You write Khadafi, I write Qaddafi, Let's Call the Whole Thing....

Perhaps we will only need it for the history books now.  But, for the record: "A much-circulated 2009 ABCNews.com story found 112 different ways to render the Libyan leader's last name in the Latin alphabet, used in English and most other Western European languages. But, according to this passport, and presumably the Libyan man himself, the accurate Latinized spelling is one of the least commonly used of those 112: Gathafi." (Max Fish, The Atlantic, August 24, 2011, "Rebel Discovers Qaddafi Passport, Real Spelling of Leader's Name")

Surely Juan Cole Deserves Some Credit Too

Tripoli, 22 August (see Immoral Minority, etc.)

Great article by Juan Cole ("Top Ten Myths about the Libya War," 08/22/2011, Informed Comment) who surely gets to take a bow for not only supporting Libyan FF, but supporting the limited air support by the US/UK/France/Nato since before its inception.  From my, admittedly circumscribed view, I would only question 2 of his myths:

1. " The United States led the charge to war. There is no evidence for this allegation whatsoever."  Doesn't this go against the Lizza, New Yorker article which stated, some months ago: "Nonetheless, Obama may be moving toward something resembling a doctrine. One of his advisers described the President’s actions in Libya as 'leading from behind'"? ("The Consequentialist: How the Arab Spring remade Obama’s foreign policy," by Ryan Lizza, New Yorker, May 2, 2011)  Lizza's article (and the adviser) might be wrong, but I don't recall Mr. Cole taking them to task earlier.
2. "The Libyan Revolution was a civil war. It was not, if by that is meant a fight between two big groups within the body politic."  This is more a judgement call.  Charles Tilly's definition of a revolution is when two groups of elites appeal to non-elites and the two blocks fight to control state apparatus.  In a revolutionary situation,civil wars often are a stage.  That appears to have happened over the past few months.  I think Cole rightly wants to show that Qaddafi's support among non-elites was not that strong.  I agree.  But, for as long as it lasts, I think we can term this a civil war, because Qaddafi did have some, if limited, support

Those are my caveats to an otherwise outstanding string of great articles on Libya.  Which is why Informed Comment is on My Blog List to the left of this blog.

Map and Video Show the Rapid Change in Libya

Al Jazeera Maps the Progress of Freedom Fighters in Libya


While an impromptu street demonstration in Tripoli (Al-Dhul Street August 21, 2011) suggests the rapidity (fluidity?) of the change.

Time and the Devil...: The Map Tells a Tale in Western Libya

17 August 2011

17 March 2011

This map (left), via Informed Comment (courtesy Iyad Elbaghdadi), gives an idea of what Col Ghaddafi is up against in Western Libya ("Qaddafi Explores Routes to Flee Libya as Rebels Advance," 08/18/2011 by Juan Cole).  Contrast it with the, admittedly more schematic, map to the right (below) from exactly five months earlier.  The story has been one of small villages and crossroads.  But the mountain ridge in the interior is now almost entirely filled with the flags of the opposition TNC.  And now the routes to Tripoli from the West and the South are at the very least contested.  (Juan Cole also reports, "[i]n Sabratha to the west of Zawiya, the Free Libya forces not only completely subdued the city but they also captured the military base and transferred to themselves all the weapons in it.") Most Libyans live in Tripoli and the situation there is uncertain.  But the map suggests the outcome no longer is.

Now: Zawiyah, 18 August 2011

Then: Zawiyah, 11 March 2011

And the latest?: "Libya rebels seize Zawiyah oil refinery." (Aug 18, 2011, by Ulf Laessing and Yvonne Bell, National Post)

Combined Action on Several Fronts in Western Libya


Great map from @k_thos, courtesy of Libya 17 February ("Map: Libya last updated August 14," 15 August 2011), which also notes that Libya’s interior minister, Nassr al-Mabrouk Abdullah and family arrived in Cairo signally a possible defection, and includes the second of Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr's amazing reports from Zawiyah  ("Video: Revolutionaries say they control 70% of Zawiyah," 15 August 2011.  For the latter, note the bridge which FF control (or at least are huddled under).  That is one of the last two supply lines to Tripoli.  Perhaps Mr. al-Mabrouk Abdullah knows something.

Certainly, a comment in Al Jazeera's Live Blog a couple days ago, is another tea leave about the endgame.

