Oil

If they find oil in Zimbabwe then I expect there will be some attempt to stop Psycho Bob from killing his own people. Meantime it will be bloodshed as normal.

thanks for this Michael B

We need some good news these days. Even if short-lived.

I like the sound of what

I like the sound of what Byers has to say. Of course we all wish for all people to be safe. However, in speaking to a citizen of Yugoslavia prior to 1990, I find it very interesting and hard to process, that there is another side to this story which does not resonate with those who grew up in Canada but which I really need to respect as another opinion. Yugoslavia trained Libyans in the military and supported each other in many ways when no one else would support Tito. Remember the us vs them scenario during the cold war? Well some people in the world have not forgotten and what with the dashed hopes of democracy in these newer democracies , they don't see that a one leader regime is a bad thing when it is the current capitalist seemingly democratic system which has not fulfilled their needs. Is MG really the enemy? There are some surprising answers to that question.

Gwynne Dyer

Gwynne Dyer Has a column in yesterday's Strait on this subject.

He says root out Qaddafi then it must be the thing to do.

You can google Dyer, he has his own website.

He is a world class journalist and I've never known him to be wrong.

Human Rights: The White Man's Burden

Mideast Oil Produces, by Known Reserves
Source: U.S. Department of Energy, Oil & Gas Journal; 2007 figures.

Rank Country Reserves

1 Saudi Arabia 262.3
2 Iran 136.3
3 Iraq 115
4 Kuwait 101
5 UAE 97.8
6 Libya 41.5

Take up the White Man's burden--
The savage wars of peace--
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to nought.

The Sunni Royals in Bahrain are killing the Shia

who had the nerve to ask for a constitutional monarchy and the Saudi Royals have sent troops to quell the rebellion since they also have a population asking for the same thing.

Of course the Israels have been committing slow genocide for years, but the UN never did anything about that either.

I hope Qaddafi's capitulation scotches this UN adventurism, but I would not be at all surprised to see a repeat of the kind of thing that went on in Yugoslavia and Iraq where the first things bombed were part of the civilian infrastructure, like water plants.

"A "humanitarian war" would be "good for business". It serves the interests of the institutional speculators, it contributes to a further process of appropriation of money wealth.

Financial institutions which had prior knowledge or intelligence of events in Egypt and Libya have already made billions of dollars in speculative gains in the futures and options markets for crude oil."

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=23741

God save us all from "humanitarian" wars.

Blue moon

I'm with mopled. I can't see how this could have happened any other way, but it makes me very nervous that there's so much rah-rah boosterism for dumping everyone's favourite Satan. Byers' article in particular makes me nervous - exactly how does he know that this is no attempt to seize the oil of Libya? I agree that with the Daffy Quack pumping and selling it like there's no tomorrow, there appears to be no real need, but if Shell and Total end up with all the assets (with a bone thrown to ExxonMobil for Obama's support) in a few months, some of you are going to have a lot of egg to wipe off your faces.

Of course, you don't pay the cost, so why should you worry? It's a global sport! Swallow the hook and cheer as the bombs fall! It's been going on since the first ape raised a club to the other.

Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Bahrain (to name a few) ...

...are allowed to kill and oppress their citizens with impunity while the moral, human rights loving West turns a blind eye.

The governments of France, the US/UK, and little lapdog Canada, couldn't give two shits about the people of Libya. It's about resources, stupid.

The Arab League (an organization comprised mainly of despots and thugs) is more than happy to throw one of their own under the bus if it means the West will continue buying their oil and ignoring their crimes.

The history of Western intervention in the name of "human rights" speaks for itself.

Anyone who believes this whole thing is about human rights and humanitarian concerns is either naive, gullible or seriously deluded.

Layton the war monger?

"It's appropriate for Canada to be a part of this effort to try to stop Gadhafi from attacking his citizens as he has been threatening to do and as we have seen in past days," he said."

