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

u r joking but really he is that old, haha mccain is so old

it's also important to remember that these guys are both losers, and why would you take the advice of a loser

Libya doesn't have that many military airfields (only 14 according to globalsecurity.org), and most of them are in Transitional National Council controlled Cyrenaica or were built for the Chadian–Libyan conflict. I count 6 airfields that would need to be neutralized (Al Jufra, Musurata, Mitiga, Al Jufra-Hun, Sirte, and Tripoli Intl) to ground the Libyan AF. One can stage military operations from civilian airfields, but moving the ordinance/maintenance etc operations quickly are probably beyond their current logistical capacity. Consider it took the U.S. military nearly a month to establish itself at Tirana, Albania during the Kosovo conflict.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/libya/images/libya-ab.gif

One sortie by a 4 stealth B-2s or 12 stealth F-117s with BLU-109 earth-penetrator loadouts would be enough to crater all the relevant runways. I suspect the U. S. is seriously considering this contingency, but will hold off until the evacuation of foreign nationals is complete.

As you might suspect, I misspent much of my youth wargaming. Watching footage of skirmishes on the Brega to Sirte road has made me grimace at the horrid discipline/tactics of the rebels. Then again, Malian mercenaries are probably no better, and morale can go a long way. The rebels will win if they can figure out logistics (they're already running out of fuel, capturing Ras Lanuf's refinery and stores was vital), but its going to be slow progress and the food/water situation in Ghaddafi controlled areas is going to be horrible for civilians trapped. The most important news this week will be the progress of intertribal negotiations in Sirte to allow rebel passage. As for the "stranded" rebels in Az-Zawiya (on the west of Tripoli), they're probably screwed.

As you might suspect, I misspent much of my youth wargaming.

ok why is that not a fascinating thread that i could be reading RIGHT NOW

thank you for the remarkably informed post

Even without firing a shot, a relatively passive operation using signal-jamming aircraft in international airspace could muddle Libyan government communications with military units. Administration officials said Sunday that preparations for such an operation were under way.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/07/world/middleeast/07military.html?_r=1&hp

Preparations...were under way. Obama and his slow deliberative ways, influenced here apparently by military brass.

The defense secretary, Robert M. Gates, and top commanders have warned of political fallout if America again attacks a Muslim nation, even to support a popular revolt.

Gen. John P. Jumper, who served as Air Force chief of staff from 2001 to 2005 and commanded all Air Force missions in the Middle East from 1994 to 1996, said past flight-denial missions over Iraq proved that requirements reach far beyond the jet fighters and bombers that are the most obvious instruments of carrying out a presidential order.

The destruction of Libyan air-defense radars and missile batteries would be required, perhaps using missiles launched from submarines or warships. A vast fleet of tankers would be needed to refuel warplanes. Search-and-rescue teams trained in land and sea operations would be on hand in case a plane went down.

The fleet of aircraft needed for such a mission would easily reach into the hundreds

Recent events suggest this is becoming a civil war, which is all the more reason not to intervene. Intervention to stop the massacre of unarmed civilians is one thing, intervening on the behalf of one side of a civil war is an entirely different thing. Personally, I think the uprising lost a lot of its moral superiority when it took up arms.

personally i would rather lose the moral high ground than be massacred

Why bother then? Just don't try and remove the dictator then.

you're skipping a step

Yeah.

It's way too late for me to start an argument on ILX but it seems like you're arguing 'why revolt if you'll only eventually lose moral infallibility in the eyes of the global public?'

That, to me, is crazy.

Like, they shouldn't have taken up arms when facing decimation because taking up arms means they're not singing we shall overcome anymore and so it's harder to be 100% behind them?

No. Obviously you're allowed to feel how you feel and when it comes to this few things matter more than deeply felt conviction, I just won't go there with you.

I hear you, but I have trouble believing in the righteousness of a government and society that emerges from violence.

http://www.weirdwildrealm.com/filmimages/liberty-valance.jpg

Super Cub, they didn't start w/violence. They started w/demonstrations and violence was thrust upon them by a bloodthirsty dictatorship.

I have trouble believing in the righteousness of a government and society that emerges from violence.

don't expect the result to be 'righteous' ffs, no more than anywhere else. trying to thing of a government and society that didn't start w/ violence.

I would like to hear Supercub's case for how Gandhian non-violence works against a dictator who ruthlessly uses violence and refuses to bend.

"it's a matter of will", heh

Anybody know anything about these British dudes who showed up in Benghazi after dark in a helicopter, armed to the teeth? The guys who supposedly were sent as envoys to the opposition but ended up being taken prisoner by the opposition instead? And are now on a boat back home? WTF happened? Sounds like somebody forgot to phone ahead or something.

William Hague is a fuckwit, is what happened.

Ah it was eight guys - http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/mar/07/sas-mi6-released-libya-rebels

Crack squad of Frank Spencer impersonators.

In the commons, Hague was asked if neighbours moved into his street would he "knock on the front door to say hello or climb over the fence after dark" which was followed by about a minute and half of laughter.

what a brilliant analogy

I get that ruthless, bloodthirsty dictators make nonviolent revolution costlier and all the more horrible, but that doesn't mean that nonviolent revolution is impossible.

http://www.aeinstein.org/organizations/org/FDTD.pdf

if only the rebels had this PDF, we could really respect their position then

^they did in Egypt and used it. You people really are smug. Sorry for having principles.

that third sentence kind of undercuts the second just a tad

Right, true. I defer to the zing masters.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/03/08/world/08Libya2_cnd/08Libya2_cnd-articleLarge.jpg

My main point is that it is the epitome of bordering-on-imperialistic first world privilege to prejudge the outcome of this conflict before it's even finished. The thing you wrote that generated bad reactions was:

I hear you, but I have trouble believing in the righteousness of a government and society that emerges from violence.

