Libya's Pre-1996 History Revisited: Part 3

A Wall Street Journal editorial recently proposed that the Democratic Obama-Clinton Administration consider the option of some kind of “humanitarian military intervention” in Libya in 2011 in response to the recent deadly attacks on demonstrators inside Libya by the current Libyan regime’s security forces. Yet most people in the United States know very little about the hidden history of Libya. Guy Arnold’s 1996 book, The Maverick State: Gaddafi and the New World Order, for example, observed:

“…Critics of Gaddafi, and he has many, tend to portray him unthinkingly as a mercurial, dictatorial figure implying that any benefits the people have received from the revolution are likely to be incidental rather than planned. This is to underestimate not only Gaddafi and his co-revolutionaries who were perfectly genuine in their desire to improve the lot of the Libyan people as a whole but also the need of all political leaders, whether dictators or not, to enjoy a base of popular support for once that is lost their days are numbered…

“…During 1971 the government began to tackle development problems with precise programs. At that time an estimated 72 per cent of the Libyan population was illiterate; the government launched a 15-year program to eliminate illiteracy…

“…A five-year housing plan for 1971-76 set a target of providing 15,000 housing units a year. At the time an estimated 150,000 Libyans were living in sub-standard housing and a further 30,000 to 70,000 were homeless…

“…In the field of housing 3500 medium-range housing units were completed in 1972 and a total of 6650 units altogether.

“These were impressive statistics for a small country with a population then estimated at under 2 million which in the 1950s had been rated as one of the poorest in the world by the United Nations…

“…By 1975 the Libyan people were experiencing better economic conditions than ever before, after six years of rule by the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC). But, as always in such a revolutionary situation, the government now had to cope with its own success in the form of the rising expectations of the people. In January 1976…a decision relating to housing laid down that people earning less than 100 dinars a month would not have to pay rent…

“During 1992 Libya began to suffer as a result of UN sanctions…

“…Despite the complex political pressures which Gaddafi always manages to attract to himself, in economic matters the Libyan people have done reasonably well out of the revolution. Their per capita income is the highest in Africa, while other statistics of well-being are equally impressive: one doctor per 948 persons, one hospital bed per 207, daily calorific (food) intake at 140 per cent the FAO recommended minimum. Overall, the economic achievements of the revolution have been very substantial indeed.

“…Plenty of dissidents have fled the country and as time has passed Gaddafi has become increasingly ruthless with his political opponents…”

Libya's Pre-1996 History Revisited: Part 2

A Wall Street Journal editorial recently proposed that the Democratic Obama-Clinton Administration consider the option of some kind of “humanitarian military intervention” in Libya in 2011 in response to the recent deadly attacks on demonstrators inside Libya by the current Libyan regime’s security forces. Yet most people in the United States know very little about the hidden history of Libya. Guy Arnold’s 1996 book, The Maverick State: Gaddafi and the New World Order, for example, observed:

“During 1971 Gaddafi twice stepped down from office, a tactic he was to employ on a number of occasions thereafter. In January he did so briefly saying he would not run for the office of president but within two days had relented due to `popular pressure’. In September he stood down for three weeks at a time when there was a rift in the Revolutionary Command Council [RCC], some of whose members opposed his rigid attitudes over Islamic purity and pan-Arabism. However, explaining his three-week resignation in a speech delivered at Sabrata on 7 October, he said he had resigned because neither the public nor the bureaucracy had risen to meet the challenges of the revolution…

“On 21 February [1973] Israel shot down a Libyan airliner that had strayed over Sinai. The failure of Egypt to retaliate for such `aggression’ sparked off disturbances in Benghazi leading Gaddafi to call a meeting of the RCC and resign. He then retired to the oasis of Houn in the desert where he spent two months in meditation. On 15 April [1973], the anniversary of the Prophet’s birthday, Gaddafi re-emerged and reversed his resignation…At Zuwara, in a speech that came to be known as the Zuwara Declaration, he said that he had been profoundly disturbed by the unwillingness of the people to make sacrifices for the revolution and argued that the revolution was in danger from lack of Arab solidarity; he attacked both Syria and Egypt for failing to retaliate against Israel for the forcing down of the Libyan Airline flight LM114…

“…At the end of June [1973] to a press conference of Cairo journalists, he said he was giving power to the people to prevent the development of dictatorship or a police state…; then on 4 August [1973] he told students that the transfer of power to the people required a `psychological change’ in outlook…

“The early days of the revolution were marked by both enthusiasm and confusion: over 1000 people were arrested for anti-revolutionary activities including the tearing up of revolutionary posters by members of the Islamic Liberation Party and the Communist Party while some Palestinians complained of victimization during the revolutionary purges…

