a thread about the civil unrest in egypt (& elsewhere in 'the region' if necessary)

on a related note, this telegraph piece is pretty astute - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/8339469/The-revolution-may-be-televised-but-dont-expect-the-full-story.html

the US has wanted a less crazy source of Libyan oil for a long time. so in this scenario it's nice that US interests align so closely with Libyan protestors - so the diplomats and a few well-placed military dudes get a sniff of which way the wind is blowing, the US keeps absolutely schtum, and a new, less-crazy dude gets installed who is surprisingly amenable to US commercial and energy interests and who promises to only murder a few people a year and even then strictly on the DL, and a few reform bills get thrown to the Libyan people for whom nothing much really changes

I think you may be overestimating the CIA's capabilities and competence. Most evidence points to an organization that is barely able to keep up with events as they transpire, seldom actually foresees events, and has little capacity to dictate events. I mean maybe the CIA is executing all kinds of hugely successful plots that we don't know about, but I kind of doubt it. They seem to spend a lot of time nowadays explaining their failures and getting out of their own way. See news from Pakistan today.

xpost

diplomats prob just seeing the writing on the wall

diplomats traditionally pretty good at that sort of thing

^ These diplomats are major players in the Qaddafi regime, so it makes sense that they would want to distance themselves as quickly as possible from their obvious culpability. They probably figure that dramatic denouncements of Qaddafi might help save their assess.

Who knows whether there are behind-the-scenes overtures from the US or anyone else...my impression (based on nothing more than media reports though) is that it's a mixture of self-preservation and straw-meeting-camel's-back. Obviously anyone high up in the government must have gotten over their qualms long ago but I don't know about e.g. embassy staff.

Assuming Gaddafi isn't going to retire willingly, I assume what needs to happen is for some sections of the military to turn on the regime forces. Seems like a good opportunity for a well-positioned general to take the credit for "liberating" the country.

diplomats traditionally pretty good at that sort of thing

― lex pretend, Monday, February 21, 2011 5:43 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yeah occurs to me that the unusual volume and swiftness of their defection likely indicates that they recognized libya was next as soon as egypt feel and have had time to prepare

you couldn't make it up. title of saif gaddafi's phd? "the role of civil society in the democratisation of global governance institutions"

https://catalogue.lse.ac.uk/Record/1187568

ha wow

Ok, this is what I was expecting to see:

10.50pm: Another potentially massive development, if true. Sultan Al Qassemi has just tweeted that Al Jazeera are reporting on a statement by Libyan Military Officers which asks all members of the Libyan army to head to Tripoli and remove Gaddafi.

yeah occurs to me that the unusual volume and swiftness of their defection likely indicates that they recognized libya was next as soon as egypt feel and have had time to prepare

probably occurring across the region - maybe this is one thing that partly explains how each revolution seems so much faster than the previous

No one has any idea what's on the other side of any of these revolutions. More conservative? More liberal? More religious? Less religious? More saber rattling? Less? I've had lots of friends who were all like "OMG, Israel!" And I've said each time, we have no idea what impact any of this will have on Israel. It's all completely without reference point, save the fall of the Soviet Union, but that was so much different.

well, i know

xps

It's interesting though - when did it become inevitable that the regime would fall? Until today I thought that Gaddafi would succeed in putting down the uprising through unrelenting force.

Honestly, I don't know shit about any of these places, but Libya seems like an even harder nut to crack than Egypt and Tunisia. No idea how to read this stuff.

It's interesting though - when did it become inevitable that the regime would fall? Until today I thought that Gaddafi would succeed in putting down the uprising through unrelenting force.

― Pisle of dogs (seandalai), Monday, February 21, 2011 10:57 PM (47 seconds ago)

There seems to be a pattern of sorts. Regime uses violence, and if that violence doesn't break the will of the protestors, regime is done.

Given that Libya's response to the uprising seemed closer to the Iranian model than the Egyptian one, I half-expected that the regime would indeed "break the will of the protestors". It says something about the resolution of the protestors that it hasn't worked.

I don't know that this is so far different from 1989, at least insofar as the revolutions are driven by masses aspiring to a vaguely western, basically secular, materially more prosperous and dignified society. That seems to me such a sweet and precious thing to be preserved and nurtured at all costs. That ideologues, nationalists or islamists get hold of these movements is my big fear. Eastern Europe had sufficient time & institutions to stop that happening, not sure how true that is in the Arab world.

Ismael Klata OTM.