• Speaking from a prisoner of war camp in the rebel enclave of Misrata, Colonel Wissam Miland said Gaddafi's military hangs together through coercion and mercenary-enforced martial law, but that infighting is rife.
• "I think it will soon collapse," he said, offering a rare glimpse inside Gaddafi's three-pronged loyalist force, made of up army regulars, militia fighters and mercenaries....
• "Within my unit there were a lot of mercenaries," Miland said. "But they are not fighting with the army -- they surround the army. They don't let anyone fall back. If you retreat, they will kill you." ("Saturday, August 13, 2011 - 15:20 - Libya," Al Jazeera Live Blog)

Turns out that the FF Opposition is not the only group with splits and divisions.

Our (noncombatant) Ears and Eyes On the Ground

Terry Gross's Fresh Air Interview with C.J. Chivers is much recommended. As is his website and his Twitter page (on our list to the left).

End Game?

Battle in Misrata (see map) and siege in Mountains (Zintan, above) continues.  But the drip-drip of defections might signify another front:

• Eight generals from embattled Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's army have defected to Italy, the Italian Foreign Ministry told CNN Monday.
• The generals were accompanied by more than 100 Libyan soldiers, a senior Italian official with first-hand knowledge of and responsibility for the operation said.
• The Libyans crossed their country's border into Tunisia, where they were met by Italian intelligence agents, the official said. ("Libyan generals, soldiers defect; South African leader meets Gadhafi," by the CNN Wire Staff, May 30, 2011; see also "Over 100 Libyan army members defect from Gaddafi," by Deepa Babington, Reuters, May 30, 2011)

The Two Michaels: Orientalist Prophets of Doom

Two of the high-priests of intelligence privatization and managers of the Chertoff group, "a security and risk-management firm," Michael Chertoff (former secretary of homeland security) and Michael V. Hayden (former director of the CIA from 2006 to 2009 and director of the National Security Agency from 1999 to 2005) trot out the old tribalist (e.g., those people are different) argument:

• Optimists can point to the fact that Libya is more ethnically and religiously homogeneous than, say, Iraq, but it is also more tribal than most Arab societies. As brutal as he has been, Gaddafi has still had to respect tribal dynamics to sustain his rule. Is the United States confident that the dominant narrative today, of democrats vs. oppressor, will continue to play out — and will not be overtaken by latent ones such as tribe vs. tribe, haves vs. have-nots or, worse, Islam vs. “crusaders”? ("What happens after Gaddafi is removed?," by Michael Chertoff and Michael V. Hayden, Washington Post, April 21, 2011)

They are correct to the extent that, yes, anything might happen.  But Hayden also used "the devil you know" argument on-screen as an "expert" on CNN last week.  And you can see the inklings of "the devil you know" qualifier gambit "As brutal as he has been...." In Libya, yes, there are tribes.In the Arab world, yes, there is Islam. But this sure has the hallmarks of a nationalist rebellion at the moment. Not that I know much about Libya; my knowledge of it is about the same as Hayden's.

Who Controls the Mountain, Controls the Valley?

Wazin (Wazen) is a small border post. But put alongside Nalut and Zintan and it appears that the Gaddafi regime has a Berber (also known as Amazigh) problem in the Western Mountain Region. The Libyan flags flying from the seized border post suggest also that this remains a nationalist, not a tribal, rising. (Maps from "Libya Live Blog - April 21,"
by Al Jazeera Staff;  "Map of the Rebellion in Libya, Day by Day," New York Times, April 21, 2011)

The Good Soldier Švejk in Tripoli (and Manama)

Bretschneider, undercover agent for the state police,
in Švejk, watching for suspect views in the tavern.

Jaroslav Hašek's Czech novel The Good Soldier Švejk (1923) notes the idiocy (or at least surreal behavior) of imperial Austro-Hungarian leaders and the secret policemen detailed to seek anti-monarchist views in the most unlikely settings. In Tripoli, according to a recent BBC report, the joke making the rounds is that they have run out of paint (to paint over the anti-regime graffiti of the post-17 February protesters).  An incident, evidently not a joke, is reported as follows:

• The latest trend was demonstrated in a public school for girls - the Quortoba High School in Hay el-Andalus district. Word quickly spread about what happened - "it's the talk of the entire neighbourhood", a friend tells me.
• You would be forgiven for thinking this next illustration of artistic expression is a joke, but it is not.
• Red, black and green helium-filled balloons have been spotted rising into the capital's skyline on several occasions in different parts of the city.
• The colours represent the original post-colonial flag of Libya that has become a symbol for opposition-held territories here. Reports suggest that when they can, security forces shoot the balloons down. ("Tripoli witness: Covert protests and black humour," 14 April 2011, BBC)

Suppressing nationalist rebellions, by those with imperial (pan-African, pan-Balkan) dreams, is perhaps like shooting balloons. Effective in the short run....

