Downward?

An article in Foreign Policy argues that the situation is far worse in Libya than previously thought.

He argues “Just prior to the Benghazi assault, on the 11th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri released an Internet video in which, according to CNN, he said that al-Libi’s  ‘blood is calling, urging and inciting you to fight and kill the crusaders.’ Even if the deaths were not linked to al Qaeda or its dangerous North African affiliates, the event is still a maj or threat to Libya’s chances of successful transition to stability, and could be a watershed of the worst kind. The nightmare scenario that Libya could go the way of Iraq in 2004 is still not likely, but no longer seems implausible”. He continues “the attacks should force the country’s leaders to take a much more active approach to ensuring safety and security and pushing ahead with other state-building measures.

If these attacks do not galvanize momentum for progress, they could undermine it entirely. Instability in Libya could, in turn, undermine progress elsewhere in a region where transitions are still fragile after the Arab uprisings”.

He reinforces this point by discussing the role America and ” its allies, and partners that helped free Libya from Qaddafi’s rule have a responsibility to do their utmost — providing intelligence, technical advice, and, where necessary, military support — to ensure the situation does not spiral out of control”.

The point that he only hints at, but should be elaborated on, is that of the EU. If the EU is so concerned about being a global power it should act like one and use its vast monies to back up the Libyan state and protect its own interests and doing that, the interests of the world by blocking terrorists and warlords gaining control of what is a fragile state.

He goes on to argue that “Were the United States and its allies naïve about the dangers in post-intervention Libya? The attacks come on the heels of a gradual deterioration of the country’s security in recent months. Last year’s uprising began in Benghazi, Libya’s second largest city, where Tuesday’s attacks occurred. Qaddafi claimed the revolt was the work of terrorists, long native to Eastern Libya, and warned that if it were not crushed, the country could become the Somalia of the Mediterranean”.

However, this argument is mistaken on a number of fronts. Firstly, it ignores the Libyan election that elected a, mostly, moderate Islamic government willing to work with America and the EU. Secondly, he cannot claim that just because an otherwise insignificant group murdered US ambassador and some of his staff that America, the UK and France were naive about supporting the rebels. As he himself notes “the vast majority of the revolutionaries had no ties whatsoever to al Qaeda or other terrorist groups, and when Qaddafi moved to raze Benghazi with tanks and aircraft, the Arab League and United Nations condemned him”.

He goes on to write “Initial efforts to disarm, demobilize, and reintegrate these militias into a centralized Libyan army under the authority of Libya’s leadership were quickly abandoned when it appeared that doing so might spark violence and undermine Libya’s tenuous stability. Subsequent efforts to do so by international actors met with further resistance and even suspicion from Libyan authorities”.

He futher argues that the violence has become much worse as a result of three factors, “attacks against Libyan government officials and buildings, both in Benghazi and in Tripoli”, this, added to the “more aggressive actions by radical Islamist militias, who recently destroyed a number of Sufi shrines charging that Sufi practices are un-Islamic” and lastly “attacks against diplomats, including an attack against a U.S. diplomatic vehicle in Tripoli and an attack on the British ambassador’s car in Benghazi. Until this week, these attacks looked like isolated incidents. Now they appear in a different light”.

He concludes noting that “groups in eastern Libya that have had ties to al Qaeda are involved. Concerns about groups such as the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), which played an important role in Libya’s liberation, are long-standing. Knowledge of such groups initially made several U.S. officials wary of intervention. Even if the LIFG appears now to support the new Libyan state, such concerns have not gone away. The eastern town of Derna is well known as a hotbed of radicalism and source of recruits for the insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan. This summer, the Libyan authorities, reportedly arrested 20 suspected AQIM members on Libyan soil”.

Libya is still a long way from being a terrorist hotbed, but lack of action could easily wish countries were longing for a return of Gaddaffi.