This is either a wholly vacuous thing to say as no society has ever been established without violence, or drastically misstated as even your followup example of Egypt happened due to what could arguably be called a military coup.

(note that page 5 of your PDF is all about how coups suck)

http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/03/07/what_obama_needs_to_do_with_libya_and_with_the_joint_chiefs_of_staff_today

tom ricks runs through some possibilities.

1. Best option: Give the Libyan rebels the aid they need to win. This may be no more than some secure communications gear and a couple of thousand rocket-propelled grenades to deter Qaddafi's tanks and SUVs. (This may be already happening in some form.) Can we start flying discreet charter flights of stuff into some airports in the east? This needs to be ready to go ASAP -- like yesterday.

I don't want to come off as some kind ideologue; I fully realize that regime change is an unstable and dangerous process and I also fully realize that I have never known repression and violence. My point is that violent resistance perpetuates tyranny and is more likely to fail in it's ultimate goal of promoting a civil society that embraces freedom and respect for rights. Clearly events in Libya could prove differently, but my original assertion, that revolutions that espouse principles of freedom and civil rights lose some of their legitimacy when it uses violence still stands. That's all I really have to say.

Xp

You would have a more tenable argument if your position was "violent resistance perpetuates violence". The legitimacy argument continues to strike me as wholly specious unless you are also arguing that both the American and French Revolutions (to name a couple of examples) were illegitimate.

violent resistance perpetuates tyranny and is more likely to fail in it's ultimate goal of promoting a civil society that embraces freedom and respect for rights

have no idea what sort of historical precedence you could cite for this, sorry. every conceivable paragon of civil society re: freedom and respect for rights has been borne of violence whether you're referring to Greece, Rome, England, America, France, etc. maybe India, I guess? but they're hardly a paragon of a successful civil society what with the whole caste-system/slavery thing and ongoing ethnic slaughter

precedents argh

well just as, as a baseline belief, i think the US should avoid bringing 'extra' violence to the libyan situation, sitting here in america i can't exactly disapprove of libyans who have tooled up on their own.

the libyan protests seem to have been a weird hybrid of street demos and anti-state violence from the beginning. and Qdf's response was violent right away, so, what's a guy to do. plus i'm not exactly sure how much this is grounded in 'principles of freedom and civil rights' -- being against a dictator kind of puts you in that camp as a side-effect. i have no idea how idealistic this revolt is, seems more of a "bodily" undertaking, if that makes sense. it's not my "principles" that are being violated, but my life, it's not "the state" that is oppressing me, but this one nutty guy and his hired guns.

xps

Even Gandhi realized that the reason his non-violent way worked was because the British were capable of being shamed. It actually made non-violence more effective. Gaddafi has always been thoroughly shameless and unapologetically ruthless - non-violence in its traditional form wouldn't work against him and his thugs.

it's not "the state" that is oppressing me, but this one nutty guy and his hired guns.

^^^this. it's not like the rebels' goal is to revise some antiquated and unfair legal system. there basically is no legal system.

I think a pretty sound argument could be made about the illegitimacy of the American Revolution. Anyways, the past is obviously not a great model for nonviolent approach - that is kind of the point. But maybe lofty principles are better left for another day. Because I fear I am sounding like a sanctimonious twat.

Xp

Your pdf that you attached referred to Burma which is not yet a democracy.

tom ricks runs through some possibilities.

1. Best option: Give the Libyan rebels the aid they need to win. This may be no more than some secure communications gear and a couple of thousand rocket-propelled grenades to deter Qaddafi's tanks and SUVs. (This may be already happening in some form.) Can we start flying discreet charter flights of stuff into some airports in the east? This needs to be ready to go ASAP -- like yesterday.

That appears to sound good. I read a former Bush official, Former U.S. National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley suggest we start dropping in that plus anti-aircraft machinery for the rebels. He made it sound easy to provide and use the latter. But the Pentagon is insisting that it would be incredibly complex for us to stop air attacks, so this former Bush official's suggestion may not be so simple.

obviously if there is a way to get weapons into the hands of the rebels – if we can get anti-aircraft systems so they can enforce a no-fly zone over their own territory, that would be helpful.

“And I think that’s what really they are calling for: Help and support. But they want to be empowered to do it themselves, rather than have someone do it for them,” Hadley continued.

as someone who is about as close to a pacifist as it gets, i sympathize with super cub's instincts here. it is a bit, er, problematic, though, to criticize these people for "taking up arms" when faced with the brutal conditions they find themselves in - essentially telling these people to choose between being massacred and continuing to live their lives under undignified oppression isn't the best look

the reason, perhaps, that almost no government exist that hasn't been borne of violence is that the government itself represents the legitimate use of force/violence...it's only natural that when that legitimacy is questioned it will lead to violent struggle.

^^^*ding ding*

"state" = "institution with a monopoly on violence"

Forces loyal to Col. Moammar Gadhafi pounded rebel positions with airstrikes here Monday as Britain and France began drafting a United Nations resolution for a no-fly zone in Libya that could balance the scales

no society has ever been established without violence

uh. i don't agree with this. maybe *most* - but not all. Canada, for example, had a few uprisings - but they had little/nothing to do with setting things in motion towards dominion.

that said, i very much disagree with Super Cub here. the opposition in Libya (as far as i'm aware) started off relatively peacefully. what would you have these people do when they're demonstrating in a public square and suddenly tanks/gunmen show up and start blasting away? you're options are: stay & likely die right then there (and maintain legitimacy i guess?), go home to be oppressed further and possibly killed at a later date (still legitimate?), or fight back (illegitimate!).

if violence was the first thing they went for in their revolution toolbox, i might agree with you. but here i do not.

What about the First Nations tribes?