Some Comments on Libya
There are some who have an almost voyeuristic satisfaction whenever they hear of NATO bombing civilians by accident in Libya. Not once, have I ever seen them mention anything about, or express any sympathy for, the victims of Gaddafi's family and their sadism. Here, Gaddafi's daughter in law pours boiling water over her Ethiopian nanny. Here, Khamis al Gaddafi's brigade massacred dozens of people in the warehouse. But, of course, heaven forbid that NATO should get its hands on any Libyan oil.
But wait - what oil are these people talking about? Is it the same oil that was already available in Gaddafi's Libya after he came in from the cold? Didn't BP sign a major exploration and production deal with Libya? What was ENI, the Italian oil company, doing in Libya for all those past few years? So Libya's oil was already going to the West? Oh dear... where does that leave their argument then?
What is sad is that instead of placing the blame firmly on Gaddafi's idiocy, that has made NATO intervention in his country possible, these individuals continue to blame the Libyan people, his victims. In that sense, they are no different from those who support Zionism and blame the Palestinians for the misery they are in. Dogma, it seems, can be found in politics as well as religion.
3 comments:
Well said, Maysa. I have wondered the same thing.
Outstanding, as usual.
I also loved the one on Mr. Kadi, well deserved.
As a matter of fact the oil argument looks weak in Iraq too. The first fields subcontracted under Paul Brenner went to all sorts of companies, including the French Total despite the French opposition to the war. The contracts under the Iraqi government went to decisively non US companies. Some were given to bizarre companies from Angola and China, which is a mistake by the way. The Iraqi government seems to have demanded a larger than usual share of revenues making the contracts unattractive for oil majors. They should have better gone on US companies that have real expertise and state of the art technology. I would bet that some deals will collapse later either by the Iraqi initiative or because the Angolans and others will fail to make profits and pull out. But this is beyond the point. The point is that the US oil companies avoided Iraq.
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