Qaddafi and Assad. Those guys have many things in common, one of which is: These guys are extremely secularist. So were Saddam. You probably can't find any more secularist than these guys in the ME. They're well educated, positivist and secularists. These guys have one more thing in common, too. They were all supported by the Soviets. As we know, NATO cleared the Russian influence on Balkans in the 90's, It seems that it's now time for the ME. After the Arab spring, probably Islamist governments will rise in those countries, but probably not have an issue with the US. Politics is fun.
As far as I know, Gaddafi graduated from a millitary academy. Actually their secularist and positivist behaviour is what I wanted to stress. Forget about education. They might well had been self educated.
He didn't .. that is pure invention.. Khadafi was a bedouin boy. Years later he claimed he went to Sandhurst. Khadafi was delusional all his life.. Look at his decisions in 1969 and 1970.
Maybe. One thing is clear though, this thread is not meant to glorify Qaddafi. It's super obvious that he has some mental difficulties. But you got my point right?
My family was living in Tripoli when Khadafi ousted Idris.. My father's job was to report to the oil company. My father said he was an impetuous loon and would be a problem for Libya and everyone else. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muammar_Gaddafi
Well... IMO there is a difference between a secular dictator and a devout Muslim who is a cautious reformer. I think the second is far more thoughtful and benevolent.. and successful over the long run.
Sure. Being secular doesn't make you automatically a good guy. I don't portray them as good guys at all. The thing is NATO now helps Islamists to crush secularist governments there. This is still a (*)(*)(*)(*) resolution of old cold war blocks. The God of dictators is the king of Saudi Arabia. But he sided with the US in the cold war. Lucky him!
I have trouble with the word Islamist.. I am never quite sure what that means. As for King Abdullah.. he is a fine man and a kind one.. The SAG sided with the US LONG before the Cold War. Why do you think Saudi Arabia has been stable and made steady progress since 1940?
The US declared the war on terror, just to use their terms. I don't know if it was a good idea to intervene in Iraq and in Libya, time will show.
No, I'm not seeing that at all. Things were much more complicated in that regions. The relationships there seemed to be more along the lines of "the enemy of my enemy is...also probably my enemy as well, but I'll send him a pile of weapons for now. " Saddam's situation was like that, where the USSR and NATO countries were simultaniously sending military aid. A bizzare situation given the cold war, but it seems rather like both the USSR and NATO felt both Iraq and Iran were led by dangerous psycopaths, and we didn't want to see either double in size or gain in strength. I think we're still reigning in dangerous psycopaths over there, as opposed to this being anything against Russia. That would be quite nice. However it seems these people had grown up being fed a steady diet of hate against the west so they'd feel they should support their leaders and be good little soldiers. Their leaders had a higher level view of the situation, and could keep them in check when they felt they would benifit by that. However now I worry that they're just going to go nuts, we're starting to see bits of that. Still, I'm not giving up hope on them just yet.
