As Fighting Continues in Tripoli, A Look at Role of the U.S., NATO and Oil Firms in Libya Uprising

By Democracy Now!

Fighting continues in parts of Tripoli, the capital of Libya, where rebels are reportedly battling with Muammar Gaddafi’s forces outside his heavily fortified compound. Reports by the Libyan Rebel Council that Gaddafi’s son, Saif al-Islam, had been captured were contradicted late Monday when he emerged amongst supporters in front of foreign journalists in Tripoli. The International Criminal Court had claimed he had been in the custody of anti-Gaddafi fighters for the past 24 hours. The rebels have also claimed that two of Gaddafi’s other sons were detained but have provided no evidence. Meanwhile, details have emerged that U.S. andNATO forces played a key role in the Libyan rebel push into Tripoli, carrying out 17 Predator drone strikes and 38 air strikes since August 10. Overall, the U.S. has carried out 1,210 air strikes and 101 Predator drone strikes in Libya since April 1. NATO says it will keep up pressure on Gaddafi and that its "mission is not over yet." We are joined by Phyllis Bennis, who is a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies.

Saif al-Islam: Libya is a piece of cake

Libya: it's not about oil, it's about currency and loans

By John Perkins

WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- World Bank President Robert Zoellick Thursday said he hopes the institution will have a role rebuilding Libya as it emerges from current unrest.

Zoellick at a panel discussion noted the bank’s early role in the reconstruction of France, Japan and other nations after World War II.

“Reconstruction now means (Ivory Coast), it means southern Sudan, it means Liberia, it means Sri Lanka, I hope it will mean Libya,” Zoellick said.

On Ivory Coast, Zoellick said he hoped that within “a couple weeks” the bank would move forward with “some hundred millions of dollars of emergency support.”( By Jeffrey Sparshott, Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES –full article here – http://tinyurl.com/3hj8yyp .)

We listen to U.S. spokespeople try to explain why we’re suddenly now entangled in another Middle East war. Many of us find ourselves questioning the official justifications. We are aware that the true causes of our engagement are rarely discussed in the media or by our government.

While many of the rationalizations describe resources, especially oil, as the reasons why we should be in that country, there are also an increasing number of dissenting voices. For the most part, these revolve around Libya’s financial relationship with the World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), and multinational corporations.

According to the IMF, Libya’s Central Bank is 100% state owned. The IMF estimates that the bank has nearly 144 tons of gold in its vaults. It is significant that in the months running up to the UN resolution that allowed the US and its allies to send troops into Libya, Muammar al-Qaddafi was openly advocating the creation of a new currency that would rival the dollar and the euro. In fact, he called upon African and Muslim nations to join an alliance that would make this new currency, the gold dinar, their primary form of money and foreign exchange. They would sell oil and other resources to the US and the rest of the world only for gold dinars. 

The US, the other G-8 countries, the World Bank, IMF, BIS, and multinational corporations do not look kindly on leaders who threaten their dominance over world currency markets or who appear to be moving away from the international banking system that favors the corporatocracy. Saddam Hussein had advocated policies similar to those expressed by Qaddafi shortly before the US sent troops into Iraq.

In my talks, I often find it necessary to remind audiences of a point that seems obvious to me but is misunderstood by so many: that the World Bank is not really a world bank at all; it is, rather a U. S. bank. Ditto, its closest sibling, the IMF. In fact, if one looks at the World Bank and IMF executive boards and the votes each member of the board has, one sees that the United States controls about 16 percent of the votes in the World Bank – (Compared with Japan at about 7%, the second largest member, China at 4.5%, Germany with 4.00%, and the United Kingdom and France with about 3.8% each), nearly 17% of the IMFvotes (Compared with Japan and Germany at about 6% and UK and France at nearly 5%), and the US holds veto power over all major decisions. Furthermore, the United States President appoints the World Bank President.

So, we might ask ourselves: What happens when a “rogue” country threatens to bring the banking system that benefits the corporatocracy to its knees? What happens to an “empire” when it can no longer effectively be overtly imperialistic?

One definition of “Empire” (per my book The Secret History of the American Empire) states that an empire is a nation that dominates other nations by imposing its own currency on the lands under its control. The empire maintains a large standing military that is ready to protect the currency and the entire economic system that depends on it through extreme violence, if necessary. The ancient Romans did this. So did the Spanish and the British during their days of empire-building. Now, the US or, more to the point, the corporatocracy, is doing it and is determined to punish any individual who tries to stop them. Qaddafi is but the latest example.

Understanding the war against Quaddafi as a war in defense of empire is another step in the direction of helping us ask ourselves whether we want to continue along this path of empire-building. Or do we instead want to honor the democratic principles we are taught to believe are the foundations of our country? 

History teaches that empires do not endure; they collapse or are overthrown. Wars ensue and another empire fills the vacuum. The past sends a compelling message. We must change. We cannot afford to watch history repeat itself.

Let us not allow this empire to collapse and be replaced by another. Instead, let us all vow to create a new consciousness. Let the grass-roots movements in the Middle East – fostered by the young who must live with the future and are fueled through social networks – inspire us to demand that our country, our financial institutions and the corporations that depend on us to buy their goods and services commit themselves to fashioning a world that is sustainable, just, peaceful, and prosperous for all.

