Could Gaddafi Still Win...?

Reaganite Republican ^ | February 28, 2011 | Reaganite Republican

[Reaganite Republican]

Perhaps the better question is: 

"can rag-tag rebels take Tripoli anytime soon?"

He's lost 3/4 of Libyan territory... army desertions rampant... international community now attempting to employ the stage-hook... so how's the 'mad dog of the Middle East'
still hanging on? 

First, there's a real reason the Libyan Army can't solve this all as cleanly as was done in Egypt: distrusting military officers like himself who possess the desire -and ability- to stage coups,
Col Gaddafi long ago emasculated his own army, rendering them largely unable to topple him.  They possess the oldest weapons, have limited intelligence capabilities, and number a mere 50,000 men. This brings the dawning realization of what Gaddafi meant last week by "this is not Egypt, this is not Tunisia." 

And while many have been encouraged by pictures of soldiers joining up with the protesters, defections to this point have been along tribal lines- not something entirely unexpected. The fact is that there's simply no unitary, disciplined military force in Libya today with the ablity to quickly push Gaddafi aside...

The Air Force is a bit more impressive and loyal than the ground troops, and outside of a couple well-publicized defections, most of them have shown no compunction whatsoever in buzzing, bombing, strafing civilian protesters on the orders of the Brotherly Leader and Guide of the Revolution (brothers can be cruel... but this is something else).

And Col Gaddafi has clearly been planning for this eventuality for decades... all the pieces are in place: support now comes from fiercely loyal militias and armed "revolutionary committees" who are -as the last line of defense- sworn to Gaddafi and/or his sons personally, as well as co-opted tribes and black African mercenaries. All these parties have a large personal stake in the outcome and are willing to kill almost anyone to protect it. Contrary to popular opinion, this motivation also applies to the foreign fighters... there's surely little good waiting for them back in Chad. 

At the vanguard of pro-Gaddafi forces is 5th son Khamis Gaddafi and his crack special forces unit, one that's already played a large part in putting down unrest in the capitol- and in the most ruthless fashion imaginable. Khamis Gaddafi is cut from a different cloth from his international playboy brothers, was trained at a top Russian military academy, and is the one who hired the black African mercenaries who really don't mind shooting Libyans... unlike the the army regulars. Loyalist forces have already shown they'll waste whoever they need to to keep Gaddafi in power.

Alas, Moammar Gaddafi himself has got little to lose at this point: after unleashing air power and even naval shelling upon protesters, he surely faces war crimes charges at The Hague... provided that he even makes it out of the country alive. It's now down to kill or be killed... a no-brainer for a bloodthirsty megalomaniac like this one. 

Both the old man and his son/spokesman Saif al-Islam have stated publicly that they'll fight to the death, with "rivers of blood", etc.- and I believe them. How much of the country they drag into the abyss -or if Gaddafi manages to turn the tide- is most of what remains in doubt. 

Actually, some experts see Gadaffi already winning. And if not, he'll arm allied tribes if he has to... likely leading to a bloody civil war. Seems logical to expect some sort of Gaddafi military offensive in the coming week, before any aid reaches the rebellious east.

And hey, it's not like he doesn't have any friends left... Farrakhan says they're "still cool".

On the rebel side, things have gone quite well to this point, and they've even been pledged US support over the weekend. What a shame it is for that the kiss-of-death has arrived in the form of an Obama endorsement. I sure hope they're not aware of the implications in that- guy sure knows how to pick a loser....

International Business Times  Michelle Malkin  The Daily Caller   

Kenya News   Weasel Zippers   The Telegraph (UK)   Aljezeera
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[sinsofsolarempirefan]

I can’t see how he can possibly survive. Most of the country has fallen to anti-Gaddafi forces, and they’re putting the squeeze on Tripoli itself. Most Libyans have now come out so comprehensively against him that I just don’t see how he could go on the offensive and crush the opposition at this point.

In addition, he has become a complete pariah and pretty much the whole world (with perhaps the exception of the mighty nation of Zimbabwe, lol) has hung him out to dry. Many of his former cronies have defected, and only he, his family and his most die-hard supporters have any stake left in him winning. There is almost nobody, in Libya or without that would gain an advantage in seeing him regain control of Libya. The world has to support the rebels now because if he did regain control of the situation, this lunatic would be seriously pissed off at the world and would go back to being a NK style pariah state.
It is clearly and unambiguously in the interests of the whole world, not just the Libyans, that this clown goes down, ASAP...

[4rcane]

the problem with Obama’s endorsement is that he never back up his words with actual help.

[Reaganite Republican]

Your points are valid... but he ain’t stepping down, they’ll have to kill him, imho

[cripplecreek]

Personally I think his side can win without his survival. In other words its a civil war that doesn’t require his survival to continue.

