Something that stands out to me about Ghadaffi

[JohnnyRingo]

All day I've been hearing about "Colonel Ghadaffi". I thought about that, and considering that as a dictator, why is he a mere colonel? He obviously could assign himself any rank from 12 star general to absolute supreme leader of the Libyan army, so why the lowly position?

One theory I came up with is that if anything goes wrong, he has someone to blame. He can send a general to a firing squad saying "I'm just a colonel, you should have known better"? Apparently Sgt Ghadaffi just doesn't have the pizzazz.

Any other ideas?

[tabatha]

1. Apparently he has already said that he is not the leader.

In a speech to the nation Tuesday, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi said that he was "a leader of a revolution not a president who steps down, and revolution means a life long sacrifice that only ends in death."


"Libya will continue to lead Africa, Libya will lead the world. I am a Bedouin warrior who brought glory to Libyans," he added. (Roee Nahmias and News agencies)

[David__77]

2. Not at all. He never wanted to be formally "military dictator."

It was a politically wise move to obscure the real power relations. The smartest unelected leaders obscure their formal role, like Deng Xiaoping, for instance. The formal reason in Libya's case was that "the people" exercise all power through the basic people's committees, and that there is no role for individual powerful leaders in state affairs.

[stockholmer]

3. Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings of Ghana,as well, I think because both took power in military coups

so they wanted to keep up the rough and tumble 'revolutionary' facade

http://www.jjrawlings.info/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Rawlings

[Old and In the Way]

4. I always assumed that was his last rank in the military before he overthrew the last government.

It must be a bit odd for a general to have to pledge allegiance to a colonel, though.

[BOG PERSON]

5. colonels' coups are supposed to have a nationalist-egalitarian aspect

for example, the coup staged by the free officers movement in egypt, led by a certain colonel gamal abdel nasser.