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

The EU foreign affairs chief, Baroness Ashton, has told Euro MPs that Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi should be "sent back into the cold".
http://www.whatsonxiamen.com/news17879.html

baroness ashton is a fucking amateur, a little leftover joke by the outgoing brown government

she's changed her tune, is what im saying

and in this case, what is she talking about? 'sending him into the cold' leaves libyans as they were in the 1970s and 80s, ie with a psychopathic thug running things. UN/EU/__ should make some bodies turn cold more like.

assuming the west starts seriously arming/training the rebels, I would think that would quickly tilt the scales against Ghaddaffy, no...? I mean it could be long and drawn-out and (I'm sure) brutal but dude has like no allies at this point, and his funds are frozen.

I read that he has access to funds he has stored in Tripoli

hopefully that won't be necessary. the arab league called for a no-fly zone and could be the desired neutral arbiter everyone can agree on.

Scotland's First Minister Alex Salmond says he "strongly supports" the UN resolution. He tells the BBC it sends a strong message to the Libyan regime and "will concentrate minds". Asked if he supports the idea of "regime change", he says he believes "the end game" is "a new government of Libya".

Wee Alex has spoken, Gadaffi may as well get out while the goin' is good

hopefully that won't be necessary. the arab league called for a no-fly zone and could be the desired neutral arbiter everyone can agree on.

Which of the various despots, dictators and tyrants are in the Arab League? Dominated by the Saudis?

that's the joke

Ah! Maybe a winky emoticon in future?

dude has like no allies at this point

Seems to have a few in Libya though!

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704360404576206992835270906.html?mod=djemalertAsianews

here's the wsj report on the egyptian arms shipments

talking speculatively here, can we say that the opinion of mideast elites is that there are despotisms, and then there a despotisms? it's like, ok sure we're tramping the dirt down in bahrain, but that's different, this guy is nuts!

saudi arabia has beef with libya going way back. he's tried to kill some of its princes or whatever. he was #teamussr and saudi arabia was... not. etc.

not really in the realm of categorical imperatives here

right, that's kind of what i meant. we here in the_west can look at this and be like, where's the logic, this shit over here is the same as that shit over there.

really wonder who is making those decisions in egypt to beef up the libyan opposition. i'm going to assume this is not some young lafayette fresh out of tahrir square. but maybe it is!

Yemen:

The security forces that had massed at the protest’s south end then began to pull back into the city center, firing tear gas as hundreds of protesters gave chase, hurling rocks. People in apartments overlooking the action tossed onions down to the protesters for them to use to relieve the effects of the tear gas.

so surreal

amazed these guys are still going

A man walked through the crowd with a microphone yelling, “Peaceful, peaceful! Don’t be afraid of the bullets!”

just... damn, dude. amazing

I wonder if part of what's playing into the_west's thinking - across the spectrum of craziness in the Middle East - is "if we just sit back, no one will owe us anything"?

(which could be "bad", obv)

xpost to DG

love that they're linking to, like, simon jenkins and peter oborne

they seem terribly confused

Oborne's all anti "the Jewsih Lobby", that seems like the sort of thing they could get behind

peter oborne thinks britain is secretly run by jews, so do they

check out the brains trust

haha

I find Tariq Ali... perplexing.

i dont see what the point of 'tony benn' is either

would love to see him denounce the UN now

Standard "it's all about oil" dogma from Stop the War. Seeing George Galloway top right is a sure sign that you should read no further.

Bahrain tore down the pearl at the center of Pearl Square in a symbolic end to the popular protests.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/19/world/middleeast/19bahrain.html?hp

I guess noone is speaking up for the people of Bahrain in the US State Department or elsewhere in the world's political establishment

our choices are between the Saudis and Iran. not exactly great options there.

As someone asked upthread, do we really know that the Bahrain Shiites (Shia?) will embrace the Iranian Shia or be controlled by them automatically, or is that just a probability? I recognize that the Iranian fundamentalist Shia rulers are trying to influence other countries and their people, but is it possible Shi-ites elsewhere do not want Iranian help?

