THE DEATH OF Muammar Gaddafi brought with it statements from western leaders about an end to tyranny and new beginnings. Their view of Gaddafi has altered dramatically over the past eight months.
Indeed it is not the first time the west’s view of Gaddafi has utterly changed.
He was once considered a pariah, a brutal dictator, and perhaps most damning of all a state sponsor of terrorist atrocities carried out across the world. Then in the post 9/11 world he was welcomed back into the arms of western leaders who shook his hand and exchanged pleasantries with the Colonel at international summits.
The reasons why Gaddafi was so reviled in the west in the 70s, 80s and 90s are clear. He provided the IRA with semtex to carry out their atrocities here in Ireland, in the North and on mainland Britain.
As well as this, he was ideologically and financially fully behind the fight of the Palestinian Liberation Organisation. His government was also alleged to have been complicit in the brutal 1988 Lockerbie bombing and a nightclub bombing in Berlin two years before that which killed two US soldiers.
Such actions and views led to him famously being described by US president Ronald Regan as the “Mad Dog of the Middle East”:
But after the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States much of that changed.
Blair and McCain
Men's Fringed Trainers Suede Classic Louboutin Black Leather Sneakers Coachelito Christian Gaddafi appeared to rehabilitate his image with the west particularly after the 2003 invasion of Iraq when it was felt he feared the prospect of a similar incursion on his country.
He backed up his words of condemnation for Al Qaeda and decommissioned his weapons of mass destruction, which then British Prime Minister Tony Blair described as a “courageous” decision.
Contrast that reaction and the 2007 meeting between Blair and Gaddafi in which the PM warmly embraced the Libyan autocrat with a recent television interview in which Blair fully advocated the removal of the Colonel from power, explaining the reasons for his change in views:
But it was not just in the UK that the attitude changed.
Former US presidential candidate John McCain tweeted in 2009 about his meeting with Gaddafi at his “ranch” in Libya: “Late evening with Col. Qadhafi at his “ranch” in Libya – interesting meeting with an interesting man.”
Contrast those warm comments with his statement yesterday in which the Republican senator appeared to welcome the death of Gaddafi as “an end to the first phase of the Libyan revolution.
“While some final fighting continues, the Libyan people have liberated their country,” he added.
Later a smiling McCain appeared on BBC’s Newsnight and pointed out that governments in Syria, Russia and China should be “nervous” about the message sent by the fall of Gaddafi adding: “It is the Spring, not just the Arab Spring.”
Europe and the US
For further evidence of how western leaders courted Gaddafi in recent years you need not look at words but pictures of him on an international stage with the likes of Gordon Brown, Vladimir Putin, Nelson Mandela and Silvio Berlusconi.
As Euronews reports in 2007, a Libyan flag and even a Bedouin tent were erected in Paris in honour of the visit of Gaddafi where there was even a lavish reception at the Elysee Palace.
In Italy, Silvio Berlusconi enjoyed a warm relationship with the Colonel, exchanging hugs and handshakes when they met and as this video shows, the Italian prime minister was even prepared to kiss the hand of the Libyan leader:
Now, in France Sarkozy has been one of the leaders driving the NATO mission along with British prime minister David Cameron. While in Italy, Berlusconi SIDOINE I Love Gris Shoes Shoes Love I vfXHv1q (NTC) which as much warmth as he once did Gaddafi.
Even US president Barack Obama shook hands with Gaddafi as recently as 2009 at a G8 summit but yesterday following news of the dictator’s death he commented: “The dark shadow of tyranny has been lifted.
“And with this enormous promise, the Libyan people now have a great responsibility.”
How can this change in views be explained?
Quite simply, western leaders will argue that the turning point came when Gaddafi’s rhetoric went from the bizarre and rambling to the downright dangerous as he vowed to never give up in his struggle to crush the “cockroaches” who were behind the revolution in Libya.
As Blair alluded to in the above video, Gaddafi’s actions on the international stage in appeasing western demands were not matched by actions that appeased his own people at home. For the ordinary Libyan people, they had had enough.
The imminent humanitarian threat to Benghazi, which had been overtaken by rebel forces whom Gaddafi vowed to crush led to states in the Arab world joining calls from the west for intervention and the eventual imposition of a NATO no-fly zone.
This effectively meant it was only a matter of time before his rule was toppled as it was in August when Tripoli fell.
For some Gaddafi’s death denies victims of his rule a chance for justice and closure as noted in today’s Financial Times editorial but as Robert Fisk writes in today’s London Independent perhaps the absence of any trial is a good thing for some
“How the West must have been relieved that there would be no trials, no endless speeches from the Great Leader, no defence of his regime,” he writes. “No trials mean no accounts of rendition and torture and no cutting of sexual parts.
“So let us not recall any grovelling to Gaddafi,” he adds.
More from the death of Muammar Gaddafi:
COMMENTS (22)
What a load of rubbish! The west needed to control Libya as a buffer against the Arab spring. Also to counteract growing Russian and Chinese influence in the region. Oh and as usual oil. Anyone who think the west give a shit about humanitarian issues is deluded or perhaps a media employed propagandist.
Its a pity Syria doesnt have much oil, NATO might liberate them if they had!
Syria has Russian military base.
Keyword: Oil
Careful now mike, all petrol / oil comments were deleted from colonel gadaffis death story yesterday…for some unimaginable reason
We’ll see haha
I can’t wait for the day oil runs out, i really can’t. It jsut amazes me how corrupt politics is and we stand here, do nothing, and manage to elect the most corrupt of them all.
Do you know the real reason why they are attacking lybia?
