Who exactly are the Libyan rebels? Do we have any clue who exactly we're trying to help here?

[spooked911]

Or is it just that they are not Ghaddafi? I've found precious little on them. Are they even Libyans?

Any info is welcome. Thanks.

[arcane1]

1. Don't ask me

I have no freakin' clue who they are.

[Name removed]

38. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[L. Coyote]

52. Perhaps Osama bin Laden and his friends, but you are the first to ask.

Don't bring up details when we have an evil dictator to eradicate.

[CJCRANE]

2. My guess is that they're just people who want democratic rights

just like the protesters in Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen etc etc.

[The_Casual_Observer]

6. That pretty optimistic considering what little is known about that

region.

[CJCRANE]

8. We know what happened in neighboring countries like Tunisia and Egypt

and is happening in Bahrain and Yemen.

These people are tired of One Party States and want more freedom.

[The_Casual_Observer]

14. I don't think we can begin to make any conclusions about any of these places

yet.

[CJCRANE]

21. Why shouldn't they have a voice?

What's wrong with people asking for freedom of speech and the right to vote in free elections?

[WingDinger]

3. OBL the next?

[Ohio Joe]

4. I believe they are...

The peaceful protesters that MK decided to start slaughtering.

[spooked911]

7. except they are armed and are based away from the capital

which is different from the other protests

[Ohio Joe]

9. They are all over Libya

I suggest you do some in depth reading of joshcryer's (sp?) "Libyan Revolution" posts. They will tell you a lot, josh has been covering the whole thing extensively and with plenty of links.

[Shiver]

16. They didn't start armed.

They began as protesters. They didn't become armed until they were first attacked by Gaddafi's forces. I can't provide the links to back this up, although you can probably find it in the Libya Revolution threads, but as I understand it they became armed after some of the army defected and opened the weapons depots to them.

[spooked911]

31. thanks

I just was having trouble finding the info though I am finding it now

Wiki have some decent info
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Libyan_uprising#Anti-Gaddafi_movement

[Adsos Letter]

5. That's one of the Million Dollar Questions in this whole thing.

I believe they are probably mostly Libyan citizens (no link, just what I've gathered from AJE, etc., and I could well be wrong). But there have been reports that Eastern Libya is home to various jihadi elements. No link (I know it has been discussed on DU) and I have no hard evidence to support the assertion, although I believe I have seen reports on it somewhere (not helpful, I know).

Edit: spelling... :dunce:

[David__77]

10. There are many groups in opposition.

They are heterogeneous in character:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libyan_Islamic_Fighting_Group
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Conference_for_the_Libyan_Opposition

There are Islamists, liberal-conservatives, a few royalists, and so forth. It spans the political spectrum. The question "who are the rebels" is an important one, but so is the question "what are our objectives?" Are our objectives to facilitate regime change, or to minimize deaths? The two goals are not identical necessarily.

[Adsos Letter]

15. You've stated it clearly; and the objectives question is one that is causing

my initial support to grow shakier. It seems as though there is confusion on this point now, which can lead to all types of unwanted consequences.

I think the question of who composes the revolutionaries is important in the sense of what the country will develop into when this is fully played out.

[CJCRANE]

18. The arab protesters in general want democracy

so if they get it their countries will develop into whatever they vote for.

Just like any country there will be a mixture of liberals and conservatives, moderates and fundamentalists.

That's democracy: it's messy, and doesn't always work the way you want it to, but everyone gets a voice.

[Adsos Letter]

19. I agree; I really hope they get it. I just wonder what it will look like.

[David__77]

28. How do we know? And what is "democracy?"

This is a poster of the opposition, condemning Gaddafi for allegedly being "Jewish." I am not saying all rebels would support this sort of racism, but many do. Is that "democratic," or is democracy merely equal to majority rule, with no rights for the minority? If democracy is being understood as anything recognizable to a Westerner, I would not expect to see democracy in Libya.

[CJCRANE]

Some teabaggers compare Obama to Hitler

others burn Korans and still others are antisemitic.

So what? That's democracy. There are unpalatable people everywhere.

I don't understand this meme that somehow the protesters are monolithic. Their opinions will be just as varied as any other country.

[David__77]

37. I agree with you.

Libyan people should hash this out. I do not think Libya should be forced to be Western-oriented.

