Reuters Reports Death of Gaddafi In Libyan City of Sirte 302
syngularyx writes with a snippet from Reuters' report that "Former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi died of wounds suffered on Thursday as fighters battling to complete an eight-month-old uprising against his rule overran his hometown Sirte, Libya's interim rulers said. His killing, which came swiftly after his capture near Sirte, is the most dramatic single development in the Arab Spring revolts that have unseated rulers in Egypt and Tunisia and threatened the grip on power of the leaders of Syria and Yemen." An anonymous reader links to the news as reported by Al Jazeera (citing confirmation from the military spokesman of the National Transition Council). Time reports that many Libyans were celebrating even preliminary reports of Gaddafi's death.
I'm gonna wait: (Score:4, Insightful)
Is this as reliable as when they captured his son and he showed up on TV soon after?
I think they've supposedly killed Kamis a couple of times. Resilient young man, that one.
Well, that's it then... (Score:1, Insightful)
Libya can proceed at full pace towards becoming a repressive Islamic repiblic along the Iranian model. I wouldn't like to be a woman there right now.
Re:Arab spring my ass (Score:5, Insightful)
arab spring seems to be a shitty operation by u.s. to topple unfriendly governments to install their own islamist supporters and to oblige the countries to financial system.
Right. Which explains why one of the first governments that was overthrown in the "Arab Spring" was Egypt... a staunch US ally that the US had poured many billions of dollars into. Congratulations. You managed to set a new record for cluelessness.
Re:So this is /. related in what way? (Score:5, Insightful)
So how is this tech news?
Read it again. At no point does it state "Tech news."
"News for nerds. Stuff that matters."
Re:Well, that's it then... (Score:3, Insightful)
So true. The Muslim Brotherhood's motto is "Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. The Qur'an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope."
To them democracy and Islam can not coexist.
Re:Congratulations, citizens of NATO countries! (Score:3, Insightful)
Sorry you must be confused. The thread about Saddam's capture was posted back in 2003 or so. This is the one about Libya and Gaddafi.
Wait, don't tell me you actually believe a grass-roots revolution led by the poor to topple an authoritarian leadership and it's elite minority is somehow sponsoring the interests of the powerful few?
Or perhaps you subscribe to hypocritical Russian politics where attacking a foreign sovereign state is always bad. Well, unless it's Georgia.
Or are you one of those dumb conspiracy theorists who thinks this was about oil or something?
The only self interest for the respective NATO countries involved in this was prevention of mass immigration to Europe if Gaddafi continued to make things worse in his country, but mostly this was the first bout of military action in a long while that was actually meaningful, just, and most importantly - succesful.
That sux (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So this is /. related in what way? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Congratulations, citizens of NATO countries! (Score:3, Insightful)
The only self interest for the respective NATO countries involved in this was prevention of mass immigration to Europe if Gaddafi continued to make things worse in his country, but mostly this was the first bout of military action in a long while that was actually meaningful, just, and most importantly - succesful.
Errr, well, no. Europe and especially France & Italy are very dependent on Libyan oil. It's not like one day the Europeans woke up and discovered that there's a dictatorship in Libya and some people are revolting against it. If not all, at least most European leaders (Tony Blair, Sarkozy, Berlusconi etc) have shaked hands with Gaddafi in the past in good spirit (just google it). And Europe's relationship with Libya was in good terms until 1 year ago. So, the matters in Libya are way more complicated than they seem (or than some mass media let us see them) and one must be really naive to think that this is just about some poor people revolting against an oppressing regime.
Re:Congratulations, citizens of NATO countries! (Score:5, Insightful)
Look, Gaddafi was a complex and strange man, and there can be no doubt that he did some things for his own people and others that other, more straightforwardly venal Arab dictators, did not do. But: an entire nation was scared to criticise him for 42 years; he killed thousands of his own people in the most vicious and terrible ways; and he punished entire cities and regions whose support he thought he did not have fully. Net net, he was a vile and terrible dictator.