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/canada/harper-deploys-jets-to-libyan-crisis-118289324.html

perfect

The Brits were going to "take him out" in the 70's but the Yanks stopped them because the replacements were going to be commies.
This way the coalition will kill the incumbents while the incumbents kill the insurgents, and everybody gets righteously killed.
This is right up there with giving aboriginals smallpox infected blankets and it's called genocide.
The chap who invented the smallpox gambit had a university named after him....Amherst.
Universitaire de Sarkozy....I like it.

blood for oil

despite the humanitarian rhetoric, there is no doubt that without the oil the western capitalist elites couldnt care less about human rights violations, hypocrites. they themselves routinely slaughter civilians as collateral damage with air strikes in afghanistan and pakistan where rebels use human cover. shame. and now we are planning to buy new stealth jet fighter bombers f35s as member of the Empire in good standing.

We got to save the "people"

It has a nice ring to it
but I don't expect it is what makes these guys get
out of bed in the morning.
"We have to save the "Oil."
At all costs, even it takes "people's" lives.
And will it stop there? The damage done to the planet by dropping bombs is not to bright. Lets blow them away.

A little unsetteling

We just experience a major earth quake and the best anyone can do is drop more bombs. It is the stuff that leads to wars and destruction. Wars are good for business as usual but hell on the planet and people.

Pollyanna Byers knows boo!

http://tarpley.net/2011/03/15/behind-the-2011-orgy-of-destabilizations/

"In the late winter of 2011, governments were for a few weeks falling like bowling pins all across the Middle East and far beyond. We are witnessing a massive orgy of deliberate destabilizations of previous client regimes on the part of the CIA, the State Department, the National Endowment for Democracy, and the various NGOs and foundations which follow their lead. This has taken the form of a mad rampage of attempted color revolutions, people power coups, putsches by camarillas of generals, and incipient civil wars in such countries as Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and others, with the tremors being felt as far away as Belarus and China. This tsunami of coups was signaled by three waves of document dumps by the “Wikileaks” limited hangout operation of the Anglo-American intelligence community, and has been supported and encouraged by the Obama regime up to the limits of what the traffic would bear in each case. During the most recent days, the time of the Libyan civil war, the old Suez 1956 coalition of aggressive and unreconstructed British and French neo-colonialists has also reemerged as a strange historical atavism.
The Anglo-American Empire is now undergoing a collapse phase, although not caused by debt as claimed by the reactionary academic and imperialist planner Niall Ferguson at the “Aspen Ideas Festival” last July – a gathering where calls were raised for an immediate attack on Iran.1 The overthrow of existing governments and the breakup of existing national states, wherever possible, is intended to put the brakes on this collapse by preventing the national states from taking timely political action to save themselves from the imperialist shipwreck by defecting to other power centers, reversing existing alliances. The Anglo-American plan is for a super-national empire over the planet, with a neo-feudal war of all against all on the ground."

Disappointed

Michael, I'm surprised and disappointed at your response to the situation in Libya. I have been trying to find out exactly what is going on there beyond the over-the-top headlines to demonize one of the West's favourite villains. Qadaffi is no saint, that's been obvious for years. But who are the "rebels"? A key leader of the Libyan National Council, Mahmoud Jibril, is a leading proponent of neoliberal ‘trade reform’ in Libya, and the head of the NEDB, a think tank created by US and UK consultants to further US and UK interests in Libya.

As Chomsky has said, what's happening in Libya is not the same as what's happening in the rest of the Arab world. It's a civil war, not an uprising. The left needs to step back a bit and try to understand what's going on instead of reacting to the propaganda spewing out of Washington, Paris and London.

It is disappointing

And don't forget the propaganda spewing out of Canada. Harper has been itching to take on the Libya right from the start. Obama and Harper discuss the Global recovery and Libya's Oil. Who are the rebels and when did Canada go looking for a fight? Instead of looking for peaceful solutions. What was the G20? There where no rebels attending the event but look what happened in Toronto.
This is an historic event.