[tabatha]

11. According to this video of Benghazi

they are doctors, lawyers, truck drivers, etc, etc - all kinds of citizens

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0vChMDuNd0

Mo, the person from Benghazi, who created his own live internet show, was an engineer who studied at Oxford.

Just normal people sick of brutality.

[in_cog_ni_to]

12. No one really knows for sure, but Hillary Clinton met with 2 leaders

who had organized the protests. (This is all info I got from some Mideast terrorism "expert" who was on MSNBC the other night). Supposedly, they are a secular group and separated from Al Qaeda because their beliefs differed from the radical Al Qaeda group. However, Al Qaeda factions ARE still in a small section of Libya (I don't remember where that is). The man also said that Al Qaeda likes to move in when there's an opening to do so and IF they tried to do that after the NFZ is established, the Coalition would be on them like flies on (you know what) shit."

So, I don't believe they are Al Qaeda, but I still do NOT agree with spending OUR MONEY that we do not have, to get involved in another war.

[kenny blankenship]

13. Who EXACTLY was the French Resistance?

I hear a lot them wuz Commies.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

25. Or, the Confederate Army?

[kenny blankenship]

26. But they were very easily known. They had a clear leadership with very clearly abhorrent goals.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

36. How about the Contras? UNITA? Or, the Freedom Fighters in Afghanistan?

They had clear clear leadership with very clearly abhorrent goals.

[kenny blankenship]

46. You're right of course. Libya IS Nicaragua. Libya is Angola -AND- Afghanistan in the 1970s and 80s

Libya is not Libya at all but those other three places and times, and Libya must not be considered in any way as distinct from those dim historical examples which are not mere precedents but wholly descriptive of the present and any future case.

Thanks for setting me straight. Now I need to see about changing my avatar to a "I heart Gaddafys!" pictogram - anybody got one?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

48. Does that mean that anything that Gaddhafi has done in the past is off the table?

If we're going to judge him by his past actions (aka - "dim historical examples") why not us? American exceptionalism? How many people has Gadhaffi killed over the last 42 years compared to us?

[riderinthestorm]

53. FFS, anyone asking these questions isn't on Gaddafi's side either.

This ASSumption is ridiculous. Fact is, there are some very intelligent reasons to be asking who the rebels are (and who we are basically arming with the most powerful military on the face of the planet!)

[Waiting For Everyman]

17. Here's some info from the Libyan threads joshcryer is doing

Posted last night. This reply and the one under it.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=709976&mesg_id=713524

[spooked911]

22. thanks

[damntexdem]

20. Who exactly are the Libyan people? Do we have any clue who exactly we're trying to help here?

Who exactly are the people of Wisconsin? Do we have any clue who exactly we're trying to help here?

[spooked911]

23. not the same thing and definitely

I have a better understanding of who is protesting in WI than who is fighting in Libya

[Travelman]

24. I wish to hell I knew.

For that matter, I wish to hell anybody knew. I also wish they had known that before we started bombing the place.

[revolutionnow45]

27. Doesn't anyone here read Twitter? See for yourself!

Just keep on listening to the corporate media that has been lying to us since the Bushco started to fucked up wars based on lies.

Next week there will be a puff piece on what a great leader Bush is...but lets all keep on after Obama for helping people who asked not to be slaughtered.

[spooked911]

33. No I don't generally read twitter

there's too much going on in life, much less to follow foreign affairs, and twitter is incomprehensible to someone who doesn't normally go there.

I'm not attacking Obama (over this anyway). I'm just trying to understand the situation better.

[Baclava]

29. Does it matter? We'll arm them this time, then come back and kill them later if need be.

Freedom fighters one day, terrorist enemies the next.


Just keep that war machine turning.

[Distant Observer]

30. Who exactly are the pro-Gaddafi fighters? Do we have any FACTS of just anti-Gaddafi propaganda?

[spooked911]

34. I don't support Gaddafi but I don't trust the mainstream media or the military industrial complex

that is for sure.

[GSLevel9]

32. oh they're folks from an area of the nation

that supplied an unusually large number of terrorists to Al Qaeda to kill Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan.

