Yemen

Ya. What Leinad said. Yemen is Yemen. A deeply poor, largely illiterate, faction-ridden tribal society. Saleh hasn’t stayed in power because he’s an authoritarian strong-man completely in charge of a repressive police apparatus, but because he’s a weak leader able to manoeuvre between factions. That’s just another illustration of why “principled” criticism fails the test of complex political affairs. Which is not to say that criticism of various “unprincipled” motives and interests is unwarranted. It’s just not deducible.

I’d think the Bahrain thing is in on my mind, too. Despite some pretty serious black-outing of coverage, people are aware that snipers have been employed against Bahrianis while people ‘s backs have been turned, also.

Yemen is Yemen. 2 insurrections, actual al Qaeda, and qat.

How it become strategic is beyond me.

Which should make it easier for the US to walk. And the Saudis are there already.

Plus, as I tried to argue in the other thread, scale (of evil) matters. He hasn’t resorted to shelling whole towns and/or neighborhoods. If your gonna try to stamp out wrongdoings, its best to concentrate on the really big ones first. Not to mention finishing the one you started before jumping into yet another one. Lets open up an N front war, to free the world of all tyrants! I doubt the refuge flows from Yemen are nearly the threat to European stability that Libya is.

The hypocrisy is that the arms exporting nations, who have been bending over backwards to do deals with Gaddafi very recently, are now claiming the moral high ground.

Sorry to distract from Yemen, but I have a question about Libya. I’ve always had some trouble understanding the country’s politics and its place in history. That last part may sound rather grandiose, but hear me out.

For most regimes in the world, that I know about, I feel like their ideology and actual character is not mysterious. I understand the concepts of monarchy, socialism, ethnic fascism, theocracy, etc. I also get that a society may espouse some ideology or other but actually be a corrupt oligarchy, that societies experiencing war or insurgency take on a different sensibility, and so forth.

I don’t feel this way about Libya at all. I’m not even sure whether it’s sui generis or whether there is some “reductive” account of its political character that is essentially correct. You can read Gaddafi’s Green Book to see his ideology. To me it seems very 1970s, very Third Way (in the sense of the nonaligned movement, not in the sense of Blair and Clinton). It’s sort of a Bedouin Maoism, an anarchist utopia of direct democracy by popular committees, Afrocentric (“the black race shall triumph”), with an admixture of musings on life by a guy who prefers the desert tent to urban sedentarism… As you can see, I struggle to do it justice.

So all that is part of the ideology of the “Libyan Jamahiriya”. There’s a government with ministries, there are popular committees instead of political parties, and then Gaddafi has no official government role (except possibly commander of the armed forces?) but permanent status as “guide of the revolution”. Which might bring us to political realities hiding beneath the ideology. One gets the impression that Gaddafi, his sons, and the intelligence services have been the real powers, and that the supposed government would always be required to change direction according to the advice of the “brother leader” – who also gets to tour the world as the country’s supreme representative, like any other head of state…

Then there’s the external political context. Gaddafi originally took power in the shadow of Nasser’s pan-Arabism; I tend to see him as also anticipating, just a little, the Islamism of Khomeini, but despite the Islamic content to his ideology, he was enough a man of the late 1960s to produce his own ideological manual rather than just using the Quran (and this is something that Libyan Islamists hold against him). So he was yet another 1970s Third World revolutionist, focused on the Arab scene. But I think his political destiny for several decades was then shaped by being on the US list of ‘state sponsors of terrorism’, a framing circumstance in which American geopolitical categories became part of Libya’s reality. Maybe the nature of the Libyan political experience is to be found in the intersection of Gaddafi’s indigenous populism and the American-dominated world system with its category of heterogeneous “rogue states” united only by being strategic nuisances while not being great powers. And finally, after the Bush-era moderation and opening of Libya, now we have the cataclysmic end of the regime, along with the end of many other regimes of completely different character, in the great upheaval of 2011, which is a whole new era for the Arab world.

So that’s my attempt to sum up Libya. My question is: where can I find some genuine insight into these aspects of Libya – ideology, concrete political and social character, and place in history? Preferably I would like to see these insights coming from a big-picture theory. So it’s not just Libyan history as “one damn thing after another”, but something which interprets it as the contingent local expression of universal human and political realities. Can anyone suggest what to read or who to ask?

LFC wrote:

“my impression is that the Afrocentrism of the Green Book to which you refer increasingly became a sort of megalomaniacal vision of himself as revolutionary exemplar for the continent vs. the oppressive world powers-that-be”

Precisely. Let’s not forget Gaddafi’s colonial/hegemonic ambitions for Chad.

May be a bit late for the United States to call the shots in Yemen.

“On your final point, no-one knows how any of this is going to turn out. But relying on dictatorships to provide “stability” has been a recipe for failure, here as elsewhere.”

Everybody sounds like Bush these days.

“But relying on dictatorships to provide “stability” has been a recipe for failure, here as elsewhere.”