R/M old man....

At a final cost approaching $75 billion? (if this government follows the "norm" in cost overruns)
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/parliamentary-budget-officer-says-f-35-cost-far-20110310-073347-406.html

Rick

Do you think we could get some cheaper ones from China instead?

Imperialist Selectivity and Deceptions II...

Continuing Russian Envoy...

"Of course, Libya is a big enough energy supplier to Europe. Certain countries, like Italy, for example, are heavily dependent on Libyan deliveries. Others are not so much dependent, but either way, Libya’s share is considerable. We know that NATO, for example, puts energy security matters at the top of its main agenda.

For this reason I think that this factor has a most direct bearing on the speed of the West’s decision-making regarding Libya. No one wants to let this conflict become protracted. All of them want it to be over as quickly as possible so as to be reassured about guarantees of energy supplies to Europe. I think it’s a very important problem.

Aside from that, there is yet another factor. Some major Western oil companies with an axe to grind, where their concessions and oil development projects in Libya are concerned, are quite likely to be pushing certain Western countries toward hasty decisions with regard to an intervention in Libya.

They think they’ll be able to follow the military and thus get unique access to Libya’s oil riches. So this factor is also taken into account and discussed." End of quote from Russian Envoy.

In any case, there is more smoke, mirrors, bullshit and selective reasoning going on here than it is right now fully possible to keep track of. But what is clear already is... that as repugnant as Qaddafi's terror against the Libyan people is, and the Libyan citizenry's "right" to demonstrate against him and demand his removal, Western Imperialism is engaged here, in the pursuit of its own imperialist interests, especially involving the largest remaining oil reserves in North Africa. They care not a fig for the Arab people of Libya. And the proof of that is, where they have surety of oil supply and the right of military presence, in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, the repression and slaughter there proceeds "with understanding" on the part of The Empire and its partners in imperialism.

One should not be fooled about what motivations and forces are at work here.

The Empire and its bootlicks, including Canada, are as selective about who they interfere with and don't, as who they charge with war crimes and don't. I'm still waiting to see a number of US Empire and other imperialist administrations up before The Hague. But you know as well as i that we won't. Not short of world revolution anyway.

Mopled....

"The Anglo-American Empire is now undergoing a collapse phase, although not caused by debt as claimed by the reactionary academic and imperialist planner Niall Ferguson at the “Aspen Ideas Festival” last July – a gathering where calls were raised for an immediate attack on Iran.1 The overthrow of existing governments and the breakup of existing national states, wherever possible, is intended to put the brakes on this collapse by preventing the national states from taking timely political action to save themselves from the imperialist shipwreck by defecting to other power centers, "

Some interesting stuff, mopled. (We can disagree some on "global warming" :-), and still agree much on other stuff, brother.)

But particularly this characterization of an Anglo-American Empire is, I think, from the emerging evidence, a more accurate characterization of the current period of capitalist imperialism. More accurate than my "US Empire", I might even say.

Indeed, I must thunk on it more... and maybe steal the concept. 8-D

A good day.

I have a feeling this is

I have a feeling this is going to turn out fairly well.

Egypt,Spain,Norway,and others are involved and are likely to make sure there is some kind of social democracy when the dust settles.

Libya isn't pre revolution Egypt,
the people have their population under control, and are fairly well off thanks to having oil.

Qaddafi wasn't a particularly bad leader like Mubaric for example.

I expect the Libyans won't hand over their resources to big oil.

Canada doesn't need a large military with F-35s.

We should go back to looking after Canadian, and stop kissing Yankee butt.

On Kissing Butt... :-)

"We should go back to looking after Canadian, and stop kissing Yankee butt." Lawrence.

I very much agree.

