April 2011 - Centre for Civil Society - University of KwaZulu-Natal

Government’s forces are proving incapable of advancing militarily in any
serious manner. In the past few days they have been pushed back from the
positions that they had taken earlier, from Bin Jawad all the way back to
Ajdabya, in spite of having the backing of NATO’s air power.
Thus, the only way they can really remove Gaddafi is to step up the level
of NATO operations. There has now been some speculation as to whether
NATO should arm the rebels. That would be the next logical step of the
imperialist intervention. The only problem with that is that they are not
sure where the arms would end up. That means the imperialists don’t fully
trust the rebels to do the job for them.
Thus at some stage ground forces would have to be deployed. There has
been admission to the fact that special forces, military advisers, etc., are
already operating on the ground. The intervention risks becoming like Iraq,
a war on the part of imperialism to impose a government to its liking. It
has nothing whatsoever to do with supporting the revolution or
guaranteeing the Libyan people their democratic rights.
Just as in Iraq, we must oppose imperialist aggression, be that in the form
of aerial bombardment, “military advisers” or ground troops. Should the
imperialists succeed in their aims in Libya, it would be a blow to the Arab
revolution. Instead of a genuine expression of the will of the Libyan people
we would have yet another imperialist-imposed stooge government that
would proceed to serve the interests of imperialism.
Such a government would be corrupt and in the pockets of imperialism. It
would proceed to accelerate the process of privatisation, which the
multinational corporations would be keen to get involved in.
Let us not forget that in Afghanistan Karzai does not govern with a genuine
mandate from the people. He wins elections through blatant fraud and
stays in power thanks to the presence of foreign troops. In Iraq the
“western-style democracy” has recently fired on peaceful protesters.
From the beginning we have made our opposition to Gaddafi and his
regime clear. This was a dictatorial and oppressive regime which politically
and economically was following imperialist dictated policies. However, the
Libyan people cannot win genuine freedom by putting their fate in the
hands of the imperialists. The Sarkozys and Camerons of this world are not
interested in the youth and working people of Libya. Their interests are
those of the capitalist class they represent. In their own countries they are
attacking workers’ basic living conditions and are facing growing
opposition as last Saturday half a million strong trade union demonstration
in London clearly showed.
If Gaddafi is overthrown with the direct intervention of the military power
of the imperialists, the people of Libya will not be free, but will have to
prepare for a second revolution to remove the puppets of imperialism.
www.marxist.com
The glossary of greed
Joan Baxter First Published in Pambazuka 1 April 2011
With the 2011 Forbes List of the world’s billionaires recently released –
and acutely aware of the huge volume of unaccounted for money found in