[This is not unlike, of course, the incoherence of the destruction of the Pearl Monument in Manama, Bahrain which has lead to the following horrific ironies in the following report:

• Quietly approaching the ring of defensive fencing surrounding a dead space, a Nepali migrant worker described in halting English witnessing the pathetic destruction of the Pearl Monument on March 18. In a horrifying accident, a Pakistani crane operator was crushed to death after being ordered to destroy the monument....
• [T]he central bank "canceled" the 500 fils coin (about US$1.3) that for years proudly displayed this symbol [Pearl Monument] of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) pre-oil boom past when the region was a British protectorate known mostly for harvesting pearls. 
• A cashier at Carrefour, the French hypermarket ubiquitous in the Gulf, said she was instructed to make the pearl coins disappear by simply tossing them in the rubbish bin after receiving them as payment from customers, ensuring the erasure of the bad memory plaguing the kingdom. (Apr 7, 2011, "Dangerous change rattles Bahrain," by Derek Henry Flood, Asia Times)]

Dueling Orientalisms

Libya flag seen during pro-Bahraini demonstration, Baghdad's Sadr city (Stringer Iraq/Courtesy Reuters, "After the Arab Spring on TheAtlantic.com," March 28, 2011, by Steven Cook, CFR Blog)

We have charges of Orientalism from all sides now, at least from the pundits.  Juan Cole notes that when he praised the translation of Thomas Jefferson into Arabic in a new edition, "Journalists [asked] me if there isn’t something Orientalist or imperialist about translating Americana into Arabic."  Cole responds, "translation of the great works of Western literature has been central to the Arab renaissance and modern Arab culture....  [Only] [w]ith the rise of Arab nationalism and Muslim fundamentalism from the 1950s forward, Washington was often seen as being on the wrong side of history by Arab authors, and that sentiment discouraged translation, especially of political thought." ("Thomas Jefferson in Arabic," 04/08/2011, by Juan Cole, Informed Comment)

Bernard Lewis, Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Studies, Princeton University, evidently "regards a dash toward Western-style elections, far from representing a solution to the region's difficulties, as constituting 'a dangerous aggravation' of the problem, and fears that radical Islamic movements would be best placed to exploit so misguided a move." (Abdurraham, below, citing "A mass expression of outrage against injustice," by David Horovitz, Jerusalem Post, 25 Feb. 2011)

Najla Abdurrahman compares the argument that Arabs are not ready for democracy because they are either tribal, responding to sub-national loyalties, or likely to be influenced by supra-national, pan-Arab loyalties, (or pan-Muslim, see the Libyan-Iraqi-Bahraini loyalty in the photo above) as reminiscent of the earlier Orientalists.  Abdurrahman notes, "The 18th century English Orientalist Sir William Jones, writing from British colonial India, once argued that 'a system of liberty, forced upon a people invincibly attached to opposite habits, would in truth be a system of tyranny'."  ("Libya: Making something out of nothing," by Najla Abdurrahman, Al Jazeera, 07 Apr 2011)

While Orientalism-bashing is a game that all can play (and have done so ever since Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 1979), it is hard not to share Abdurrahman's outrage. We tend to be willing to speak in the name of the masses, "the silent majority," and we tend to explain them in terms of the last uprising.  That is, the people are tribal; the people are given to extremism, etc.  The people are seeking what they say they are seeking might be another meta-narrative imposed from without. But at least it is one that takes what people are saying on the streets, on the walls, and on social media seriously.

Western Libya Theater

The less reported war in the interior (Zintan, etc.).

Multiple Identities a Good Thing For All But Pundits: Age, Tribe, Nation, Religion

"Alaa al-Ameri" reminds us that this rising didn't begin tribal and it is unlikely to end that way.