Relying on States as solutions has been a recipe for failure. The whole Middle East is riddled with the outcomes of trying to find solutions that can be easily boxed into States. Maybe its time people started looking at some of them and asking what precisely is the point of continually glueing these cracked eggs back together. What is the point of Yemen or even Bahrain? Indeed what is the point of modern Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan or even Syria. The Lebanonisation of the Middle East continues…

Andrew@15:
Am I the only one who finds humorous the similarities between the predictions of the neocons regarding freedom and democracy in the Middle East, and the recent calls from the left for more aggressive stances in support thereof?

Probably, since the similarities are all in your head. The Neocons said that if we invaded Afghanistan, this would cause a domino effect creating western-friendly secular democracies from the halls of Montezuma, to the shores of Tripoli, bombs away! Meanwhile, most of the Leftish leaning commentary I’ve read on the Middle East uprisings is that they will produce a wide range of outcomes but so long as they are native born and created from the bottom up, they’ll probably be more stable than the dictators they’re replacing, even if they all turn out to be Islamic Republics who may not be as willing to become proxy states to western corporations . The two outlooks couldn’t be further apart.

But sure, let’s play the false equivalency card. I’m sure creating mildly antagonistic Islamic Republics was just the sort of Democracy PNAC had in mind when they started the Great Middle East Adventure back in 2001.

I think we might do well to keep in mind that Yemen shares most of its border with Saudi Arabia.

Anything destabilizing in Yemen is bound to ricochet into Saudi Arabia, and then we’ll have real problems. It’s not a matter of hypocrisy, it’s the necessity of deferring to the Saudi power, the local power, in view of its security needs.

Seems like Stephen M. Walt thinks neocons and liberal interventionists are quite similar, and that the Libya, Afghanistan and Iraq Wars have a lot in common too.

I don’t quite see how the decision to intervene in Libya requires the US or any other party to intervene in Yemen.

If I donate to Charity X I am not a hypocrite if I then refuse to donate to Charity Y a few days later. I would however be a hypocrite if I went round loudly condemning those who never give to charity while giving to neither.

The action in Libya is being driven by the UK and France, two countries that Gaddafi directed terrorist attacks against. The current Yemeni government has not directed terrorist attacks against any Western power that the decision makers are aware of.

So it is completely consistent for the UK and France to decide to give Gaddafi a slotting without committing to slot anyone else or intervene elsewhere.

The main consideration in this type of attack is not whether the allies can win, its what will come next. In this case there is no possibility that any imaginable government is going to be worse than Gaddafi who has directed considerably more terrorist attacks than Al Qaeda.

There is also a geographic consideration. deposing Gadaffi creates a contiguous block of three newly liberated countries, all of which are situated on the Mediterranean. The EU has already demonstrated its ability to facilitate the transition from dictatorship to democracy. It has done so in Spain, Portugal, Greece and most of the former Warsaw pact countries.

IMO the best outcome for Saudi Arabia would be for the royal family to agree to hand over political power to elected officials and become a ceremonial monarchy, like England’s. But I doubt they’re interested in doing that until they believe the alternative is more like France.

The fact that the country is called Saudi Arabia should tell you all one needs to know about the likelihood of their relinquishing power voluntarily.

(Although I suppose Liechtenstein did become democratic, even if the current Prince had recently achieved a power grab.)

Norwegian Guy @26:

The Neocons would love to take credit for the ongoing Middle Eastern revolutions, since it would both justify their initial cause from 2001 and associate their ideology with grassroots uprisings in general. Anything to wash away the stink of a decade long quagmire they helped create. Letting them get away with this reframing is foolish and dangerous. After they’ve “reshaped the Middle East” you think they’re just going to take their bombs and tanks and go home? Some of them are already looking at North Korea and China and licking their lips.

But relying on dictatorships to provide “stability” has been a recipe for failure, here as elsewhere.”

Well, it doesn’t seem to be working well now but it’s worked pretty well for the last several decades, surely? And it’s not as though the region’s two democracies – Lebanon and Israel – have been terribly good at providing and exporting stability either.

The EU has already demonstrated its ability to facilitate the transition from dictatorship to democracy. It has done so in Spain, Portugal, Greece and most of the former Warsaw pact countries.

Of course, at least part of that was with the promise of eventually joining the EU. Given that the EU has already pretty much told Turkey it’s not going to happen, I can’t imagine they’ll be telling an even more Islamic and even larger population Egypt that they’ll be able to join. (Is there some possibility Tunisia and Libya could be allowed, given that they’re so much smaller, and possibly even have some connections to current EU member Malta? Or is there connection to Malta like Turkey’s connection to Cyprus?)

Keith @22: I was careful to note that there are important and stark differences between the two. But it’s a bit dubious to assert, as you did, that there are NO similarities of importance, isn’t it?