I don't dispute Ismael Klata's analysis, but the geopolitical situation and ideological dynamics are so different in this case.

offering a new anthem and flag is kind of like

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=me_E5Kl6EPc

http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/51364000/jpg/_51364325_51364324.jpg

i didn't know that mubarak travels with female bodyguards on the basis that they're less easily distracted than male ones

nor did i know that mubarak's mother-in-law came from pontypridd

less easily distracted by what?? movie bodyguards are always distracted by women, so that, maybe.

seems p knowledgable http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2011/02/how-qaddafi-lost-libya.html

i'm just here to say 'wow' again

Ha, love this from the Solomon [insert POTUS of choice]

"As a housing crisis has escalated in the past few years, the regime has made no effort to provide adequate public accommodation. Wealth is concentrated in the hands of the very few. It would have been easy for [________] to raise the standard of living for the population as a whole either by creating a sustainable non-oil economy or simply by distributing some portion of oil revenues, but he chose to do neither."

http://anarabscontemplations.blogspot.com/2011/02/misinformation-loss-of-credibility.html

I am in Tripoli and have been following the libyafeb17 site. The posts they have today about bombing and air strikes across Tripoli and Musrata and Zawia is total rubbish. I don’t know who is feeding them this info but it’s not true. I sent them three emails confirming that three areas were not under fire.

Across Tripoli nothing much is happing other than we sitting in our homes, glued to the TV and trying to call around and see what is happening. It might be that they will hit hard later on when we are all so fed up and tired of the “isha3at”. We are (a large number of us) afraid that if and when that happens none of the media or countries across the world will believe us.

One thing has been confirmed though, by witnesses and people who were able to contact their families and loved ones in some areas: where ever there are protests, they are shooting at them from helicopters. According to people in Tajoura and in Ben Ashur in Tripoli, the same happened there too. We say these helicopters – the ones that transport soldiers and military gear, fly over Tripoli from west to east and back many many times all day long.

http://b5.s3.quickshareit.com/screenshot_b4743610f88577fe5.png

That ideologues, nationalists or islamists get hold of these movements is my big fear. Eastern Europe had sufficient time & institutions to stop that happening, not sure how true that is in the Arab world.

i seem to remember a little problem with nationalism in Bosnia, Serbia and Croatia

Indeed. Encouraged by the EU sticking their noses in as I recall.

True xp. I don't really associate Yugoslavia with 1989 though, it felt like another set of events entirely.

lol

i mean there's a lot of vying for position among the internet commentariat: who is the realist of all kind of thing

and the point is, it's me, the super-hard-headed types are all like 'hey, the new regime might not be that much better than the old one', which, 1) duh, 2) i guess it *could* be worse but the same was true of the english/american/french revolution so stfu (yes the english had one), 3) who's being the pollyanna here? what perfect transition to utopia can you hold up as a comparison?

xpost

the EU/outside actors get hated on for sticking their noses in, hated on for being ineffective. iirc the story is it's 'all germany's fault' for recognizing croatia's desire to break away from greater serbia. idk.

Hated on for sticking their noses in and THEN being ineffective, I think

you couldn't make it up. title of saif gaddafi's phd? "the role of civil society in the democratisation of global governance institutions"

https://catalogue.lse.ac.uk/Record/1187568

― lex pretend, Monday, 21 February 2011 22:52 (Yesterday) Bookmark

I work at LSE library, and we regularly get people asking for this. I think we turn them down- its in closed access...

This is his conclusion, via my friend with said access - and it's unbelievably bad, written in the style of a precocious fresher:

'On the basis of the analysis in this thesis, is it now possible to answer the question that is the sub-title of this thesis-can we democratise global governing institutions by creating structures that move civil society 'from soft power to collective decision-making?' I believe that the evidence presented in this thesis suggests that the collective decision making approach has real potential and deserves further examination.'

If you turn in something like that, do you still pass?

"And if you grant my son his doctorate it's absolutely amazing how many ways we won't plot to have you killed!"

http://londonersdiary.standard.co.uk/

Lord Desai reveals that he examined Saif for his PhD, entitled the Role of Civil Society in the Democratisation of Global Governance Institutions. “I was an examiner with one other for this PhD at the university,” said Lord Desai. “I grilled him for two hours on it — there was no suggestion he hadn’t written it himself. We were struck by how idealistic it was. We said it was not realistic and needed some realpolitik in it.”

Of his former student’s performance on Libyan TV, Lord Desai added: “I was disappointed by the speech because he was not behaving as if he had had an LSE education.”

"And if you grant my son his doctorate it's absolutely amazing how much money you and your oil companies will be able to make... and can we have Megrahi back too?"

That ideologues, nationalists or islamists get hold of these movements is my big fear. Eastern Europe had sufficient time & institutions to stop that happening, not sure how true that is in the Arab world.

This seems a rather, er, rosy view of what happened in the Balkans and Nagorno-Karabakh in the wake of '89!

1554: "Libya wants chaos, beards and turbans", says Col Gaddafi, according to the live translation.

Gaddafi barking at his people now... He won't step down, that's for sure. "I'll be a martyr, like my father, if necessary"

Col Gaddafi says he will not leave Libya, he will die on Libyan soil

Well, if you insist, I'm sure it can be arranged

Protestors are on drugs attacking police stations like mice

This is really two-doctors-and-a-social-worker level BATSHIT INSANE.

... don't forget the Ukranian nurse

when was that UN speech he gave that lasted like two hours?

Yeah, pull up a chair this might go on for some time

I'm sure the restraints she's been putting him in are... uh, not straitjackets, knawamsayin'? xpost