Thursday, February 19, 2015

Obama Destroyed Libya

Source: Ted Rall, Guest Post

What he did to Libya is as bad as what Bush did to Iraq and Afghanistan. He doesn't deserve a historical pass.
When Obama took office in 2009, Libya was under the clutches of longtime dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. But things were looking up.
Bush and Gaddafi had cut a deal to lift Western trade sanctions in exchange for Libya acknowledging and paying restitution for its role in the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. In a rare triumph for Bush, Libya also agreed to give up its nuclear weapons research program. Libyan and Western analysts anticipated that Gaddafi's dictatorship would be forced to accept liberal reforms, perhaps even free elections and rival political parties, in order to attract Western investment.
Libya in 2009 was prosperous. As citizens of a major oil- and natural gas-exporting nation, Libyans enjoyed high salaries, low living expenses, generous social benefits, not to mention law and order. It seems like a mirage today.
Looking back, many Libyans miss their former tyrant. "Muammar Gaddafi inherited one of the poorest nations in Africa," notes Garikai Chengu of the Du Bois Institute for African Research at Harvard University. "However, by the time he was assassinated, Libya was unquestionably Africa's most prosperous nation. Libya had the highest GDP per capita and life expectancy in Africa and less people lived below the poverty line than in the Netherlands."

No comments:

Post a Comment