We stand at the threshold. It is time for you and me to step across that threshold, to move out of the dark void of brutal exploitation and greed into the light of compassion and cooperation. 

John Perkins

Twitter: @economic_hitman

Libya - war for the resources

Gaddafi and the seven sons, blond mercenaries and X

By Alex Thomson

Channel 4 News

For pretty obvious reasons I can’t disclose my source’s identity and let’s just call him X.

He can still recall the area of Green Square last Sunday (Liberty Square of pre-Gaddafi days) where he stood as the protesters gathered telling The Colonel it was time to go.

“The police were cool,” he says in fluent English,”the people were handingout sweets.”

And cool it stayed into the night; Green Square becoming to Tripoli what Tahrir Square was to Cairo?

Well no, says X, who watched what happened.

“This is Libya. We could never be Egypt, never Tunisia. We have no teargas in Libya. No rubber-coated bullets. It is straight to lead in Libya.”

It was.

It was dawn when X says “armoured vehicles approached the Square. They opened fire on the unarmed protesters. “They had big calibre guns – like anti-aircraft guns. You could see the shells bouncing off the streets.”

He saw, with his own eyes he says, scores of people mown down. Mention the estimate of dead given by Human Rights Watch at this point of around 270 dead and he simply laughs in a tired way: “We all saw that figure on the TV – we just laughed.”

From then, he says Tripoli has essentially shut down. No businesses, shops or schools function. Colonel Gaddafi has the army here, armed civilian militias on the streets. “There are mercenaries fighting for Gaddafi for sure. You see them, black guys, sub Saharan. But I also saw guys with blond hair and blue eyes in central Tripoli. They were controlling the technical side. They were speaking Russian or Ukrainian. You don’t get near these guys – not ever.”

Anyone who is anyone is in fear of “the call”. And they can come any time of day or night. When they do come they will be armed, pistrols at the very least. “They’ll say ‘are you for us or against us?’ and of course there is only one answer to this question. I know this. It has happened to so many people. Many, many people. That was why I had to leave yesterday. They would call for me. You see?” He takes a pause, a long drag on his cigarette.

“So you say of course and they take you off in their car and you help them. You are told you will use your influence to help the regime however they want.”

“And if you hesitate at all when they come?”

“That’s it. You are also into the car. But it is over.”

“You get shot? ” I ask.

“Wasteground, an underground carpark. Whatever. You don’t come home.”

Since the fighting at Green Square he says the protesters have retreated to their neighbourhoods. Barricades have been attempted but mostly people just stay at home. To go out is to risk being shot on sight, he says, possible during daylight – a near certainty at night.

He says he personally witnessed helicopters firing down on the city on several occasions since that Sunday. He also tells how he watched ‘big helicopters’ with visible guns heading west from the capital.

X is adamant that many Libyans would certainly get out if they could, but it is far from easy. That explains why so few are coming over the official crossing points too.

You’ll appreciate why X can’t give names and locations as he describes a long, nerve-jangling odyssey taking most of the day to cross the 150 miles or so from Tripoli to Tunisia. It’s all about friends, family, safehouse, wait, new vehicle, safehouse, wait and so on.

“If you reach a checkpoint you are in very big trouble. No main roads. Just small roads and tracks. You cross the border miles away from the road. Out in the desert there is no border.” And Gaddafi? Is there any strategy?

Like the people, he cannot go back now. Tripoli is the last stand. He has nowhere. He cannot go anywhere. Even abroad? No – not now.”

“Could he leave Tripoli?”

“His home town, Sirt, is nothing. Just a shell. A concrete jungle. Empty palaces for foreign leaders to meet him. Nobody lives there. He has the army but only in Tripoli.”

Yet there is a strategy. Gadaffi still has arms and support in the capital, it is true. Around it, to the west, the military plan appears to be to allow the rebels to hold towns like Zuara on the coast, but then to isolate them, cut them off, and attack them.

X’s view of the regime’s apparent plans, borne out be what’s happened in the past 24 hours: Zuara calm yesterday but reports of gunfire – the town of Zaweya attacked by forces loyal to the regime yesterday.

Yet the attacks failed. X paints a graphic picture of Gaddafi’s seven sons at odds, with bitter in-fighting: “The eldest is not even considered a real son you know. Each if them ran parts if the country – security, defence, economy – it was just cronyism – or like mafia, a mafia family but with billions from the oil.”

Then X lowers his voice and leans in, even though it’s so late the bar staff have gone to bed: “But f*** the oil. It doesn’t matter now. Blair and then Bush in 2003 they supported this murderer. But there is no going back now for the people here. No going back.”

The end of Gaddafi’s regime and the end of his sons’ kleptocracy would, says X, always be bloody. But he says be prepared – the ousting of the Italians cost thousands of lives.

It is after 2am. A cleaner is sweeping up at the other side of the bar, X makes to leave, then turns, his voice echoing in the empty bar:

“Life post-Gadaffi will not be easy. But this is our chance. We have to take it. We have to go for it. We will not get it again.”