As for what we need for a military, my view is here: http://coyotetimesca.blogspot.com/

We do need a military, perhaps even a system of "citizen soldiers", but ONLY what is absolutely necessary for the defence of this country, including any "prospective" invasion from our south. In any case, I invite you to read this series of mine.

Here, in Libya, where I fear the "Anglo-American Empire" :-) and its allies is much grinding its own axe (oil), the Arabe League is suddenly displaying alarm and some opposition as well. If they have half a bloody brain, and know their own real interests, they'll raise their voices louder.

potpourri

I think about other situations in the area where civilians could use some protection, - Bahrein, Yemen, Israel, Iran,...and so on.

I figured that Libya was almost done, with the government forces almost in Benghazi. I guess the question would be 'What would happen to the people in Benghazi when the government forces moved in?' Would the government wipe out many people? Or would the government do what it had done in other towns and cities that it had taken?

Initially there was lots of info about mercenaries fighting for the government side in Libya, but it looks to me that there is a bit of support for the government. I'm sure that Libyans are flying those war planes.

My paranoia side tells me that the story a week ago about those SAS and Brit diplomats in Benghazi is important. Odds are that those Brits were there doing some kind of 'work' with the anti government groups.

As for oil, there is profit for particular oil companies, - but there is also the geopolitical stuff about control of oil. Maybe certain countries are not looking to use Iraq or Libyan or any other area's oil, but they want to control who does have access to that oil.
(I think here of Japan, in October of 1941. Britain, USA and Netherlands - gvt- in-exile put oil sanctions on Japan. No more oil from Dutch East Indies! NO oil for industry, navy, shipping, air and ground forces - nada!So Japan had a stark choice: stand down completely and be a quiet, quaint little island, or fight.)

Suggesting that this does not have to do with oil is something that I will take with a grain of salt.
And suggesting that this is a precedent of some kind- I notice that in Yemen and Israel the governments are using police and military force on the people they control right now.

Finally, those new single engine war planes of ours might not be that useful for High Arctic defence, but they will be great for shipping here and there to keep 3rd and 4th world peoples in place.

to Mooney

Very interesting comment. One of the biggest exports the US has is its weapons. Look at Canada. Where do the weapons come from that criminals use in Canada? They come from the US and are, I believe, illegally imported into Canada. If all the handguns that criminals use in Canada are legally imported, sold and registered, then it should be easy for the RCMP to determine who has them. The weapons the rebels have were also manufactured by a "legal" enterprise and sold to both the oppressive governments and the rebels.
It is time the US stopped its manufacture of weapons for export.

Wufff!

"Qaddafi wasn't a particularly bad leader like Mubaric for example."

He was terrible! No vote, no political parties, no opinions, no press. The only think you can say is he didn't steal all the oil money, but did put some of it back into the country. He's worse than Mubarak, but that's like saying you'd rather be boiled alive in oil than torched by napalm.

Agreed (typos correced)

Michael,

I agree with your views above. I think we need to look at how we bring Col Gaddafi to justice. The NFZ is an attempt to neutralize some of his capacity that has been used against civilians (and now the rebels). This isn't going to be sufficient as he can do a lot of damage on the ground. The next steps will be complex, in part because not all of the structures are in place to resolve these problems. Clearly a ceasefire works only when both sides are willing to cooperate, and neither intends to take advantage of it.

Robin

"I have a feeling this is

"I have a feeling this is going to turn out fairly well."

Boo-YaaH!

Let's see if we can top the last attempt to liberate!

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

We're well on our way, the results of the air raids on Libya we're described as a Highway of Death on CBC this morning.

The NFZ in certain areas has quickly been transitioned to a no drive, no walk and no breath zone.

This UN Resoution, rather than being an extension of the Resposibility to Protect doctrine, is a do what you want affair.

Iraq was a strait up attack

Iraq was a strait up attack with boots on the ground.

It was done for two reasons, theft of their oil and to hobble a country that was sympathetic to the Palestinians.