There are only seven nations left in the world that are not borrowing from a Rothschild cartel bank: Iran, Syria, Algeria, North Korea, Sudan, Iceland, and Cuba. Those countries create their own money for their own people; and interest rates are low or zero. National banks that recently fell to the Rothschild cartel include: Iraq, Afghanistan, and most recently, Libya (on day 4 of the recent invasion). http://www.wearechange.org/?p=9351 Libya, the untold story. A Debt Free nation ransacked! Some believe it is about protecting civilians, others say it is about oil, but MOST are convinced intervention in Libya is ALL about Gaddafi’s PLAN TO INTRODUCE THE GOLD DINAR, a single African currency made from gold, a true sharing of the wealth AND THE END of the western world trying to controlling the middle east.. “It’s one of these things that you have to plan almost in secret, because as soon as you say you’re going to change over from the dollar to something else, you’re going to be targeted,” says Ministry of Peace founder Dr James Thring. “There were two conferences on this, in 1986 and 2000, organized by Gaddafi. Everybody was interested, most countries in Africa were keen.”
You I reckon there’s more than a few people capable of swallowing your particular brand of Blancmange but even the most credulous fool will buck at the following passage: “Libya is ALL about Gaddafi’s PLAN TO INTRODUCE THE GOLD DINAR, a single African currency made from gold, a true sharing of the wealth AND THE END of the western world trying to controlling the middle east.”
Newsflash @Conor_Graham The Middle East isn’t in Africa and Africa certainly isn’t in the Middle East. You know the aul saying Conor, “better hold your tongue and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.”
Because it suited them to do so. Just like it suited them to hand back the Lockerbie bomber. Just like it suits SF/IRA to attempt to re-write history when them as the peacemakers instead of the murderers and bombers. If you tell people something enough times, many of them will believe it. Problem number 1 with media-influenced democracy.
And you are the ultimate victim of that BT. The unionists used to say collusion is an illusion. The widgery report into Bloody Sunday was the truth etc. For Unionists , questioning the media or government is seen as disloyal. Our brave boys in Iraq and Afghanistan can do no wrong etc.
I doubt you have a clue about Irish history beyond your fireside lessons in how Catholics eat babies etc.
Paul, what are you on about? To challenge and to question is the mark of an intelligent, confident and responsible society of people. To be stuck in views and to fail to even question that they may be wrong is surely the antithesis of that. Irish history is an interesting case in point, now that you raise it. Where do the 140,000 Irish who volunteered to fight in the Great War feature in the “official” history of the country? Where is the record of the abuses they received when they were lucky enough to survive the trenches and return to a changed country that was trying to expel the British? Of course, looking back now, we had the “freedom fighters” of 1916, but could you entertain the idea that they were just terrorists? I didn’t think so either. Despite Mr McGuinness’ view that he is a peacemaker, how is it wrong to view the the IRA as murderers, when topically enough, they used Libyan semtex to murder two young boys in a Warrington shopping centre, for example? How, by extension, is it wrong to propose an equation between SF ad the IRA when, as per yesterday’s IT, Martin Ferris collected the convicted murderers of Det McCabe from prison? The point is that when news media is opinion rather than factual reporting, it changes the views of those unwilling to question or challenge what’s put in front of them.
Tony Blair has more blood on his hands than Gaddafi ever did. He was removed purely because it suits the western elites foreign policy strategy in the region. Western imperialism strikes again!
I Personally believe that post 911 he had his uses to the west. Some evidence suggests that some renditions took place to Libya. So when they realised that the tide was turning they quickly changed sides and aided his defeat to prevent the dirt coming out on them. A suggestion that he financed sarkozy’s election does tally with the fact that the French leader led the way in taking action against him. Are they covering their tracks. You dont these allies rushing in to places like Saudis Arabia to defend the innocents there. It’s pick and choose based on their own selfish interests.
I know that the IRA weren’t especially active on the Scottish islands etc. but is there any need to specifically refer to ‘mainland’ Britain?
We are the bad guys in this story. if someone or something stands between us and our goal – we destroy that. Colonel was not the angel but you cannot be weak in Libya as a leader – you can see now why.
If gadaffi won the war, the people who tried to overturn him would be labeled in history as ‘terrorists’. If gadaffi loses and is taken out of power, these people are liberators of peace and freedom. So, presumably the same would apply to the IRA yeah?
Or that it was rumoured that he had planned to introduce a new currency as the new way of pricing oil that would replace the dollar. It was going to be a gold backed currency called the dinar. I have only heard about it on Russian sites so dont know much about it. Whatever the reason money & power are always the reason these guys end up dead.I still think putting the face of a dead man on the front page of all newspapers ,shows how far we have fallen as people. No death should be celebrated no matter who it is.
It happened when he began toying with excluding major Western gas and oil producers and reducing quotas to others in favour of China primarily. Gas in Europe is pretty much controlled by Russia. Libya is an alternative source – important for France and Italy especially.
It’s very simple really Silvio and Nicolas hug the very imp and his tent is on Red Square as well as nearby Big Ben Hypocrisy is the name of it He was a terrorist and mad man. But we Do Not approve ritualistic killing online worldwide We all are back 24 centuries into BC era, alas.
The American KHII spy satellite was watching the Marita Ann trawler as the Irish warship LE Emer intercepted it just beside the Skelligs on 29th September 1984.
The trawler was loaded with tons of arms for the IRA.
A gift for the IRA from Colonel Giddafi.
I’ll tell you why
1. Oil
Trainers Sneakers Coachelito Men's Black Suede Christian Louboutin Classic Fringed Leather 2. Gaddafi wanted to sell oil in African diner instead of the US dollar.
That’s it! plain simple
How and why did the west change its view of Gaddafi?
Because our some of ”The Wests” sleazy leaders became jealous of him?