Re:Congratulations, citizens of NATO countries! (Score:4, Insightful)
Right, so dependent on it that since action in Libya European oil prices have actually largely stabilised rather than increased as would be the case if it was such an important source?
It's nothing to do with the fact European leaders waking up and realising he was a bad man, they knew this all along. It was about the fact the Libyan people and Arab/Middle Eastern people in general were ready to rise up, that was the fundamental turning point. Apparently you missed that rather major section in the news for the last 9 months+
Re:Congratulations, citizens of NATO countries! (Score:2, Insightful)
Down with tyrants, that's what I always say.
Now if the CIA would stop putting them in power, we could call this progress.
Re:So this is /. related in what way? (Score:5, Insightful)
but isn't "Stuff that matters" a clarifying explication of "News for nerds"? /.'s motto rather banal and lifeless.
in other words, it means to imply that "on this website, Nerd news IS what matters" rather than "on this website, Nerd news, oh and also other stuff that matter just as much"
and in every definition, "Nerd" means a one-track-mind dedicated to technology or other socially-atrophying pursuits
unless of course you redefine (and dilute) the word "Nerd" to encompass every field of interest, but then that would make "Nerd news" indistinguishable from just "news", and make
now, I'm not saying this news won't give us some very lively conversation, or that I don't appreciate it being here. on the contrary. I guess I'm being pedantic since this excuse always comes up whenever someone makes a point about the mainstream-ification, I guess you could say, of slashdot, and it always strikes me as unconvincing.
Re:Congratulations, citizens of NATO countries! (Score:5, Insightful)
Dear AC, go fuck yourself. This gun toting meat eating liberal says we should have dealt with Gadaffi years ago.
I disagree. We never should have initiated action to take out Gadaffi. This is how you become occupiers (whether that's your intent or not, it is what happens), like we did after "dealing with" Saddam's regime.
Instead we should have waited for the Libyan people to initiate action to take out Gadaffi, and then helped them deal with Gadaffi themselves. Which is what we did. Planes in the air, advisers on the ground, and material support, but no U.S. marines patrolling Tripoli with us hoping that eventually Libyans will be able to do it themselves. Instead of us taking over Libya and then handing back to them when we feel they're ready, we helped Libyans take over Libya for themselves, and now it is theirs. This is infinitely better.
Imagine if the French had decided to "deal with" the British government in the American colonies well before the revolution. How hated would they have been? Instead, they provided significant -- I would say decisive -- support for a popular uprising, and thus became a great and loved ally of the U.S. for many years (minus a few disagreements and one quasi-war at sea), until Americans forgot that without the French we'd still be spelling color with a 'u'.
By the way, I do think we never should have supported Gadaffi and maybe this would have happened sooner.
Also, the right time to have dealt with Saddam was when the uprising occurred after Desert Storm. And we never should have supported him, either. Then we might have actually been greeted as liberators.
Going after every 'bad' guy is not the right way to exercise military power in a 'liberal' way. At least if it's the outcome that matters, not the feel-good activism aspect.
Re:Congratulations, citizens of NATO countries! (Score:4, Insightful)
But thanking NATO for its actions in Libya is hypocrisy at large - If the NATO countries really cared for the Libyan people then they would have killed that asshole DECADES ago.
No, because taking out a dictator in the absence of a local revolutionary force to combat the regime means that we have to not just take out the dictator but the rest of their military and government ourselves, so we become occupiers that hope to eventually hand the country back to its own people. You know, like in Iraq.
However supporting a popular uprising, preventing the dictator from being able to freely use their military hardware to crush the uprising, so that the people themselves can take the country back for themselves without us ever deciding whether or not they deserve it is how you show you care about the Libyan people.
Oh and obviously decades ago the U.S. didn't give two shits about the Libyan people. It was all about Israeli and Cold War politics. Controllable dictators were better than communists or free countries that might become communist was the official line. That's why we supported assholes like Gaddafi and Saddam.
Times have changed. And now, for the first time in decades, we've put ourselves on the right side of history.