Posted by
ApolloSpeaks on Friday, March 18, 2011 10:36:02 AM
Those who are cheering yesterday's 10-0 vote on a UN resolution to impose a No Fly Zone over Libya should take note. Yesterday was anything but an auspicious day for such rejoicing or to start such an undertaking. First, the vote took place on the eighth anniversary of George Bush issuing a final ultimatum to Saddam Hussein and his sons to quickly leave Iraq or suffer the consequences of a massive ground invasion
(see). This suggests that yesterday's UN vote is the first step toward putting boots on the ground in Libya to either replace the defeated rebel forces and topple the intransigent Arab Nationalist Kaddafi, like we did the unbending Arab Nationalist Saddam-who successfully crushed every rebellion, sanctions, embargoes, no fly zone and all*-or to bring order to a strife torn Lybia of a post-Kaddady era.
*Interestingly enough Saddam's Foreign Minister Naji Sabri responded to Bush's ultimatum by calling him a "crazy man," words that Kaddafi echoed when he said yesterday in anticipation of the UN vote: "If the world gets crazy, we will get crazy, too"
Secondly, and most distressingly, the Islamist leaning military junta in Egypt, who is aiding anti-Kaddafi rebels with troops and arms, released from jail yesterday (in a blanket amnesty program to placate extremists) Al Qaida terrorist Mohammed al-Zawahiri, brother of bin Laden's number two man Ayaman Al-Zawahiri (see ). This is a portentous sign of an Islamist state replacing the Kaddafi regime in Libya if the dictator should fall. Will M. Zawahiri (with the other freed terrorists) join extremist forces in Libya and become a jihadist leader (as did Zarqawi* in Iraq) terrorizing Kaddafi if he stays in power, or fighting occupation forces if an invasion takes place?
*In a Jordanian amnesty program Zarqawi and other radical prisoners were released from prison in 1999. Shortly after he was freed Zarqawi demonstrated his gratitude to King Hussein by attempting to blow up the Radisson Hotel in Amman where many US and Israeli tourists lodged.
Update
Released with M. al-Zawahiri was Abdoud al-Zommer, who mastrerminded the assassination of Anwar Sadat, and 950 former militants from the Gama’a al-Islamiyya terrorist group. How many of these terrorists (all of whom hate the un-Islamic secular Kaddafy) are en route to Libya to join the jihad with the blessing of the military regime?
Postscript I: UN Resolution 1973 (slightly revised, 3-19)
Another inauspicious sign was the number of yesterday's UN resolution: 1973. This could be highly signifiacnt for understanding the disastrous course of events unfolding in the Middle East in that it indicates the year of the Yom Kippur War* when Egyptian and Syrian forces struck Israel in a surprise attack. 1973 was also the start of the Arab Oil Embargo against the US and several other countries because of their support for Israel. This triggered the energy crisis and price controlls by the Nixon adminstration causing shortages and long gas lines. Ominously as a possible sign from Providence that today's events were prefigured by 1973, Israel that year shot down a Libyan commercial jet over the Sinai Peninsula killing 108 people. Israel mistook the jet for a military plane***.
*October 10, 1973.
**October 17, 1973
***Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114 accidently shot down February 21, 1973
Postscript II: The Battle of Badr
Another dire sign that yesterday's UN vote might end up benefiting the forces of Islamic supremacism was that it coincided with the 1387th anniversary of the Battle of Badr, when Mohammad and his jihadists defeated the pagan army of Mecca in a predatory war of Islamic aggression.
Postscript III: Shock and Awe (revised dates, thanks Diana)
Obama's speech today on the Libya crisis, where he threatened Kaddafy with military force if he refused to comply with the ceasefire, fell one day short of the eighth anniversary of Shock and Awe Washington time*. As it's unlikely that Kaddafy will comply with UN demands an NATO Shock and Awe campaign is likely to follow with bombings of loyalist forces throughout Lybia and strikes in Triploi to kill Kaddafy and his sons. If this doesn't stop Kaddafy or drive him from power what then? What if rebel forces fail to prevail? Or if they do and they turn on each other in a post-Kaddafy era what then? Don't for one moment believe Obama when he says that they'll be no US boots on the ground in Libya. Mission creep is in the wind. *Shock and Awe started on March 19 around
*10PM Washington time which was March 20th in Baghdad.
Postscipt IV: The War Powers Act
This gets more and more fascinating. The War Powers Act which some Washington lawmakers are accusing Obama of violating by going ahead with the No Fly Zone action without Congressional approval was passed in 1973 oddly corresponding to the number of the UN No Fly Zone Resolution. It looks as if this action is going to cause headaches for Obama even if he refrains from sending ground troops into Lybia. Even if Kaddafy is defeated captured or killed a post Kaddafy Lybia is likely to either descend into anarchy and chaos, or emerge an anti-western Islamist state. With a blundering, incompetent, ill-starred man like Obama in power you need to expect the worse. As I said before: ALL CATASTROPHES ARE POSSIBLE IN THE AGE OF BARACK OBAMA. Especially in the Middle East that's now looking into the abyss of instability and regional war.