[montanajoe]

I've always felt he was likely to survive unless someone in his inner circle takes him out, which in my view is unlikely. He will ruthlessly defeat any attempt by the rebels to take Tripoli and then over the next months will go after each and every one of the protester's in the country and eliminate them and anyone that knows them. Its going to be very ugly..

[sinsofsolarempirefan]

Hitler wasn’t stepping down either. But there wasn’t any hope of him winning towards the end either. One of his former closest friends said that he would be like Hitler and kill himself in his bunker.

I think that shortly, we will be hearing news of his suicide or well-deserved lynching. This guy has no friends, nowhere to go, nowhere to run and in any case he is too deluded to have done the sensible thing even when it wasn’t too late to do so...

[katana]

If Egypt looked like Obama’s Iran this is beginning to look like his Rwanda. He’s twice the incompetent and accomplice in genocide as his democrat predecessors, and in only two years!

[Reaganite Republican]

Hitler was surrounded by the US, British, and Soviet armies... Gaddafi is surrounded by tribal enemies with small arms and a couple tanks

And imo NO WAY he steps down, never

[K-Stater]

And hey, it's not like he doesn't have any friends left... Farrakhan says they're "still cool".

To paraphrase another tyrant, how many divisions does Farrakhan have?

Qadaffi is not going to survive this one.

[PapaBear3625]

Beware the man with nothing to lose.

He's going to either win or die. He's already gone too far for any other result. He's ensured that his air force and the tribes allied to him are in the same position: win or die, and the longer the conflict continues, the less likelihood there is of any settlement short of complete victory or extermination for them.

The final move will be to arm his loyal tribes and have them attack the rebels.

[montanajoe]

This is not about Obama its about Gadaffi. There is nothing any US president could do short of a Iraq style invasion to influence the coming events in Libya. Which would be impossible because if anything is hated more than Kadaffi in Libya it is the USA

[PapaBear3625]

It is clearly and unambiguously in the interests of the whole world, not just the Libyans, that this clown goes down, ASAP...

I wouldn't be too sure of that. Remember that Iran's Shah was replaced by the Mullahs, the Tzar by the Bolsheviks, France's King by the Terror.

Will you be happy next year upon finding out that Daffy's replacement is al-Queda?

[samtheman]

How many mercenaries are there? How well-disciplined are they? What kind of military power do they represent? Are they essentially a large gang of armed thugs or are they a military force that could spearhead a real advance into rebel-held territories?

[sinsofsolarempirefan]

I seriously doubt that will happen. Libyans aren’t Islamic fundamentalists on the whole, and they wouldn’t have enough support to take control of Libya.
The fact is that now what has happened has happened, Gaddafi is alienated from the rest of the world, so it is very important that he does not regain control, because if he did, in defiance of the rest of the world, he would start supporting terrorists and start developing WMDs again, like he was in the 1980s. In the unlikely event that he would actually manage to succeed in being able to crush this rebellion, we would need to take him out for our own sakes...

[katana]

I absolutely agree. Just referring to the image the incompetence and faulty timing projects for him personally and politically. Libya may end up looking more like the Spanish Civil War with Qadafi as Franco and Benghazi as Guernica.

[Reaganite Republican]

My real point is Obama is dreaming if he thinks Gaddafi is stepping down because he told him too- he knows that smiley plastic mannequin isn’t going to do anything

Kill or be killed now- he painted himself into a corner with the massacres and will now fight to the end imho

[sinsofsolarempirefan]

I think you are underestimating the forces ranged against Gaddafi. He’s completely lost the eastern portion of the country, and rebel forces are already in posession of territory very close to the capital. Army, Navy and Air force units have defected to the rebel cause, and I’m sure that the SAS, SBS assets that we already know are on the ground (along with other nation’s SFs no doubt) are probably going to be working with the rebels to formulate a plan to make the final push.
Nobody outside Libya is helping Gaddafy, not even his own diplomats, the only people who are actually likely to be getting any outside assistance are the rebels themselves because because most countries have dropped Gaddafy like a heavy sack of s**t, and we are all much more invested in wanting to see the rebels win. Combined with the embargo that is now being enforced on Tripoli, I would think that it is the rebels who have the advantage of being able to call on outside assistance and supplies, not what is left of Gaddafy’s regime. This is a role reversal in what is usually the case with tyrannical governments dealing with rebel insurrections..

[Reaganite Republican]

Entirely possible IMO... I don’t think the rebels will take Tripoli anytime soon

[montanajoe]

You are right about it looking like the Spanish civil war except this time it will be Islam's mercenaries pouring in instead of westerners