Both view a surge of democracy as the answer to many foreign policy problems. The neocons believed that by using military force to remove repressive regimes, this would allow humanity’s natural instincts to liberty to express themselves, and, somehow, good democratic government would emerge. Liberals, generally, are more circumspect in their advocacy of force, but the underlying belief in democracy as the only natural and legitimate form of government towards which human beings are driven, the beneficial effect its establishment will have upon foreign policy problems, and the supportive role that the US should play, is there.

I suppose I’m simply feeling a little more cautious as to whether revolts under the banner of democracy would actually result in democracies in either Bahrain or Yemen, much less as to whether those democracies would result in less repressive policies or less suffering.

I agree John, but I find particularly interesting the aspects of similarity that go beyond legitimacy. Both come with the same essential package of beliefs as to how democracy will work (well), how it will come to exist (by natural impulse), and what the effects will be (beneficial).

I would contrast this view, held by neocons and many liberals alike, with that held – in my impression – by realists of various stripes, who are more dubious of the notion that democratic mechanisms in any given country, at any point in time, will lead to better outcomes both domestically and internationally. I don’t think this skepticism is logically implied by realism, but given the emphases of realism it’s not surprising either.

I think the package of beliefs held by neocons and liberals explains why, for many, there is a presumption in favor of revolutions or movements to overthrow authoritarian governments, even when our knowledge concerning the outcome or the opposition is minimal; neocons and liberals think that not only is democracy the right form of government, but is also the one that will lead to the most good. The presumption in favor is not just moral, but also prudential.

I believe that the Obama Administration is simply less ideological than the Bush Administration – less taken by the package of beliefs described above – and so much more cautious in lending support to any particular movement or revolution beyond the usual admonitions for governments to better behave themselves.

However, I do think the Obama Administration contains strong proponents of humanitarian interventionism, which best explains the somewhat stumbling entrance of Western military efforts in Libya.

This ideological caution, on the one hand, and this humanitarian interventionism on the other, explain in part the differences in treatment that Libya has received in comparison to Yemen, or Bahrain. And I think this in part resolves what might seem to be, from a principled vantage, inconsistent treatments of those situations – provided that one agrees that the humanitarian abuses in Libya were much worse, and had the potential to get far worse, than those in Yemen or Bahrain.

It also looks like your reading of the future of Saleh in Yemen may prove accurate, though I can’t tell whether the military is split. For your next trick, though, can you tell us the future of Yemen and General Ali Mohsin al-Amar?

“Saudi Arabia is a non-constitutional monarchy, which is to say, a dictatorship. If tenure isn’t legitimacy for Mubarak or Gaddafi (or for that matter Castro or the Kims or many other examples), it can’t be for the House of Saud, either.”

This is silly. There is no law forbidding people to live under a dictatorship. If the population of Saudi Arabia is reasonably content with their form of government, then what basis would the U.S. have for opposing it?

Or pragmatically, if the oppressed population itself isn’t interested in rising up and seeking regime change, what business — or chance of success — does an outside power have in intervening?

Does “liberal interventionists” include people who think we should avoid giving weapons and support to dictatorships because they tend to be unstable?

One thing not often mentioned, [including here], is the fact of Libya’s resistance being armed. Could this [non-mentioning] be because the US had already intervened in Libya by providing arms and training? Wouldn’t be the first time ‘we’ have played both ends against the middle, would it?

John, I was thinking of a report I’d seen about previous (since the ’80’s) covert aid that obviously did not remain covert. I’ve searched and cannot find the report I saw. It IS remarkable that, in the one country with a sizable amount of o-i-l there is mounted the only armed uprising, and that it immediately captures oilfields.

There is much speculation on the far left, far libertarian,and the far right, re: who the Libyan rebels are; ( I suppose this should have been posted at the ‘humanitarian intervention’ thread. I’ve succumbed to comment creep!)
“Covert US military support most likely underway from the beginning. ”
by Tony Cartalucci
It turns out, according to the Library of Congress Federal Research Division archives, that Sahad’s NFSL [National Front for the Salvation of Libya] had attempted to violently overthrow Qaddafi in 1984. The Library of Congress document goes on to explain that “according to various sources, the United States Central Intelligence Agency [CIA] trained and supported” NFSL before and after the failed coup.
http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2011/02/us-libyan-intervention.html

And:
“It remains a mystery of the uprising why the estimated 6,000 troops, whose defection led to the rebels seizing eastern Libya, have not been seen in the front line. Their commanders are not united and appear to be hedging their bets by staying out of the fighting.” –Patrick Coburn at Counterpunch: http://www.counterpunch.org/patrick03142011.html

And:
“The revolt is being led, in part, by Royalists and Islamic Fundamentalists and I don’t see them crying for ‘democracy’….
Was this revolt spontaneous? Then explain to me how, on the very first day, there were thousands of flags from the Monarchy on the streets of Benghazi?”
George Kazolias at Counterpunch:
http://www.counterpunch.org/kazolias03222011.html

Interesting. Source?