Yes Mubaric was worse, his people are a lot poorer than the Libyans and he helped the Israelis attack Gaza, among other things.

Getting back to Iraq, did you know that war has created 500,000 brand new orphans.

Yes folks, the Iraqis make pretty children and the West makes them into half a million broken hearts.

Counter Points

1. The resolution is aimed at the protection of human rights.

We've numerous examples where human rights are of no concern to the major powers. There are even human rights abuses within the borders of many of the leading powers.

2. Arab League support.
Big deal. What and who is the Arab League? Its made up of a cabal of governments that have terrible HR's records. An escalation of Libyan violence spurred on by the West is a nice way of demonstrating to their local populations the danger of a drift to democracy.

Also, which states did not support the UN Resolution? BRIC and Germany. Two of these five are tyrannic regimes, while the other three are democracies. Why did they not support military action?

3.A fresh position by the U.S.

Yawn. Seriously? Yes, its so fresh. But take an example that's not fresh: Haiti and Aristide.

Byers is seeing what he wants to see. There are numerous examples of contradictions to his argument. Yeah Gadday is nuts and a tyrant, but he has support in his country and he also has opposition. International interest is heightened by Libya's natural wealth and proximity to Europe and the danger of contagion.

And I thought this was good:
On shifts in western alliances with authoritarian regimes, Chomsky says that in a long series of cases it became impossible for the West to support its favourite dictators.

“At that point there’s a game plan that goes into operation. It’s being followed in the Arab world, basically to send dictators out to pasture when you can’t support them any longer and produce ringing declarations of your love of democracy,” he says.

Gadaffi must go or the rebellion will be tortured slowly

It is a difficult decision and not to be taken lightly but I fully support the UN action on this.

At this point if Gadaffi were to regain full control of the country he would slowly bleed and torture out the last of the rebellion quietly and under the radar of the international press for many years - he would use the archived footage on the internet to identify rebel leaders and have them made an example of. It would go for the most part unreported and unaccounted for - That is the unacceptable thing which must not be allowed - we have the capacity to level the playing field and we're compelled to use that capacity.

Any 'peaceful' resolution at this point would surely see the rebellion slowly crushed from the inside if Gadaffi or his supporters retain defacto control of the military. One option would be to provide amnesty to Gadaffi if he removes all trace of his regime (difficult to do after 40 years) and allow for a transition to democracy - But he would have to leave on his own - I don't think he will, his entire identity is wrapped up in being the leader of Lybia and he views himself as a political philosopher of sorts providing a "third way" (a third option other than capitalism and communism) not a puppet drunk on oil money (who would flee for his life) So there is little other option.

Should we make a habit out of bombing the military installations of dictators at the first sign of a rebellion against their rule? No. Each case needs to be examined on its own merits- unfortunately this takes time while people are killed (a no-fly zone was proposed weeks ago, before the worst of the bombings)

In this case I see air strikes to destroy overwhelming military capacity (paid for by the oil of all lybian people) Is more in line with allowing the Lybian people to make their own choices and fight their own battle on the ground.

What happened to negotiation?

Despite the appeal of an intervention for ethical or humanitarian reasons, what seems to be missing in the UN resolution or Canada's and the US' response, is any information on what steps were taken to initiate a non-violent resolution with the Libyan government.

Did the Libyan government refuse to negotiate? Were any Canadian or US diplomats who are actually skilled in dispute resolution involved in dialogue before the techno-jets were employed?

I don't mean people like Hillary Clinton, Susan Rice, Stephen Harper or Peter MacKay. They hardly have any skill or track records in tough dispute resolution talks.

Mr. Harper owes the Canadian people a description of the steps taken to peacefully resolve the dispute prior calling on the military to kill combatants and civilians in Libya.

Wrong on all three points

If the UN resolution was for humanitarian reasons it wouldn't have allowed an anything goes if it leads to Gaddaffi being overthrown, and they wouldn't be allowed to bomb hospitals in the middle of residential centers which has already happened. As for the oil, Gaddaffi last month made a statement that he didn't trust the western oil companies and was going to start selling all his oil to China and India.

