Humanitarian Wars, Preventative Warsand the Libyan War of Intervention

The NATO bombing of Libya has resulted in more than 100 civilian deaths, dozens of injuries and thousands of displaced families. This humanitarian crisis worsens every minute after the opening of the air theater of operations (no fly zone) from the 1973 resolution by the United Nations’ Security Council.

The allegations from the multilateral institution are focused on the internal situation of the North African country, following the social protests against Gadhafi’s regimen and the repression unleashed by loyal troops against the opposition. Imperial nations urged the world to intervene in order to avoid “a humanitarian catastrophe” that they themselves have made worse. They massacre civilians, destroy logistics and military forces of the Libyan regime, threaten the water supply for 70 percent of the population and assassinate the rebels — the same ones they claim to support — with bombs.

The U.S. military and its allies have interfered in the path to overthrow Gadhafi: to neutralize, disband and disarm the rebel opposition; and, as a second step, to impose a transitional government (that they could trust) and begin the expensive reconstruction of the conquest.

The current Security Council’s arguments reissue the matrix used in the 1999 military intervention of what was the former Yugoslavia, its subsequent balkanization, national destruction and distribution of its riches to other countries. The process of destruction/depopulation and reconstruction/repopulation in this Eastern European zone, which began with the deployment of at least 1,000 manned aircraft from Italy and the Adriatic sea and with 15,000 systematic attacks, was called a “Humanitarian War,” a linguistic code within “the art of destruction” of the Clinton administration that concealed the horror suffered by the civilian population. Thousands of people died of hunger while others waited to be killed by NATO bombs or by the KLA (Kosovo Liberation Army) paramilitary troops, while Washington applauded the operations as “effective strategic targets.”

At that time, the powerful nations of NATO affirmed that this was a “humanitarian effort” to stop the repression of Albanians in Kosovo. And today in the case of the escalated conflict in Libya, we again hear these type of phrases like the ones by Dennis Ross, advisor to President Barack Obama, who recently declared that if Gadhafi’s loyal forces arrived in Benghazi, the stronghold of the Libyan rebels, there would be a massacre, and “everyone would blame us for it,” and the least that can be done is “intervene to avoid it”* — of course, with predictable collateral damage to innocent families.

This new war of intervention incorporates other elements known in official rhetoric of the imperial lords. For example, “humanitarian operations” represents a “preventative war” that anticipates attacks with heavy artillery, more than 74 bombings in one week alone, in order to neutralize the enemy deployment, corner it and generate “shock and awe” tactics that will paralyze the enemy. The idea, to anticipate the use of force before the other does anything, is more a war of advancement and less a preventative war against Libya.

The “preventative war” as a geo-military strategy was first used by the George W. Bush administration in the invasions of Afghanistan and, later, of Iraq. The attacks were meant to “surprise” al-Qaida before it could carry out more terrorist attacks like the Sept. 11 attacks in New York and before Saddam Hussein could use his non-existent nuclear weapons. Through media discourse the two “enemies of freedom” were described as disruptors of world peace and allies of international terrorists. This allowed urgent “preventative actions.” The argument for war was built on the pretext for future actions against Western civilization.

With this concept, real or imaginary enemies were identified, and the United States was given free rein to use its death machinery to intervene in any part of the world with or without the consent of the U.N., and with or without the accompaniment of NATO.

The Secretary of Defense at the time, the despicable Donald Rumsfeld, declared that “defending the U.S. requires prevention, self-defense and sometimes preemption … In some cases, the only defense is a good offense.” These phrases marked the beginning of a policy shift toward new predatory wars with the same goals as always: arms trade with economic, political, geopolitical and military dividends.

The record constructed against Gadhafi dates back to the 8’0s, and Washington keeps him in the “unreliable” category, even though the Colonel has distanced himself from his independent policy of the ‘80s and recently has permitted European nations access to its highly coveted oil supplies.

During Reagan’s presidency, the Libyan regime was identified as a promoter of terrorism. Libya was designated as a principal agent of the Soviet inspired terrorist network. In 1981, it was leaked to the press that the U.S. had a CIA plan to overthrow Gadhafi with a terror-based military campaign in the interior of the African country. In 1986, Tripoli was bombed using the “legal” argument that the violence against “the perpetrators of violence” is justified as an act of self defense. The U.S. bombings were justified “to prevent an attack,” an attack that could have been seen as a form of self defense rather than an act of retaliation, and in this case the media was strategically used to yield favorable results and was effective in swaying the international public opinion.

In reality, the war of intervention has already started in Libya. We predict catastrophic results: thousands of displaced peoples, orphaned children, killed civilians, famine and a broken country. Other consequences include the advent of the paramilitary, mafia warlords that proliferate with the trafficking of drugs and weapons, private military companies and reconstruction companies. All of this as a corollary to the warmongering politics of the Empire. A completely criminal institution.

Private companies involved in the war are already producing designs. The company Executive Outcomes — whose origins are in Apartheid-era South Africa and who has as a history of horror in Sub-Saharan Africa, Sierra Leon and Angola — waits for contracts for security, military training, ground work and satellite intelligence systems in the Libyan territory. Every mafia offshoot plans its future actions.

Just like during critical moments of the invasions in Afghanistan and Iraq, the people of the world should demonstrate against the bombings of Libya. If, like in previous demonstrations, millions join in the streets, today becomes essential in achieving better levels of organization and peaceful demonstrations against the barbarity of one of the more visible and frightening faces of the capitalist system from which we suffer. Every act or peaceful action during these times is anti-capitalistic.

*Editor’s note: The above quotes, properly translated, could not be verified.