to protest him, and the Libyan UN delegation broke from Qadafi and is publicly demanding from New York that the UN step in and do something. Will anyone at least do something now that he's jamming regional TV and phone?
Funny, this. When Saddam killed Kurds, people cried out for western intervention. Then the west invades to dispose and it isn'y right either. Somalia erupts and again the same people cry out for intervention, but then complain when some war mongers get killed. Same with Afghanistan. Women get stoned, intervene! Intervention happens: GET OUT!
So, are you pro Iraq invasion? Pro-war? Pro-increased military budgets? Pro-conscription? Then what exactly do you mean with intervention.
The simple fact is that the real world is a hellishly difficult place and western governments are dealing with an electorate incapable of keeping a coherent train of thought in a single sentence. How can you make policy of any kind when one moment people want peace and war the next? When we should leave other nations alone but also stop them from doing anything we disagree with?
And do the Libyans even want intervention? By who? The reports coming from Libya are far from reliable. One thing that has been noted is that foreigners who have gotten out speak of plenty of HEARED violence and even some theft but not a single sign of the hardcore violence reported. Covering their tracks? Violence happens elsewhere or maybe the violence is over stated? Who knows for sure and you wish western officials to commit to what might turn into an extended decades long war based on this?
And if you start intervening, how soon? Intervene at any protest where people die at the hand of the police? That would have seen the US invaded by the west to stop its police killing protestors pretty much throughout its history. What of the many race riots, intervention?
Intervention is rarely used, it is just to drastic a tool.
And of course it would play right into the dictators hand, see, the rioters are lead by foreigners seeking to re-establish their colonies. You are away that Libya used to be a colony of, I believe, France? Send in the Foreign legion? Yeah, that would go over well.
No, the cries for intervention are best ignored by a politician because the exact same kids will be protesting ten seconds after you intervene about that as well. Best to ignore them.
Let the Libyans choose their own destiny. When they win, it will have been their own freedom they have won on their own terms. Imposed freedom will never taste as sweet as freedom you won yourself.
I agree with you (mostly). The Libyans let a clown-dictator to stay for 40 years! it was part of a self-determination exercise and what is happening right now is the result. West is not the world's police and as such, Libyans have to deal with their reality just like everyone else does.
When it comes to the Kurds, the problem is that the US was so bloody inconsistent. When Saddam gassed the Kurds in 1988, the US tried to frame Iran for it, and sent Rumsfeld in to reassure Saddam that the war was going well and he had the US backing (remember that famous video of them shaking hands?). In 2002-2003 Bush and his ilk kept bringing it up as a justification to invade (as if suddenly noticing it 14 years later) , but when they finally arrest him, they decline to charge him in court with neither t
"So why don't you make like a tree, and get outta here."
-- Biff in "Back to the Future"
What next? (Score:4, Interesting)
Clearly Qadafi is going to do the full Tiananmen Square on his people, and yet Europe is not doing anything because 9-10% of their oil was coming from Libya.
It's ridiculous, Libya's own ambassadors are resigning to protest him, and the Libyan UN delegation broke from Qadafi and is publicly demanding from New York that the UN step in and do something. Will anyone at least do something now that he's jamming regional TV and phone?
Funny, everyone who says the west should do someth (Score:5, Insightful)
Funny, this. When Saddam killed Kurds, people cried out for western intervention. Then the west invades to dispose and it isn'y right either. Somalia erupts and again the same people cry out for intervention, but then complain when some war mongers get killed. Same with Afghanistan. Women get stoned, intervene! Intervention happens: GET OUT!
So, are you pro Iraq invasion? Pro-war? Pro-increased military budgets? Pro-conscription? Then what exactly do you mean with intervention.
The simple fact is that the real world is a hellishly difficult place and western governments are dealing with an electorate incapable of keeping a coherent train of thought in a single sentence. How can you make policy of any kind when one moment people want peace and war the next? When we should leave other nations alone but also stop them from doing anything we disagree with?
And do the Libyans even want intervention? By who? The reports coming from Libya are far from reliable. One thing that has been noted is that foreigners who have gotten out speak of plenty of HEARED violence and even some theft but not a single sign of the hardcore violence reported. Covering their tracks? Violence happens elsewhere or maybe the violence is over stated? Who knows for sure and you wish western officials to commit to what might turn into an extended decades long war based on this?
And if you start intervening, how soon? Intervene at any protest where people die at the hand of the police? That would have seen the US invaded by the west to stop its police killing protestors pretty much throughout its history. What of the many race riots, intervention?
Intervention is rarely used, it is just to drastic a tool.
And of course it would play right into the dictators hand, see, the rioters are lead by foreigners seeking to re-establish their colonies. You are away that Libya used to be a colony of, I believe, France? Send in the Foreign legion? Yeah, that would go over well.
No, the cries for intervention are best ignored by a politician because the exact same kids will be protesting ten seconds after you intervene about that as well. Best to ignore them.
Let the Libyans choose their own destiny. When they win, it will have been their own freedom they have won on their own terms. Imposed freedom will never taste as sweet as freedom you won yourself.
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When it comes to the Kurds, the problem is that the US was so bloody inconsistent. When Saddam gassed the Kurds in 1988, the US tried to frame Iran for it, and sent Rumsfeld in to reassure Saddam that the war was going well and he had the US backing (remember that famous video of them shaking hands?). In 2002-2003 Bush and his ilk kept bringing it up as a justification to invade (as if suddenly noticing it 14 years later) , but when they finally arrest him, they decline to charge him in court with neither t