• In the last few weeks, the word "tribalism" has been used extensively in the context of the Libyan democratic uprising – a spectre looming over the country, embodying the devil we don't know. This was first introduced into the public mind by Saif al-Islam Gaddafi during his address last month....
• Disappointingly, this image of Libya as a backward tribal society with no real national identity has been picked up and amplified by many western pundits and politicians – often as part of their reasoning why military and material support for the Libyan revolution is a bad idea....
• Which tribal allegiance was Mohammad Nabbous – a citizen journalist who established the independent internet television station Libya Alhurra in the early days of the revolution – serving when he was shot dead by a sniper at the age of 28 while reporting on the bogus ceasefire cynically announced by the Gaddafi regime on 19 March? ("The myth of tribal Libya," by Alaa al-Ameri, Guardian, 30 March 2011)

Libya and the USA: Juan Cole/Mark Lynch - 1; Andrew Sullivan - 0

While what I read in the past two months suggested the slaughter possible in Misurata and Zintan (where it may still happen, see Washington Post, dynamic/interactive map) as much or more than Benghazi, that Mark Lynch argues was a key feature in President Obama's council in decided to act.  But  Lynch is convincing on the thinking that went on in the White House (the key paragraphs are below).  And the second paragraph, the importance of Al Jazeera to how this all plays out, is as important as the first:

• My conversations with administration officials, including but not limited to the one recounted by the indefatigable Laura Rozen¹, convinced me that they believed that a failure to act when and how they did would have led to a horrific slaughter in Benghazi and then across Libya.... The administration...preferr[ed] at first to use diplomatic means and economic sanctions to signal that Qaddafi's use of force would not help keep him in power. The military intervention came when those had failed, and when Qaddafi's forces were closing in on Benghazi and he was declaring his intention to exterminate them like rats.
• And my conversations with Arab activists and intellectuals, and my monitoring of Arab media and internet traffic, have convinced me that the intervention was both important and desirable. The administration understood, better than their critics, that Libya had become a litmus test for American credibility and intentions, with an Arab public riveted to al-Jazeera. ("Why Obama had to act in Libya," by Mark Lynch, Foreign Policy, March 29, 2011)

And explaining the USA's lack of response to the crackdown in Bahrain is going to be hard enough in the coming months. Embracing change on the streets of Cairo ("Pics from Tahrir anti-corruption march," by Issandr El Amrani, the Arabist, April 2, 2011), Tobruk, Daraa and Damascus, or Manama will not solve Israel/Palestine; nor will it bring peace to the Afghan/Pakistan border. But it will make Al Qaeda seem a bit like Cold Warriors: fighting last year's/last decade's issue. This is a political take on the situation. (For a military take, follow tweets of CJ Chivers.)

Libya Update: Saturday

Juan Cole notes an Aljazeera Arabic interview:

• Brigadier Gen. Safwat El Zayat (rtd.), an Egyptian military analyst and supporter of the Egyptian revolution, on the military situation in Libya.... Zayat said that pro-Qaddafi armor had moved up from Ajdabiya toward Benghazi in two columns, with the intent of breaching the rebel stronghold’s defenses and occupying the city center. The 32nd Special Forces Brigade, supported by tanks and led by Qaddafi’s son, Khamis, attacked on Friday and Saturday from the southwest. Another brigade, supported by tanks and heavy artillery and led by another Qaddafi son, Saadi, attacked from the southeast....
• Given [the French] air intervention, Gen. Zayat said, the strategy pursued by Qaddafi’s military in the past week could turn out to have been an enormous error. The pro-Qaddafi forces are stretched out over hundreds of miles, far from their supply lines, and are vulnerable to aerial bombardment because they are exposed in the desert. He said that French Mirage jets could fire infrared-seeking air-to-ground missiles that would detect Libyan armor because its temperature signature differed from its desert surroundings, and so could zero in on it. ("French Jets Defend Benghazi," 03/19/2011, Informed Comment)

Guardian has an updated and interactive map

Misratah and Benghazi are under siege according to the current updated map (to the left is an earlier screenshot), and, again according to this map, Ajdabiya is noted as retaken by government forces.

