How the US and UK helped bring jihadists like Salem Abedi to Libya and Syria
A secret 2008 US embassy cable described Qaddafi’s government as a bulwark against the spread of Islamist militancy. “Libya has been a strong partner in the war against terrorism and cooperation in liaison channels is excellent,” the cable read. “Muammar al-Qadhafi’s criticism of Saudi Arabia for perceived support of Wahabi extremism, a source of continuing Libya-Saudi tension, reflects broader Libyan concern about the threat of extremism. Worried that fighters returning from Afghanistan and Iraq could destabilize the regime, the [government of Libya] has aggressive pursued operations to disrupt foreign fighter flows, including more stringent monitoring of air/land ports of entry, and blunt the ideological appeal of radical Islam.”
The author of that cable was the late foreign service officer, J. Christopher Stevens.
A rogue former officer of Britain’s MI5 intelligence services named David Shayler alleged that his government had covertly funded the LIFG [Libyan Islamic Fighting Group] to carry out the failed 1996 assassination attempt on Qaddafi. Two years later, Libyan state television produced footage of a failed grenade attack on Qaddafi that it alleged was carried out by a British agent. At the time, the LIFG was an affiliate of Al Qaeda whose members included Anas al-Libi, a top lieutenant of Osama bin Laden.
When the Libyan uprising broke out in March 2011, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates immediately pumped arms and logistical support into the armed opposition. Then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton saw the insurgency as an opportunity for America to assert its influence amidst the tumult of the Arab Spring. She advocated arming the rebels on the grounds that Washington could get “skin in the game,” according to her Middle East advisor, Dennis Ross.
Ignoring warnings from NATO’s supreme allied commander Adm. James Stavridis about the presence of Al Qaeda in the opposition, President Barack Obama approved shipments of TOW missiles, armored Humvees, and advanced radar systems to the Libyan insurgents.
I read Qaddafi's Green Book many years ago and agreed with everything in it. The West said it was propaganda, as if the West doesn't do propaganda. I'm not into backing dictators, most are brutal, but the Libyans had the highest standard of living in Africa; they had free education; low cost public banking; help buying their homes and starting their businesses; so did they really want him removed?
The West always wanted him gone and so they backed Jihad Islam to oust him. The Jihadists always hated his secular regime, just as they do in Syria. The West backs Jihadists dictatorships and the Russians back moderate and secular regimes. So who's the bad guy? The ME is now a complete mess, millions of lives ruined, and now they are going to do the same to Iran.
They say Qaddafi run a brutal regime, but the CIA and he Jihadists always wanted him out, so he had to have a strong Intelligence. Left alone, Libya may have progressed to a liberal democracy. But what does democracy mean in the West anyway: it usually means being a vassal state of the US where democracy is a sham. When we voted for New Labour and when Americans voted for Trump, they got the same old hidden government back in.
Opening up a country to democracy and free markets just means privatising everything so the Western elite can buy it all up. They can use Western banks, which create money out of nothing, to buy up the world. This isn't capitalism, this a small group of people controlling the planet. If the Chinese get better at it, because they have a superior banking system and realise the importance of industry to create wealth, you can bet the Western elite won't like capitalism much anymore. They will demand that China becomes more 'democratic'' - as if the US is democratic - and open up its markets so the West can buy up everything.
In the UK the Royal Mail got privatised and now the elite can make a packet. But they want the NHS too. Haven't they got enough billions already, what do they want more for? But they want all of Russia's and China's wealth too, and everything in South America and the ME even if that means destroying those countries. Greg Palest has apparently caught one of the Koch brothers on tape saying - when he was cheating the native Indians out of their oil by stating that the tankers which sucked up the oil were smaller than they were - 'I want everything, I want it all'.