Second, the Arab League had so many abstentions that only 40% determined the vote, and these were all imperialist puppet dictator states.

Third, this invasion and occupation of Libya has been in the planning stage for years by the US, including financial and military advisor support for the "rebel" groups, which happen to have a pro neo-liberal leader.

There are close to a thousand posts on Libya over at babble on the rabble.ca site with lots of links to supporting documents for all of this.

This will all be a lot clearer in hindsight a couple of months from now. I predict that very soon Libya will no longer be one of the five remaining countries in the world that has a 100% state owned central bank. And oil will continue to flow to the West. And we won't know how many died for this because they won't do body counts.

Oil, oil, oil

Of course it's about oil. C'mon people. It ultimately doesn't matter if Lybia has been supplying lots of oil to Western countries in the past. What the West want is control, to make sure the supply doesn't dry up. I find hard to beleive that Mr Byers would not see that.

Human Rights?

OK ... What about Bahrain and Yemen? Not a peep from anyone in power. Dictators with American made weapons from Saudi Arabia are supporting another dictator with Western made weapons (including Canada).

Can civilians who storm a military compound and arm themselves to the teeth still be considered civilian? What would the Canadian Conservative government do in such a situation?

But back to human rights, this is always a good argument to legitimize economic exploitation. I wonder if the new "Rebel" government will give back the oil contracts to the western nations after Gaddafi cancelled them in response to economic sanctions. If we are to support human rights lets think about changing our economic system to give decent wages to our slaves in the third world.

I have no love for Gaddafi but that doesn't mean i am just going to drink the wonderful feel good Kool-aid of the western corporate aristocracy. Talk about human rights abuses! Glass houses and stones rings a bell.

Torture is good

I think supporting regimes like Libya, Bahrain, Yemen, Jordan, Mubarek's Egypt etc is the way to go.

Sure they torture people but really, who cares? Not the people in those countries, that's for sure.

If the people don't like it they can do something about it. Since they don't it probably means the bad apples are getting what they deserve and the people in those countries support the government.

The UN should stay out of Libya and let Colonel Q. and his people do what they need to do.

Thanks to the Hall Monitors of "The Left"

When it comes to a question of solidarity so basic as heeding the appeal of Libya's youth, democrats - in their darkest hour, when they have risen up against a genocidal tyrant and his mercenary forces, keep up your good work to ensure that there will be no "progressives" in Canada who can be counted on to hear what the people of Libya are saying, least of all, to come to their aid.

Sources for deep analysis & thought

Thanks for your perspective Michael, but I fundamentally disagree that this is a new milestone.

It is yet another war of aggression, remarkable in the context of numerous unsuccessful US military interventions, absurd in the context of the Japanese calamity, and tragic for Africa in general and the Libyan people in particular.

Most galling, for us as Canadians, is the lack of analysis given by the opposition parties on this important issue. Harper is laughing all the way to a majority government, while progressives hesitate to stand up and debate this act of war.

The discussion should be broadened with more information. Strongly recommended are the following:

Asia Times Online's Pepe Escobar on Libya:

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MC22Ak02.html

and this interview with Mohammed Hassan on the colonial history of Libya, essential reading to get beyond the idea that we need to heed the 'voices of Libyan youth'. It shows that we need to really get beyond the needs of the member nations of the UN Security Council

http://dissidentvoice.org/2011/03/libya-popular-uprising-civilian-war-or-military-attack/

What is a "rebel"?

Is a rebel really a rebel, or is he a private security sub-contractor? How can we know?

On the subject of human rights...
http://tinyurl.com/4u4bg6d

Tourtiere is God

"The UN should stay out of Libya and let Colonel Q. and his people do what they need to do."

Gawd, Frank, sometimes your irony is devastating....