The War on the (Libyan) Ground

Focus is rightly on continued fighting along the Libyan coast - in Misratah (Misuratah, Misrata)in the West and Ajdabiya in the East.  I note reports (Al Manara, translated and summarized in Libya 17 February) of renewed shelling in Zintan (Az-Zintan, Al-Zintan). Zintan was one of the first towns in West Libya to join protests. It is well South of the coastal road, and I worry there are few reporters on the ground in that part of Libya.  (Libyan maps, as before from Iyad El-Baghdadi)

Mapping Libya: Update

("Latest maps of Libya with Gaddafi vs National Libyan Council," Sandra from off the Strip, March 5, 2011) Maps (there is another for West Libya) are created and posted by/through iyad_elbaghdadi's Stream

"Oh my T V C one five, oh oh, T V C one five": Arab Version

Commentators most always associate recent Arab youth revolts with new social media, and have been termed them Facebook Revolutions.  But a study (published in Arab Media and Society, Winter 2010) hints of the role of more traditional media.  To learn what is going on, we could use some Al Jazeera reporting in the Midwest too!  As Hillary Clinton said, "Viewership of Al Jazeera is going up in the United States because it's real news." ("Hillary Clinton Calls Al Jazeera 'Real News,' Criticizes U.S. Media," Huffington Post, 03/3/11)

• Libyan TV services began in 1968....  Tripoli and Benghazi were the only two areas initially covered by television broadcast transmissions....  From 1990, satellite TV was introduced and offered Libyan viewers a more diverse range of programs, which they readily adopted.... These new channels quickly attracted local audiences and supplanted local TV services in public affection....
• Newspaper readership in Libya is lower than in many other Arab countries.... Radio broadcasting...does not have the popularity of television and tends to be used as a source of information about local events.... Television is the most popular medium in Libya.... Satellite TV news is especially popular among young people and they have been attracted most of all by the pan-Arab world channels such as Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya. Libyan people have also displayed a high level of trust in what they see on television news, especially in news programs broadcast by Al Jazeera. ("News Consumption among Young Libyan Adults," Arab Media and Society, Issue 12, Winter 2010, by Mokhtar Elareshi and Barrie Gunter)
  

Embattled Brega

• OPPOSITION forces appeared to have repelled an attack by troops loyal to the Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi, in the rebel-controlled east of the country.
• The Libyan troops had struck at the oil installation in the port of Brega near the city of Ajdabiya.
• Plumes of smoke were seen coming from Ajdabiya and witnesses said an arms dump there had been hit by air force planes, supporting the ground force advance on Brega. ("Battle for Brega as Gaddafi launches attacks," JASON KOUTSOUKIS AJDABIYA, The Advocate (Australia), 03 Mar, 2011)

• 1345 GMT: An Al Jazeera English correspondent has just witnessed a regime airplane dropping a bomb on Brega, where Qaddafi forces have been the opposition throughout the day.
• 1320 GMT: An Al Jazeera English correspondent and an eyewitness report on a disorganised, chaotic battle at Brega with the opposition trying to dislodge 200-300 regime fighters who are holed up in the university outside the city. ("Libya (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Battlelines Drawn," March 2, 2011, Scott Lucas, EAWorldView)

Wolves and Leopards

"We're at the Crossroads and this is the Time of Decision / Too much Informers... / Wolves and Leopards are Trying to Kill the Sheep and the Shepherd."  Dennis Brown, 1978.
And in 2011?

• A "mukhbir," or informer, knocking on doors in Cairo, Egypt is the same as the "etelaati" in the neighborhoods of Tehran, Iran. The Supreme Leader and his supporters are the same as those in Saudi Arabia, who use Wahabi rhetoric to marginalize secular, religious and ethnic minorities. Like the Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who uses force against protesters, the leaders of the IRI have no issue in exercising violence against peaceful dissenters, political prisoners, students or labor unions. Every day, hundreds of tortured prisoners of conscience rot in Evin Prison, similar to prisoners in the American-run Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay detention center. Just as the Israeli military oppresses Palestinian political prisoners, the IRI denies access to legal counsel and uses emotional blackmail, torture and murderous tactics on the opposition. We must recognize that the IRI is the essence of an oppressive, militant dictatorship, which sustains itself through its systemized spread of lies, violence and hatred. It debases the image of Islam and subverts the cause of global freedom struggles in Tunisia, Egypt, Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine and elsewhere. ("Build connections to oppose tyranny," letter to the editor, Daily Targum, Rutgers, by Farah Hussain, February 28, 2011) Farah Hussain is a Rutgers College senior majoring in Middle Eastern studies and comparative literature. [Quite an insightful letter.]