Disintegrating Libya On NATO Agenda – OpEd

By Hassan Hanizadeh

Libyan civilians are targeted by both by Muammar Gaddafi’s forces and the Western coalition airstrikes.

The Libyan crisis entered a dangerous stage after the direct intervention of the United States, England, France, and Italy to support the revolutionary forces in the North African country.

The use of American unmanned Predator drones to protect the Libyan revolutionaries proves that the United States is paving the way to deploy NATO ground forces in Libya.

Although the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973 has left the door open for NATO military intervention in Libya, Washington’s bitter experience in Afghanistan and Iraq made the United States hesitant in its involvement in the Libyan crisis.

The complication of conditions in Libya strengthens the speculation that the United States and the West seek to disintegrate Libya into two eastern and western parts.

The Sudan’s disintegration into northern and southern parts has apparently caused NATO and the United States to seek repeating this successful and inexpensive experience in Libya.

The United States and NATO could easily topple the Libyan ruler Muammar Gaddafi’s regime on the first days of the uprising in Libya. It seems, however, that vast oil reserves in eastern Libya have caused the US and the West to embark on an inhuman and profit-seeking interaction with the Libyan revolutionaries.

The West and the US have a strategic outlook on Libya’s oil reserves; because the closeness of these reserves to the Mediterranean Sea facilitates an easy transfer of Libyan oil — among the most high-quality light oil in the world — to the West.

Due to the presence of oil depots on the beaches of the Mediterranean Sea, a quick transfer of Libya’s oil to Western countries is possible in case of an energy crisis in the world.

Thus, based on this argument, NATO primarily allowed Gaddafi to utilize military equipments on an unconventional and vast scale.

More than 10,000 fatalities in recent months caused Libya’s interim government to give certain concessions in order to get military and logistic support from the US and NATO.

It is being said that the West and the US have made the Libyan revolutionary forces to pledge to provide Western countries oil needs with prices lower than those of the global market, in return for military support to topple Gaddafi.

Meanwhile, the insecurities at Libya’s common borders with Egypt, Tunisia, and Algeria have created fragile and instable conditions in these countries.

Egypt and Tunisia have asked the Arab League not to react to the possible deployment of NATO ground forces in Libya.

This shows that the disintegration of Libya has been put on NATO and the West’s agenda, because Libya’s vast lands can help creat two states within this geographical area.

Secret give-and-takes hint to plans by the West to disintegrate Libya into two eastern and Western states, because the US and the West don’t seem to have a vested interest in toppling Muammar Gaddafi.

In case of Libya’s disintegration into eastern and western parts, Gaddafi will certainly take Tripoli and the revolutionary forces will take Benghazi.

If this speculation comes true, Israel will definitely participate in looting Libya’s oil reserves in the near future.

After Sudan’s disintegration, Israel quickly signed contracts for oil and gas drilling with the southern Sudanese government.

Therefore, Libya has now entered a sensitive stage, as the stances of the United States, France England, and Italy on the North African country’s fate reinforce this speculation that Libya is facing a complicated political trend.

This process builds up two possibilities about Libya’s political trend and Colonel Gaddafi.

The first possibility is that — in a secret collusion between the international players and Libyan revolutionaries Gaddafi will end up with a fate like that of Iraq’s former dictator Saddam Hussein.

In view of this possibility, arresting and trying Gaddafi in the International Criminal Court seems likely.

The second possibility is that Gaddafi will remain the ruler of western part of Libya in Tripoli, and the oil-rich eastern part will be ruled by a newly-formed government.

Libya is now in complicated conditions; and if Gaddafi does not step down from power in the coming days, Libya will witness more severe clashes.

These clashes will pave the way for the military interference of the United States and NATO with the aim of disintegrating the North African country, and thus, Libya will become the second Arab country after the Sudan to be disintegrated by international players.

Under such circumstances, Yemen will also be subject to similar conditions, and will return to the pre-1990 unity era when it was divided into southern and northern parts.

Prior to 1990, Yemen was governed as two different countries; the capital of northern Yemen was Sana’a, and the capital of southern Yemen was Aden.