[spooked911]

35. are you serious or joking?

can't tell, sorry

[GSLevel9]

39. of course it's true...

from Huffington Post yesterday... CIA analyzing AQ documents. Per capita the Eastern half of Libya sent more insurgents to Iraq than any other nation.

[Recursion]

49. Yes, they're the second biggest source of "foreign fighters" after Saudi (nt)

[Waiting For Everyman]

40. Just FYI: Arabs who want secular democracy and Al Quaida HATE, HATE, HATE each other.

That's just as a beginning point for a general understanding of who is against who, and who is friendly to who.

Supporting the Arab Spring protesters is the best way we could discourage terrorist groups in the region.

[Distant Observer]

42. The Libyan rebellion is NOT "Arab Spring" protest. It is a factional struggle rooted

in a long feud between supporters of the Gaddafi revolution and opponents of the revolution based mainly in the Eastern Province (historically known as Cyrenaica). The Easterners have never been able to get the political power they feel they deserve since Gaddafi overthrew King Idris whose political base was Cyrenaica.

[Waiting For Everyman]

45. same as reply to #43

[Distant Observer]

43. Historically, the anti-Gaddafi faction was Islamic and extreme and critisized Gaddafi

for NOT being Islamist and being to pan-African rather than pan-Arabic.

[Waiting For Everyman]

44. "Historical" references have little relevance today, to rebels who are YOUNG.

Read some news about and from the rebels themselves instead of Gaddafi's PR firms' article-writers and think-tankers.

Yes, he has a powerful PR lobby in DC, that's a known fact. Do you really think it is not arranging for US opinion to be swayed? Our suspicions should be focused on that, just as much if not more than any suspicions of the rebels.

[Distant Observer]

51. The current "rebel" leaders are much more 'savvy' in PR than the muribund pro-Gaddafi hacks

Several are Easterners who were highup in the Gaddafi Gov or Gaddafi-supported commercial sector.

But the rebellion is basically regionally and tribally based.

[riderinthestorm]

41. Diane Rehm had an excellent show March 9th about Libya and intervening.

One of the guests Thom Shanker was really informative and says that many of the rebels are hard core Islamists from the East that Gaddafi has been keeping a lid on for decades.

The show is excellent and probably still available in her archives. I highly recommend it, and Thom Shanker who is one of the "good" journos who really know what's going on.

I'm also deeply uneasy that we don't appear to know whose going to take control of the country. Plus our objectives appear to be shifting: regime change, simply enforcing a NFZ, boots on the ground, arms supplies....

Good OP

[Recursion]

47. Many are veterans of the Iraq insurgency

That's why people are leery about arming them.

[spooked911]

54. then there is this:

"Libyan rebellion has radical Islamist fervor: Benghazi link to Islamic militancy:U.S. Military Document Reveals"

http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2011/03/17/libyan-rebellion-has-radical-islamist-fervor-benghazi-link-islamic-militancyus-milit

Well known to the United States policymakers in Obama White House and Clinton State Department along with the National Security Council but not widely known to American mainstream media, the U.S. West Point Military Academy’s Combating Terrorism Center document reveals that Libya sent more fighters to Iraq’s Islamic militancy on a per-capita basis than any other Muslim country, including Saudi Arabia.

Perhaps more alarmingly for Western policymakers, most of the fighters came from eastern Libya, the center of the current uprising against Muammar el-Qaddafi.

The analysis of the Combating Terrorism Center of West Point was based on the records captured by coalition forces in October 2007 in a raid near Sinjar, along Iraq’s Syrian border.

The eastern Libyan city of Darnah sent more fighters to Iraq than any other single city or town, according to the West Point report. It noted that 52 militants came to Iraq from Darnah, a city of just 80,000 people (the second-largest source of fighters was Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, which has a population of more than 4 million).

Benghazi, the capital of Libya’s provisional government declared by the anti-Qaddafi rebels, sent in 21 fighters, again a disproportionate number of the whole.

[JVS]

50. We don't know. We're just placing the most powerful military the world has ever seen at their ...

disposal.

[spooked911]

55. it may be even worse--

http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2011/03/17/libyan-rebellion-has-radical-islamist-fervor-benghazi-link-islamic-militancyus-milit

[spanone]

56. people who are tired of living under the thumb of the almighty colonel

probably folks like you and me