Bahrain protestors have said they want a British style parliament with a monarch. Can we take them at their word, or are those saying that not in a majority or not being sincere.

well there's the ethnic difference there too

i really have no idea how those affinities function, best not to say too much i guess

for that matter, i really have no idea what the different theologies of shia and sunni imply, if anything. like catholic-protestant conflicts i can 'get' even with all the national and economic and historical factors filtered in. with islamic sects i don't even know the difference.

there are significant doctrinal differences in terms of who gets venerated and who's got religious authority, that's the main difference. Like Protestants not recognizing the authority of the Pope.

do we really know that the Bahrain Shiites (Shia?) will embrace the Iranian Shia or be controlled by them automatically, or is that just a probability?

nobody really knows. But the Iranians WANT to get their hooks in Bahrain, and they're bound to be more appealing to Bahraini Shia than their Sunni oppressors.

exactly -- the iranians' attitude is a pretty big factor, regardless of the sincerity of the majority of protesters. the new york times says some among the protestors are in touch with iran, while some are not. sounds plausible.

This is all a real fait accompli clusterfuck. The UN OKs force and imposes a no-fly zone, so ... Qaddafi calls a cease fire. The UN allies, now ready for a fight, cast doubt on the cease fire, but theoretically their hands are tied until Quaddafi resumes shooting and killing. Meanwhile, the Saudis offer support for the no-fly zone (itself a tacit declaration that Quaddafi must go) while sending their own troops to Bahrain to beat down protesters there and fortify the elite status quo. But of course, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia are as much our allies as anyone else in the region (sure, Israel included, why not), so the US's hands are tied when it comes to those countries. And yet, I still want to know what kind of precedent this sets. Like, what about Yemen? If the Libya move was made on humanitarian grounds, how baldly hypocritical to focus strictly on Libya. Further, if the idea is really "regime change," then how can it possibly end with Qaddafi, who, ironically, has lately only been bad to his own people and not to the US or the international community? And then there's Iran, waiting like a great white shark right off the deep end of a coral reef.

Suddenly Sudan seems relatively stable! Though simmering in the background in the prospect of a whole bunch of Somalias, only Somalias with vital political and strategic positioning. Again, clusterfuck. Though it there's ever been a defense of thewar-mongering neo-cons it's that, yes, it would be much worse with Saddam Hussein still around. That's one ugly silver lining, though.

This is all a real fait accompli clusterfuck.

bit early on to make this call imo.

I still want to know what kind of precedent this sets.

yeah ok. you may have noticed that this isn't how foreign policy works, anywhere. the UN doesn't do anything about tibet, south georgia, zimbabwe, whatever. it's obviously inconsistent or 'baldly hypocritical' that nothing is done about bahrain. the reality of our dependence on saudi oil is unpleasant to behold. (i think it's a bit silly to say they are 'as much' an ally as israel.) that doesn't get gadaffi off the hook.

the rest of what you're saying... well, yes shit is fucked. the removal of gafaddi and mubarak (one a soviet client, one an american client) could turn out well. or it might not.

tbf none of the other situations currently drawing attention - Bahrain, Yemen, Egypt, Jordan - have escalated into the full-scale armed conflict of Libya. big difference.

altho hm is completely right that yeah duh foreign policy and UN mandates are wildly inconsistent, welcome to geopolitics 101.

might get a decent call of duty sequel out of all this tbf

What seems odd about this particular UN mandate vs., say, the Balkans is the the US sort of drove the Balkans thing, but here hung back. How often does Europe drive the call for military intervention?

Which is to say, this seems to me an atypical UN action, all the more surprising following Iraq.

say, the Balkans is the the US sort of drove the Balkans thing, but here hung back

uh Hillary drove this pretty hard from all accounts

http://slatest.slate.com/id/2288687

Interesting to read that. Still, the US was not driving this no-fly zone debate, however much Clinton wanted us in the mix.

How often does Europe drive the call for military intervention?

Kosovo.

Very uneasy about these developments, despite it being "just" a Security Council vote.

I still want to know what happens if Qaddafi maintains a cease fire.

And if he doesn't!