Silencing the Call of Democracy and Hijacking the Arab Revolution: Hidden Agenda and Secret Alliances Behind the Libyan Crisis

When the Arab Spring was in the offing, the view from the Western media's lens of cultural relativism was one of shock and dismay at the Arabs' desire for democracy and their willingness to achieve this lofty ideal by peaceful means. Our intelligence agencies were flabbergasted by their inability to stymie these revolutions, notwithstanding the fact that they had failed once more in predicting them like in critical junctures near the turn of every decade: from the Prague Spring of 1968 to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, from the fall and dissolution of the Soviet Union ten years later to the 9/11 tragedy in 2001, and now the Arab Spring in 2011.

Our leaders were equally taken aback by the groundswell of resistance to dictatorships across the Arab world that sent Western policy makers back to the drawing board to devise a new foreign policy towards the Muslim Middle East.  Early indications are that the new policy is neither a sincere response to the crisis at hand, nor is it a fair and balanced foreign policy that many have been calling for since 9/11. Instead, it is the same old policy of using dictators as a wedge between the people and their resources undergone a cosmetic surgery, a facelift that serves U.S. corporate interests instead of American democratic ideals.  This policy projects an attitude that harkens back to the times when Europeans justified their continued colonization by claiming that their non-European subjects were not capable of governing themselves let alone doing so democratically.

While the resonance of Obama's call for democracy still echoed in the streets of Cairo, he gave support to the indispensable dictatorship of Mubarak who was promised sanctuary, safety and incentives for a peaceful transition of power so that the baton could be passed on to another ‘trusted' man. Obama's special envoy to Egypt, Frank Wisner, stated that the Egyptian president "must stay in office" to guide his country through transitions.  Perhaps he meant to say transition to the status quo ante.

The rapid unraveling of the hypocritical scheme of protecting dictatorship under the pretence of supporting democracy called for a 180-degree role reversal to use provocation instead of accommodation.  When people were rising against Qaddafi, politicians and diplomats defecting from his government, army units joining protestors and Qaddafi fading away in the dust storm of a peaceful revolution, President Obama declared that Mr. Qaddafi must be removed from power, Prime Minister Cameron called for "the departure of Qaddafi from power as quickly as possible," and the U.N. Security Council referred Mr. Qaddafi to the International Criminal Court for prosecution.

With his back to the wall, the desperate Qaddafi had no choice but to fight for his life. The French began a preemptive attack on March 19th to enforce the no-fly zone. The U.S. joined the operation citing the imminent danger of a bloodbath in Benghazi. The terms ‘preemptive attack' and ‘immanent danger' along with March 19th as the date of attack all seem to come from George Bush's playbook on Iraq.

The Muslim world looks at the American and NATO military operations with profound skepticism.  Not that many tears are shed for Qaddafi, but because the concern to protect civilians in Libya stands in stark contrast with the West's disregard for Muslim civilians from Bahrain to Pakistan and from Yemen to Afghanistan where civilians' protests over the persistent drone attacks are dismissed with denials and repeated apologies that imply insincerity and indifference as shown in the recent Rolling Stone magazine videos.

If this legitimate revolution is turned into a civil war, it will be a win-win situation for the West.  If Qaddafi survives, the Arab Spring will virtually have ended, as other ‘friendly' dictators could apply his brutal model of suppression with impunity.  If the Libyan opposition wins, their government will be beholden to the West and will have to pay the piper through oil concessions.  A stalemate and prolonged battles would virtually divide Libya into two parts each more vulnerable to Western manipulation as they will use their oil for weapon procurement from the West.

For the West Qaddafi is expendable as he has outlived his usefulness. He scrapped his nuclear program in 2004; he took responsibility for the Lockerbie bombing and paid $2.7 billion compensation. After the lifting of the U.N. sanctions Qaddafi invested his capital in the West. He visited Italy at the head of a delegation of Libyan businessmen keen to increase their investments in Italian industry, making Libya Italy's most important trading partner.  During President Sarkozy's visit to Libya, in July 2007 a multi-billion contract was signed for Rafael fighters and nuclear power plants.

The situation turned against Qaddafi when his ex-chief of protocol, Nouri Massoud El-Mesmari, defected to France and according to Thierry Meyssan of the Voltaire Network, "proposed to the French to organize an uprising in Benghazi to overthrow Gaddafi."  Qaddafi who was rumored to have secretly financed Sarkozy's election campaign felt betrayed and cancelled the $6.5 billion contract they signed four years earlier. The French retaliated by asking the British to co-create a military expeditionary force that lead to the military exercise Southern Mistral.

The French were itching for revenge and the Arab Spring provided the opportunity.  The occurrence of the first two revolutions in two states adjacent to Libya conveniently provided the opportunity to cloud the cause and effect of events.  Libya's safe distance from the strategic Persian Gulf probably got the U.S. on board, and the vilified name of Qaddafi had the added advantage of turning Western public opinion against him to justify a military operation.

This French Connection explains why the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle was deployed to the coast of Libya early in March along with USS Enterprise as part of Operation Odyssey Dawn.  This also explains why the French aircraft initiated the attack on Libyan forces and why a key meeting on Libya was held in Paris on March 21 to define the terms of military engagement in Libya.

But none of that explains Obama's double-talk that the U.S. was moving to a backseat role at the same time it was stepping up the Tomahawk cruise missiles attacks and saying that Qaddafi's removal was not a U.S. military objective when The New York Times leaks the news of CIA operatives on the ground in Libya.  Worse yet according to Asia Times, "Two diplomatic sources at the United Nations independently confirmed that Washington, via Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, gave the go-ahead for Saudi Arabia to invade Bahrain and crush the pro-democracy movement in their neighbor in exchange for a "yes" vote by the Arab League for a no-fly zone over Libya."  Thus only nine out of 22 members of the Arab League were "seduced" to vote for the no-fly zone by the House of Saud, ‘the guardians of the holy mosques'—a most unholy alliance.

At this juncture, the peaceful grassroots revolution spearheaded by the February 17th Youth has been marginalized. The current wave of protesters may be fighting at the behest of foreign powers. Professor Vijay Prashad exposes two of these groups. "Khalifah Hifler, was a general who led Libyan troops in Chad in the 1980s and was then taken up with the Libyan National Salvation Front, went off to live in Vienna, Virginia, for 30 years, about a ten minute drive from Langley [where the CIA is headquartered], and returned to Benghazi."  In addition to NATO members, it's fundamentally Qatar, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia that call for the Libyan intervention and is the same force putting down the uprising in Bahrain.

When governments that claim legitimacy as governments of the people, for the people, and by the people betray the trust of the people, they will never regain the moral high ground to preach democracy to others.  Mubarak may have been in denial and Qaddafi may be deserted, but it is our naked aggression that is subjected to indecent exposure on the Mediterranean shore. Not until we've been reflected in the mirror of our consciousness will we realize that the tragedy of Libya is by design and it is as much our responsibility as it is theirs.