“During 1978 the implementation of the economic theories in The Green Book was begun. These included one house per family and the consequent takeover by the state of rented property; a limit of 10,000 dinars on personal bank deposits; restrictions upon moving funds overseas; and the takeover by state agencies of almost all production and commerce. These were straightforward moves towards a socialist economic state…

“The small population of Libya and its commensurately large oil wealth have enabled Gaddafi to provide major economic and social improvements for his people in the fields of housing, health, education, employment and social services while still retaining large revenues to pay for his external policies…”

Libya's Pre-1996 History Revisited: Part 1

A Wall Street Journal editorial recently proposed that the Democratic Obama-Clinton Administration consider the option of some kind of “humanitarian military intervention” in Libya in 2011 in response to the recent deadly attacks on anti-government demonstrators inside Libya by the current Libyan regime’s security forces. Yet most people in the United States know very little about the hidden history of Libya. Guy Arnold’s 1996 book, The Maverick State: Gaddafi and the New World Order, for example, observed:

“Despite an outside press that is almost universally hostile, Libyans can count many advances over the quarter century from 1969 to 1994: education which formerly was reserved for the few is universally available and many students are sent abroad for further studies; the country has a fine infrastructure of roads and many Libyans can afford cars; the 1993 average per capita income stood at $6600 (by comparison, the US per capita income was then $24,700 while in Africa, Gabon which is also oil-rich stood at $4050 and South Africa at $2590 although most of the rest of Africa had per capita GNPs well below $1000). There have been huge advances in housing and health, and despite internal press controls and largely sycophantic media, Libyans can follow developments outside their country without difficulty. Many receive Europeans television programs through their satellite dishes and anyone can receive fax or telephone messages from outside while there are few restrictions on travel. Given the range and power of his many opponents outside Libya, Gaddafi’s political survival alone has been a remarkable feat…”

“Gaddafi has been persistently portrayed in the Western media and by leading Western politicians as a dangerous and irresponsible villain…The inescapable conclusion must be that unlike…other enemies of Western involvement in the region, he represents a `soft target’ that can more easily be disciplined. When in April 1986 the United States sent its planes to bomb Tripoli to teach `terrorist’ Gaddafi a lesson (and hopefully to kill him), the exercise demonstrated—both ways—that little on the international scene has changed: the powerful bully the weak to make them come to heel and the weak use pinprick tactics to protest against policies they cannot change…

“Few international figures have ever been treated as though they are such threats to Western interests as has Gaddafi; the question is why?...Perhaps his greatest crime has been his refusal to be `brought in’ by the West and the fact that the nationalism he has espoused including attacks upon Western economic control has provided an example later followed by others…

“The world needs figures to hate and that appears to be especially true for the West as its own values appear less and less certain. Gaddafi fulfills such a role admirably…”

Are Human Rights Watch Inc. Executives Making Big Money From Human Rights Monitoring Industry?

Being an executive at a U.S. power elite foundation-subsidized human rights monitoring NGO in the United States in the 21st-century can apparently be a lucrative gig. Human Rights Watch Inc. Executive Director Kenneth Roth, for example took home an annual salary/total compensation package of $412,607 between July 1, 2008 and June 30, 2009, according to Human Rights Watch Inc.’s form 990 financial filing for 2009. In addition, nine other Human Rights Watch Inc. executives were also given annual salary/total compensation packages that exceeded $167,000 during this same period by the U.S.-based human rights monitoring NGO.

Of the $45 million in foundation “charitable” grants and rich individual donor contributions received by Human Rights Watch Inc. between July 1, 2008 and June 30, 2009, $27 million was spent on just paying the salaries of Human Rights Watch Inc.’s employees; and in 2009, the “non-profit,’ tax-exempt U.S.-based Human Rights Watch Inc. human rights monitoring firm controlled over $122 million in assets—including, apparently, corporate stock in various transnational corporations that exploit working-class human beings in both the United States and foreign countries.

U.S. Government's NED Gave $234,000 To Libyan Opposition Group

Since 2005, the U.S. government's National Endowment for Democracy [NED]has apparently given over $234,200 in grant money to the Libya Human and Political Development Forum group that opposes the current Libyan government. According to the NED website, the NED gave $40,000 to the Libya Human and Political Development Forum in 2005, $54,000 in 2007, $63,400 in 2008 and $76,800 in 2009.

Bahrain & Big Oil's Pre-1962 Special Interests

Harvey O’Connor’s 1962 Monthly Review Press book, World Crisis in Oil, contained the following reference to Bahrain and the transnational oil companies’ special economic interests in Bahrain, prior to 1962:

“In the split-up of the Standard Oil Trust in 1911, the California company inherited the Pacific Coast properties…British fumbling and the energetic intervention of the State Department transformed the California company into one of the partners in the world cartel. It began on the island of Bahrain, lying off the Arabian coast but long claimed by Iran. In 1925 a British group obtained a concession from the ruler which was transferred to an American group two years later. In 1928 Standard of California [now known as Chevron Texaco] appeared as the owner of the concession, to the consternation of the Colonial Office which could only regard this as a form of poaching on Imperial preserves, for the Sheikh’s foreign relations were shepherded from London. At this point the State Department stepped in, and the Colonial Office was obliged by 1930 to concede Standard’s position in Bahrain. While Bahrain’s oil reserves are not considerable, their advantageous location next to deep water eliminated the need for costly inland exploration and pipe lines…

“…In 1880 the [Bahrain] Ruler had declared his dependence on Britain, the better among other things to shield him from the Persians [Iranians] who claimed the island as their own…

“…The Bahrain Petroleum Company (Bapco), a Canadian subsidiary of Standard of California, took over in 1929. It was stipulated that all contacts with the Sheikh must be made through the local Political Agent, that at least one director must be British and persona grata to the Colonial Office, that the chief local representative must be approved by it, and as many employees as possible be British or Bahraini. A concession was signed with the Sheikh, and amended in 1940 to include the entire island and its offshore. In 1932 oil was discovered.

“Bahrain, while not important in itself as an oil producer, with an output of around 15 million barrels a year , proved to be the key to Arabia and its hidden wealth. Standard of California looked across the narrow strait and proceeded to obtain its golden concession from Ibn Saud, by then ruler of Saudi Arabia…

“Bahrain Petroleum Company became a unit in 1936 of the California Texas Oil Corporation (Caltex) when Texaco became a partner with Standard of California in its Bahrain-Arabian enterprises. Minor though Bahrain might be in the Caltex scheme of things, the royalties were soothing to the hitherto impecunious Sheikh. At first he got 14 cents a barrel, later 29 cents, and then in 1952 the 50-50 pattern. From a mere $8,800 in 1933, royalties mounted to $3.3 million in 1950 and to $13 million in 1959…

“Because Bahrain, under the protection of British guns, afforded a safer haven for such a venture, a refinery was built with a capacity of 155,000 b/d to which Arabian oil was piped under the Gulf as the island’s own production was small…

“The company employed Bahrainis as far as possible, but with the development of other oil areas in the Gulf, the trained Bahrainis tended to succumb to the lure of higher wages elsewhere, while their places were taken by Indians, Pakistanis, and Iranians. As in Kuwait, the Sheikh divided his income into three parts, one for himself and his family, one for the sheikhdom, and the rest for investment in London. In a small territory with a population somewhat over 100,000 [prior to 1960], the oil revenues devoted to social needs produced a town with amenities—schools, hospitals, electricity—which have resulted in Manama becoming a kind of resort frequented by foreigners from Arabia and Qatar…

“Bapco was a minor pearl in the crown of Standard of California and Texaco. Capitalized in 1929 at $100,000, by 1947 its earned surplus totaled $55 million. The gladsome profits were made possible by production costs of 25 cents for oil selling then at $1.05-1.15 a barrel. As Bapco was registered as a Canadian company, it paid no income taxes to the Untied States; Caltex as a Bahamian company was likewise exempt.

“The rise of nationalistic pan-Arab feeling has been particularly noteworthy in Bahrain…In 1954 a general strike demanded some measure of political liberty and curbing of the Sheikh’s powers with improvements in public health and education. The 1956 strike was highlighted by demands for the dismissal of the Sheikh’s British adviser, Sir Charles Dalrymple Belgrave, who had imposed censorship on the three Bahrain newspapers. The British reacted swiftly to protect their navel and air bases on Bahrain, by exiling the nationalist leader. He had demanded the enactment of a civil and criminal code (hitherto non-existent), elections and a legislative council, better use of oil royalties, and an end to immigration to leave more jobs for Bahrainis in their own country. Many work in Arabia, Kuwait, and Qatar.

“…The Suez affair in November sparked demonstrations in Bahrain that resulted in the jailing of the nationalist leaders late in the year…

“Although the first of the Arabian oil to be found, Bahrain’s will also be the first exhausted. The 300-million-barrel reserve is expected to last no more than 20 years, barring unexpected discoveries. After that, most of the $15-million annual oil revenues will cease and the Sheikh may have to enact an income tax and cut expenditures. He has stashed away some $20 million in London, yielding some $650,000 a year, so he will not be destitute.

“A sandspit named HMS Jufair is the headquarters of the British Persian Gulf Command…The U.S. Middle East Squadron also has office space on `HMS Jufair’…”

Tariq Ali Speaks In Solidarity With Egyptian People: Feb. 5, 2011

Here's a video of Tariq Ali's recent speech at February 5, 2011 solidarity demonstration in London: