Special Report
Summer 2012
The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
Author(s): James Siebens, Benjamin Case
Published by: THINK International and Human Security
Published: August 2012
Stable URL: http://www.thinkihs.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Siebens-Case-LibyaSReport-2012.pdf
Abstract
The 2011 Libyan Civil War has been widely portrayed as an ideal example of a popular
uprising overthrowing a corrupt dictatorship with the aim of establishing basic human
rights and democracy. The international intervention in the war has been presented as
an ideal model for future humanitarian intervention. This THINK “Special Report”
contextualizes the 2011 Libyan Civil War by outlining the historical conditions that made
such a civil war possible, and even likely, and explains how the intervention of foreign
forces was largely motivated by the political and strategic objective of removing and
replacing the Qaddafi regime. This report finds that the pursuit of democratic reform on
the part of the opposition was far from the only cause of the civil war, and that the
foreign military intervention in Libya may have in fact exacerbated the negative
consequences of the civil war.
The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
Contents
Contents .............................................................................................................................. 2
Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 3 Page | 2
A Brief 5000-Year History of “Libya” (3100 BC – 1969 AD) ................................................ 4
Post-revolution Libya (Libya under Qaddafi) ...................................................................... 7
Domestic Politics ............................................................................................................. 7
Foreign Relations ............................................................................................................ 9
The Libyan Civil War .......................................................................................................... 14
Civil Unrest to Insurrection ........................................................................................... 14
International Intervention ............................................................................................ 16
Aftermath and Consequences .......................................................................................... 22
Power Vacuum .............................................................................................................. 22
Violence, Chaos and Human Rights Abuse ................................................................... 23
“Deep-Seated Racism” .................................................................................................. 24
Economics ..................................................................................................................... 25
Civilian Displacement and Death .................................................................................. 27
Regional Instability ........................................................................................................ 29
Undermining international norms, “R2P” .................................................................... 30
Elections in Libya ........................................................................................................... 33
Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 35
References ........................................................................................................................ 39
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
Introduction
The 2011 Libyan Civil War has been widely portrayed as an ideal example of a popular
uprising overthrowing a corrupt dictatorship with the aim of establishing basic human
rights and democracy. The international intervention in the war has been presented as
an ideal model for future humanitarian intervention – a powerful coalition of
benevolent military powers, interested only in aiding an oppressed population achieve
legitimate aspirations, protecting defenseless civilians without the use of an invasion
force or a lengthy military occupation, and causing a bare minimum of collateral
damage. Both of these notions are gross oversimplifications, and are in many ways
inaccurate.
In reality, there were deep historical, structural, cultural and political factors leading to
the uprising in Libya beyond simply a struggle for freedom and democracy; and the
intervention of foreign forces in the ensuing civil war was the result of complex motives
and longstanding hostilities rather than pure humanitarianism. In short, the 2011 Libyan
Civil War cannot be understood without a thorough examination of the history and
politics of Libya. Likewise, the foreign intervention in that war can only be explained in
the context of the historical relationships between the Libyan state under Muammar
Qaddafi and the other states involved in the conflict.
This THINK “Special Report” contextualizes the 2011 Libyan Civil War by outlining the
historical conditions that made such a civil war possible, and even likely. This report
finds that the pursuit of democratic reform on the part of the opposition was far from
the only cause of the civil war. Rather, the Libyan uprising and subsequent international
intervention were part of Libya’s longue durée in terms of domestic politics and foreign
relations. This report also explains how the intervention of foreign forces was largely
motivated by the political and strategic objective of removing and replacing the Qaddafi
regime. The findings of this report suggest that the foreign military intervention in Libya
may have in fact exacerbated the negative consequences of the civil war, such as civilian
casualties, persistent violence and an ongoing humanitarian crisis by enabling a
disorganized, ill-equipped faction to prevail in the war, and by preventing organic
negotiation or conflict resolution from taking place. The way the intervention was
carried out has also caused significant and potentially lasting harm to stability in the
region, and may have damaged and discredited the developing international norms that
the intervention is purported to have advanced.
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
A Brief 5,000-Year History of “Libya” (3100 BC – 1969 AD)
Inhabitants of what is now Libya are first
mentioned on a pre-dynastic Ancient Egyptian
Page | 4
tablet in 3100 BC, which refers to the Tjehenu
people, believed to be Berbers living in what is now
eastern coastal Libya. Over the next thousand
years there are many Egyptian references to
people living in this region, and by the 11th century
BC, the Egyptians consistently use the name Libu to refer to the African Mediterranean
region west of Egyptian rule, a name that would later turn into the word “Libya.” 1 In 600
BC, Greek colonists settled in this coastal area west of Egypt, and called their territory
Cyrenaica. Two centuries later, Carthage, in what is now Tunisia, established trading
centers in the region to the west of Cyrenaica, known at Tripolitania for its capital city,
Tripoli. After two prolonged wars with the Romans, Carthage was sacked in 146 BC and
Tripolitania became part of Roman North Africa. Tripolitania remained Roman territory
until Germanic Vandals captured the region from Rome in 431 AD, precipitating a
century of instability. In the 6th century AD the Byzantines took control of much of North
Africa, including both Tripolitania and Cyrenaica. 2
[…] for approximately 5,000
years, the history of Libya has
in fact been multiple histories
of diverse peoples and political
entities.
Unhappy with Byzantine rule, repeated Berber rebellions weakened the Byzantine
Empire’s grip on the region and softened its defenses. In 642 AD a powerful Arab army,
spreading Islam from the Middle East across North Africa, besieged and took Cyrenaica,
and conquered Tripolitania the following year. For nearly a millennium to follow, various
groups of Arabs and Berbers controlled Tripolitania and Cyrenaica independently.
During this time Tripolitania’s culture was tied to post-Carthage groups in modern day
Tunisia, while Cyrenaica was primarily influenced by Egypt. Starting in 1551 AD the
Ottomans captured both regions, and an area to the south called Fezzan, and
incorporated all three into the Ottoman Empire. During this time, local leaders in each
of the three regions enjoyed almost full autonomy despite being under Ottoman rule. 3
Largely self-ruling, the state of Tripolitania became known as one of the Barbary States,
North African polities which funded themselves through professional piracy in the
Mediterranean, and later through the tribute other countries would pay to be able to
sail through Barbary waters unmolested. 4 This tribute would eventually lead to the socalled Barbary Wars in which the United States defeated Tripolitania. The Barbary Wars
and subsequent interventions by European powers during the 19th century ended piracy
in the Mediterranean and effectively bankrupted the Barbary States. 5
Italy invaded a still-weakened North Africa in 1911 and took Tripolitania, Cyrenaica and
Fezzan from the Ottoman Empire in 1912. The Italians invested in developing
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
Tripolitania, and enticed many European immigrants to move there. However, in
Benghazi, the capital city of Cyrenaica, a Muslim traditionalist group called the Sennusi
brotherhood organized opposition to Italian rule and led a campaign of political and
violent resistance. The Sennusi cooperated with the British to overthrow the Italians
during WWII in an alliance of convenience that led to the British occupation of Cyrenaica
Page | 5
and Tripolitania after the war, while the French occupied Fezzan. 6
In 1951 the United Nations voted to create an independent country, Libya, out of
Tripolitania, Cyrenaica and Fezzan. The new country was to be governed by King Sayyid
Muhammad Idris bin Muhammad al-Mahdi as-Sennusi (referred to as Idris) but with
self-rule for each of the three provinces. Despite being given de jure rule over the three
territories, King Idris had previously been recognized by the Italians as the Emir of
Cyrenaica, and most of his Sennusi constituents lived around Benghazi. 7 During the first
decade of independence, geographical and cultural differences between the provinces
led to regionalism and rivalry that threatened the unity of the fledgling country. In 1963
King Idris formally abolished the internal borders that separated the competing
provinces, and attempted to solidify his rule over a unified Libya. 8
The King’s popularity was short lived outside of his home territory, and in 1969 a
bloodless military coup deposed the monarch while he was out of the country and
declared Libya a republic. 9 Despite the support King Idris had received from the West,
the United States supported the coup, believing it was popular and sufficiently anticommunist. 10 Muammar Qaddafi, an Army officer, born into the Gaddadfa Bedouin tribe
in the desert outside Serte in eastern Tripolitania, soon emerged as the leader of the
new country. 11
In summary, for approximately 5,000 years, the history of Libya has in fact been multiple
histories of diverse peoples and political entities. At the time of the 2011 civil war, Libya
had only existed as a nominally unified nation for roughly 60 years, i and in reality only
began to achieve any meaningful political unity during the previous 40-50 years since
the internal regional boundaries were officially dissolved and efforts to overcome the
regional political divisions began. The regionalism of the previously existing states of
Tripolitania, Cyrenaica and Fezzan, and the tribalism that predates even those ancient
states, survived both King Idris’ and Colonel Qaddafi’s attempts to forge real national
unity, and remains an important political reality in Libya to this day. The 2011 Libyan
Civil War was as much, if not more, the result of these preexisting regional cleavages
than of any democratic aspirations.
Perhaps the best illustration of this comes from a brief examination of the historical
flags of Libya (see Figure 1). Prior to the creation of the Kingdom of Libya in 1951, the
i
The United Nations recognized Libya as one nation under a single ruler, King Idris, in 1951.
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flag of the Emirate of Cyrenaica (and the Sennusi banner) was all black with a white
moon and star. Upon the founding of the Kingdom of Libya, King Idris, who was
previously Emir of Cyrenaica, established a new flag of the “unified” country; black with
a white moon and star emblem, with a horizontal red bar on top and a green bar on the
bottom – essentially the flag of the Emirate of Cyrenaica with red and green added.
Throughout the civil war, the rebellion that originated in historical Cyrenaica flew the
flag of the former monarchy, which was based on the flag of that same region. The NTC
formally reinstated the flag of the monarchy as the national flag of Libya. 12
Figure 1- Flags of Libya (post-World War II) 13
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
Post-revolution Libya (Libya under Qaddafi)
Domestic Politics
Page | 7
The “Free Officer’s Movement” that launched the coup that deposed the monarchy in
Libya in 1969 formed a directorate, called the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC), to
implement a package of sweeping reforms. The RCC announced its dedication to “the
path of freedom, unity, and social justice, guaranteeing the right of equality to its
citizens, and opening before them the doors of honorable work." 14 The new Libyan
government reassured foreign diplomats by stating that existing treaties and property
rights would be respected, and thus received widespread diplomatic recognition. The
RCC appointed an American-educated prime minister, selected a “Council of Ministers”
to implement the reforms desired by the RCC, and promoted Captain Muammar
Qaddafi to the rank of Colonel, appointing him commander-in-chief of Libya’s military. 15
Following two failed coup attempts (the first led by the minister of defense, the second
led by a cousin of the former king and a clan from Fezzan) the Council of Ministers was
shuffled to include more RCC officers, and Qaddafi was made chairman of the RCC,
minister of defense, and prime minister of Libya. 16 Though Libya continued to be
governed by various legislative and administrative councils - including civilians,
representatives of the military, and technocrats - it quickly became clear that Qaddafi
held the ultimate authority. However, Major Abdel Salam Jallud assumed responsibility
for the actual governing of Libya, serving as deputy prime minister, minister of interior,
and eventually replacing Qaddafi as prime minister in 1972. This allowed Qaddafi to
focus on theorizing about revolution, and planning Libya’s numerous forays into Arab
and African regional politics. 17
Qaddafi was heavily influenced by Arab nationalist and pan-Africanist theories, and
embarked on a series of “socialist” national projects in the new “Libyan Republic.”
Literacy programs, free education through university level, national healthcare, and free
water and electricity programs gave the government substantial early support among
Libyans, most of whom were very poor and undereducated. 18 Qaddafi emulated Egypt’s
single-party system by creating the Arab Socialist Union and banning all other political
parties. The Libyan government took over all trade unions, press, agriculture, and public
services such as education, transportation, housing and healthcare. This process
involved restructuring or nationalizing erstwhile foreign-owned or managed petroleum
companies. The new Libyan regime also ejected Italian nationals and closed US and
British military bases. 19 This did little to endear the new Libyan regime to the US and
NATO, or to Libya’s elites. Qaddafi further strained relations with many Western nations
in 1970 by moving to nationalize banks and oil reserves, and expelling Libyan Jews, a
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people who had thousands of years of history in Libya (far pre-dating the Arab conquest
of North Africa). 20
Following a so-called cultural revolution in 1973, the Arab Socialist Union was gradually
replaced by a system of thousands of popularly elected local councils, called “people’s
Page | 8
committees,” and later a system of “people’s congresses” comprising the “General
People’s Congress” (GPC). The GPC officially held all legislative authority in Libya and
was designed to replace the RCC with direct democracy and local self-governance. 21
Qaddafi resigned from all other government posts in order to serve as Secretary General
of the People’s Congress, 22 which was essentially the executive office of the country.
The further restructuring of the Libyan state sparked a split within the RCC (whose
members stood to lose their positions in the government under the new system) and
further alienated Libya’s upper and middle-classes from the Qaddafi regime, causing it
to become largely unpopular among all but the poorest Libyans. The Qaddafi regime
responded to increasing domestic dissent by tightening its grip on the media and justice
system, and sometimes resorting to brutal repression. However, by 1977, when Qaddafi
changed the name of the country to the “Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya,” ii
Libyan literacy rates and per capita income had risen drastically as a result of the public
education and jobs programs, and all Libyan citizens had access to transportation,
housing and healthcare. 23
A salient aspect of Qaddafi’s early national policy was anti-tribalism. To this end Qaddafi
adopted the pan-Arab philosophy and rhetoric of Egyptian president Gamal Abdel
Nasser, and later the pan-Africanism of Ghana’s Kwame Nkrumah. 24 Although he
continued to use the language of pan-Arabism, in the face of internal dissent Qaddafi
soon resorted to manipulating Libya’s tribalism through favoritism and the outright
suppression of Berbers, minority tribes and Islamists in the east. Government positions
and high paying jobs were often given to members of Qaddafi’s ethnic group or other
large tribes with strategically important constituencies. 25 Ultimately, despite marrying a
woman from a politically important tribe in the east, Qaddafi’s strongholds were mainly
in the more secular Tripolitania, while most of his enemies were concentrated in the
more Islamist Cyrenaica, which had previously been favored by the king. Indeed, many
in Benghazi had not supported the coup against King Idris, and as a result of regional
resentment toward the Qaddafi government, Benghazi and much of the east were
denied some of the benefits and public works projects enjoyed by the rest of the
country. 26 Benghazi was the site of multiple riots and attempted uprisings throughout
Qaddafi’s reign, the most recent of which (prior to the 2011 revolt) was a series of
public demonstrations in 2009, held in memory of the 1993 massacre of rioting
prisoners at Abu Salim prison, many of whom had been Islamists from Benghazi. 27
ii
The word “Jamahiriya” has been roughly translated as meaning “Peopledom,” or “State of the Masses.”
(See citation # 19)
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Foreign Relations
Libya’s foreign policy under Qaddafi was
characterized by a blend of anti-capitalism, anticommunism, pan-Arabism, and later, pan-Africanism.
In the context of the Cold War, Libya identified with
the “non-aligned movement,” a loose collection of
nations that sought to avoid co-optation in the global
competition between the US-dominated NATO
alliance and the Soviet Union. Libya’s official
neutrality allowed it to maintain ties with both the capitalist and communist blocs for
decades, and to trade heavily with both sides of the Cold War simultaneously. 28
Qaddafi changed his
approach towards regional
and world politics several
times, but always charted a
collision course with the
West.
However, Qaddafi was too ideologically committed to confrontation with his perceived
enemies (especially Israel) to chart a middle path in world politics. He strongly believed
that both the capitalist “first-world” and the communist “second-world” were
imperialistic in their treatment of the under-developed, resource-rich “third-world.” In
Qaddafi’s view, third-world nations would have to collaborate, cooperate, and even
unite, politically and militarily, in order to effectively deter and resist imperialist
exploitation. He believed that such unity could only be accomplished by promoting a
combination of nationalism, Islam, and revolutionary socialism in order to overcome the
historical impediments to Arab and African unity posed by tribalism and sectarianism. 29
Essentially, Qaddafi believed his two missions were to counter imperialism in the thirdworld and to destroy Israel.
The Libyan RCC, and consequently Libya’s foreign policy, was heavily influenced by
Nasser’s pan-Arabism. During the course of Qaddafi’s administration, Libya pursued
several failed mergers with a number of Middle Eastern and African countries - including
Syria, Egypt, Sudan, Tunisia, Morocco, and Algeria - in an effort to create a politically
united Arab superstate. 30 These efforts resulted in the signing of the Tripoli Charter
between Libya, Egypt and Sudan “which called for the formation of a ‘flexible
federation.’” 31 Libya concluded a separate, largely symbolic union with Egypt and Syria,
called the Federation of Arab Republics (FAR), and a short-lived agreement for
unification with Tunisia. Qaddafi also concluded a treaty of alliance and unity with
Morocco, which he hoped would eventually expand to include Algeria, Tunisia and Syria,
but which ultimately fell apart. 32 In addition to the ideological goal of achieving Arab
unity, strategic calculations about the balance of power and Qaddafi’s zealous
opposition to the state of Israel motivated these efforts. Qaddafi believed that Israel
represented a Western-imperialist incursion into the Arab world, and believed that a
unified Arab state would be capable of defeating Israel and deterring its Western
patrons. 33 This would, in theory, place the imagined Arab superstate on par with the
major world powers. However, each of these attempts at regional political consolidation
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
failed, largely because of a lack of willingness by all parties to compromise on issues of
sovereignty or authority; though it should be noted that Qaddafi demonstrated his
commitment to the pan-Arabist project by offering to step down from power if doing so
would help solidify the unity of the FAR. 34
Another major reason for the failure of the Arab unification efforts was the intense
diplomatic war between Libya and Israel. Qaddafi strove to undermine Israel’s
diplomatic position in Africa, in part by offering support to countries and regimes that
withdrew their support for Israel. 35 “By November 1973, twenty-seven African
governments had broken relations with Israel, many declaring their support for the
PLO iii in the process.” 36 Likewise, improved relations between Israel and Libya’s
neighbors, like Morocco and Egypt, worked to spoil Libya’s ties with those countries.
Qaddafi’s failure to forge any lasting or meaningful Arab federation through negotiation
led to a change of tactics. Qaddafi sought to lead by force of arms rather than by force
of argument, as he began using his country’s new-found oil wealth to invest in modern
weaponry for Libya’s military, including research to develop weapons of mass
destruction (WMD). 37 He also used Libya’s oil to pay for numerous military adventures
and political intrigues across Africa and the Middle East in an effort to support regimes
that would be more in line with his Third World revolution. Libya was accused of
supporting subversion in Egypt, and a brief war broke out when Egypt attacked Libya in
1977. 38 Throughout the 1970’s and 80’s, Libya was also accused of supporting
subversives and rebels in a veritable laundry list of African and Middle Eastern
countries. iv39 However, the only prominent examples of overt military action by Libya
under Qaddafi were in Uganda and Chad. Libya’s military involvement in these wars was
highly complex, with numerous political and historical dimensions, all of which make it
difficult to explain Libya’s actions without providing detailed background information on
the histories of Uganda and Chad. Thus only a few important details have been outlined
here.
Starting in 1972, Libya supported Idi Amin in a series of failed wars with Tanzania
initiated by Uganda. 40 Idi Amin, then strongman leader of Uganda, was originally aligned
with the US, Britain and Israel, but Libyan diplomacy succeeded in causing him to switch
his orientation and sever ties with Israel. 41 In 1979, Qaddafi went so far as to order the
airlifting of additional equipment and some 3,000 Libyan troops 42 to aid Amin in his
invasion of Tanzania, even against the advice of Libya’s military leadership. 43 The Libyan
troops soon found themselves acting as the rearguard for retreating Ugandan units, who
used Libyan trucks to escape and transport their plunder, 44 and the Libyans suffered
iii
Palestine Liberation Organization
Jordan, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Tunisia, Cameroon, Chad, Gabon, The Gambia, Ghana,
Mauritania, Nigeria, Senegal, Uganda.
iv
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hundreds of casualties. This fiasco both tarnished Libya’s international reputation, and
worsened Qaddafi’s domestic popularity.
Libya’s involvement in Chad was even more complex. When Qaddafi took power, he
inherited a long-term policy of supporting Chadian rebels, a policy started under King
Idris. By 1975, Libya had been supporting FROLINA v rebels in northern Chad for a
decade, 45 against the French-backed forces of southern Chad in the civil war that
followed in the wake of Chad’s formal independence. 46 Northern Chadians have ethnic
and tribal ties with southern Libyans, though it is unclear how much this factored into
Libyan calculations. Starting in 1975, Libya occupied and annexed a disputed 60-mile
strip of desert territory in the north of Chad. 47 The territory Libya captured in the war,
called the Aouzou Strip, had been considered a part of the Ottoman province of Fezzan;
the territory was later claimed by both French-occupied Chad and Italian-occupied
Libya, 48 and then by Chad when it became independent. 49 Thus from the Libyan
perspective, the Aouzou Strip rightfully belonged to Libya, and their war was simply
intended to retake territory they lost during the colonial era. The Aouzou Strip was also
a source of uranium, which made the territory a valuable prize for Libya. 50
Though many Libyans considered the war in Chad to be the result of Libya’s longstanding and legitimate claim to the territory, the West and others in the region viewed
Libyan actions in Chad as an aggressive first step in the context of Qaddafi’s ambition to
forge a Libyan-dominated regional order. In 1979, a Chadian leader from one of the
northern tribes allied with Libya was placed in charge of a new unity government in
Chad through a peace agreement negotiated under OAU vi auspices. 51 In 1980, the new
president of Chad requested that Libya intervene militarily to support his government,
which it did, and in 1981 Libya and Chad announced their intention to unify their two
countries. 52 The US and France quickly urged the OAU to send a peacekeeping force to
replace the Libyans, and Chad bowed to diplomatic pressure and requested the
departure of all Libyan forces. This move worsened relations between Chad and Libya,
and the civil war in Chad soon reignited.
Because Qaddafi’s foreign intrigues tended to support revolutionary factions, and their
efforts to oppose or overthrow more status-quo regimes, Libya developed close security
ties with the Soviet Union, and Qaddafi quickly earned the ire of his neighbors, who
were more interested in regime security than revolutionary ideology, and of the
Western bloc, which was intent on containing Soviet influence around the world. 53
Qaddafi’s support for international pariahs like Idi Amin and Charles Taylor; for radical
anti-government elements such as the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Irish
Republican Army; and for the Iranian revolution, contributed to the deterioration of
v
vi
“National Liberation Front of Chad,” (FROLINA)
“Organization of African Unity,” (OAU)
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relations with the US and the West, and to his association with terrorism. 54 This
reputation was worsened by Libya’s involvement in a number of terrorist attacks,
including the terrorist bombings of a German discotheque in 1986, and of Pan Am flight
103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. 55 The US responded to the 1986 bombing by broadening
existing economic sanctions against Libya, and launching an air-raid against targets in
Tripoli and Benghazi. The raid was likely intended to kill Qaddafi and encourage a
domestic uprising, but the most notable result was the civilian death toll caused by the
bombing, including Qaddafi’s adopted infant daughter. vii This punitive attack caused
Libyans to rally behind Qaddafi, and even drew condemnation from Libyan opposition
groups living abroad. 56
The UN imposed sanctions on Libya in 1992 as a result of the 1988 Pan Am bombing,
and Libya eventually sought to comply with the UN’s terms for lifting the sanctions. In
1999, two suspects in the bombing were turned over to Scottish authorities, and in 2003
Libya accepted responsibility for its role in the attack and agreed to pay damages to the
victims’ families. 57 The UN sanctions were lifted soon thereafter, and at the end of 2003
Libya announced that it would cease its pursuit of WMD and advanced missile
technology. 58 These moves allowed Libya to normalize relations with the US, and the US
lifted its sanctions against Libya in 2004. 59
Around this same time, starting in the late 1990’s, Qaddafi changed tactics again and
shifted Libya’s foreign policy away from sponsoring subversion to facilitate Arab
unification, and moved back toward multilateral diplomacy and regional leadership, this
time focusing on Africa rather than the Arab world. Qaddafi increased Libya’s financial
assistance to other African countries like Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Sierra Leone, and
Uganda. In 1998, Qaddafi led the establishment of the Community of Sahel-Saharan
States (CEN-SAD), a Regional Economic Community (REC) 60 aimed at increasing
economic cooperation, integration and development among its membership, which has
since grown to include 18 countries across Africa. viii61 In 1999, Qaddafi brokered a peace
treaty between Uganda and Congo, and sent Libyan troops to help enforce the treaty.
In 2001 he spearheaded the deployment of a CEN-SAD force to stabilize the Central
African Republic after an attempted coup there. 62 Qaddafi made progress toward
improving cooperation and diplomacy between African nations by leading the initiative
that changed the OAU into the African Union (AU), which gave the organization a more
integrative mission. Though Qaddafi’s actions in this regard were clearly still motivated
by his desire to forge a supranational regional power, his leadership (and financial
vii
A STRATFOR article cited in this paper (see citation #55) asserts that the death of Qaddafi’s infant
daughter was “pure propaganda.” However, the author offered no citation or evidence to support this
claim, and numerous other credible sources reference the incident as a historical fact.
viii
Benin, Burkina Faso, Central Africa, Chad, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Gambia, Libya, Mali, Morocco, Niger,
Nigeria, Senegal, Somalia, Sudan, Togo, and Tunisia.
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support) was well received by many African leaders. 63 In 2008, an unprecedented
gathering of “more than 200 African kings and traditional rulers bestowed the title ‘king
of kings’ on Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi,” ix64 and in 2009 Qaddafi assumed the
annually rotating Chairmanship of the African Union. Qaddafi used his position to
pontificate on his aspirations for African unity, telling the gathering of traditional
leaders: "We want an African military to defend Africa, we want a single African
currency, we want one African passport to travel within Africa." 65
Qaddafi changed his approach towards regional and world politics several times, but
always charted a collision course with the West. His confrontational policies – from
attempting to consolidate all Arab speaking countries, and then all African countries,
into superstates capable of challenging Western hegemony, to supporting terrorists
across the globe, to inciting and aiding anti-government forces in stable countries while
supporting pariah governments in unstable ones, to a political holy war with Israel –
served to create irreconcilable enmity between Libya and many powerful countries, and
caused still more countries to become ambivalent about Qaddafi’s rule. It would seem
that a decade of rapprochement with Europe and the US, and two decades of aid in
Africa were not enough to erase the ill will accrued over the previous two decades and
garner the international support Qaddafi would need in 2011. Despite Qaddafi’s role as
one of the most vocal critics of the West, he was unable to win powerful non-Western
allies who were committed enough to his regime to prevent an international
intervention to depose him.
ix
This paper uses the spelling “Qaddafi” for the former Libyan leader’s name, but because this is a quote,
his name is spelled differently. There is no universally accepted rule for transliterating Arabic names into
the Latin alphabet; typically a person chooses a spelling for his or her own name, and that becomes
proper. In the case of the late Libyan Colonel, he never specified (because he refused to use any language
other than Arabic in public), and the Libyan government itself used multiple English spellings. The range of
different spellings of both his given name and surname is enormous – an ABC study found 112 varieties.
His given name can be spelled, among others, Muammar, Moammar, Mu’ammar, and Moamar. His
surname is spelled variously Kadafy, Algathafi, el-Qaddafi, and (seriously) Qaththafi and Gadhdhafi,
among many many others. Arbitrarily, we chose to use Qaddafi.
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
The Libyan Civil War
Civil Unrest to Insurrection
Page | 14
th
On February 15, 2011, the 15 anniversary of the government killing of 1,200 prisoners,
many of whom were from Benghazi, (also the 60th anniversary of an Italian massacre of
Libyans, a holiday typically celebrated with national pride), groups of people took to the
streets of the eastern cities of Benghazi and Bediya to demand the release of an
imprisoned human rights campaigner who had been lobbying for those responsible for
the massacre to be punished. Within a day the protests turned violent, as people set fire
to police stations and threw rocks and gasoline bombs at security forces and
government supporters. 66 The Libyan security forces responded to the violent protests
with popular methods of crowd dispersal; tear gas, rubber bullets and high-pressure fire
hoses. Thirty-eight people were reported injured, ten of them police officers. 67
Capitalizing on the unrest, an anti-Qaddafi
group called the National Front for the Salvation Whereas the Arab Spring
movements were largely
of Libya (NFSL) called for a nation-wide “Day of
composed of previously apolitical
Rage” the following day, February 17, with the
openly stated goal of removing Qaddafi from
people… in the Libyan opposition
power. The NFSL was perhaps the most
movement these elements were
powerful secular opposition group in Libya.
primarily led by pre-existing
Founded in 1981, it has offices in London and
organizations and individuals who
Washington, D.C., and has been funded by the
had opposed the government in
CIA and Saudi Arabia. 68 The “Day of Rage” on
their country for years…
February 17 resulted in the burning of the
police headquarters in Benghazi, clashes
between pro-Qaddafi and anti-Qaddafi mobs, and reports of police shooting into crowds
of anti-government protesters, resulting in numerous civilian deaths across Libya. 69
Even considering the violence, the initial response of the Libyan security forces was not
very disproportionate relative to governmental norms in North Africa and the Middle
East. In 2010 and 2011 the governments of Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen and Syria all
violently attacked protestors for challenging the status quo, despite the fact that the
movements those governments were facing were predominantly non-violent. On the
other hand, Libya’s government was responding to a violent opposition, part of which
was destroying public property and attacking police. The violence in Libya was far from a
few instances of rioting and looting in an otherwise peaceful movement; it appears that
from its inception, the Libyan opposition was not a political protest so much as an
insurrection. There are other significant distinctions between the predominately non-
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violent “Arab Spring” movements, and the Libyan uprising. Whereas the Arab Spring
movements were largely composed of previously apolitical people, driven by
spontaneous grass-roots organizing and social media, in the Libyan opposition
movement these elements were primarily led by pre-existing organizations and
individuals who had opposed the government in their country for years, many of whom
were already engaged in subversive work. 70 While contingents of the protestors were
surely seeking democracy and respect for human rights, others were using violence to
overthrow a government they did not like, and governments as institutions almost
universally respond to revolts of this sort with force. 71
Unable to quell the riots in Benghazi and Bediya, and with some army and police units
reportedly mutinying and joining the uprising, Libyan security forces withdrew from the
two revolting cities and rallied inside the nearby Katiba Military Base on February 18,
leaving those cities essentially under local militia control. Anti-Qaddafi protesters
marched to the army base, throwing stones and gasoline bombs, and troops inside
opened fire. The exchange sparked a two-day battle for the base in which rebels
besieged the walled barracks using bulldozers, makeshift grenades, weapons stolen
from police stations, and soldiers inside fired back with heavy machine guns, inflicting
hundreds of casualties. 72 On February 20 a suicide bomber driving a car packed with
explosives brought down a section of Katiba’s walls, and the soldiers inside beat a hasty
retreat, leaving Benghazi completely under rebel control. 73
Therefore, from February 20 on, the situation in Libya must be defined as a civil war multiple cities had been captured by armed rebel groups that had violently evicted
government forces, and that sought to forcibly overthrow the central government.
While the anti-Qaddafi movement in Libya in February 2011 was clearly not a peaceful
protest, it also did not immediately have the capacity to wage a successful war against
the Libyan military. Initially, the rebel forces were made up of a combination of local
militias, Islamist militants and defected army units, and nearly all of the weaponry the
opposition wielded were small arms and light military vehicles captured from police and
the armed forces. Nevertheless, mass uprisings and defections of army units “liberated”
many eastern cities, as well as several cities and towns in the west of the country, and in
late February enthusiastic Western media reports made it appear as though the Qaddafi
regime might collapse. With the momentum on their side, the rebels went on the
offensive, quickly pushing government troops out of the harbors of Ra’s Lanuf and
Brega, and the airfield in Misrata. 74 But the regime didn’t collapse, and a series of progovernment demonstrations revealed the degree of civilian support for Qaddafi in large
swaths of western Libya. 75
Once it became clear that Libya was faced with an armed and determined opposition
that could indeed pose a threat to the national government if permitted to gather
enough momentum, Qaddafi’s forces began to conduct full-scale military operations
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
against the rebels. The Qaddafi regime indiscriminately retaliated against both elements
of the uprising that were peaceful and had aims for political reform, and the hard-line
rebels. After the initial success of the rebel offensive, further protests in cities under
government control were brutally harassed and suppressed, and cities under rebel
control were mercilessly attacked using conventional military tactics, resulting in more
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than 1,000 opposition deaths by the end of February. 76 Beginning on March 6, the
Libyan army launched a major counteroffensive, routing outgunned and undisciplined
rebel fighters, and recapturing rebel-held cities and towns in western Libya.
Government troops besieged and repeatedly assaulted Misrata, the biggest city
controlled by rebels in Tripolitania, and continued to drive toward the unofficial rebel
capitol of Benghazi. 77 By mid-March, government troops had reached Benghazi and
began shelling the city, moving its forces into the outskirts of the city and shooting down
the sole MiG-23 fighter jet in rebel hands. 78 Cornered and over matched, the rebels
were hard-pressed to defend the city, and the civil war appeared on the verge of a
decisive ending.
International Intervention
On February 20, the day that rebels succeeded in forcibly seizing control of Benghazi,
the US and EU issued statements condemning the Qaddafi regime’s use of deadly force
against peaceful demonstrators. Two days later, Qaddafi delivered a speech in which he
made explicit threats against the opposition. The UN quickly called for a cease-fire, and
the Arab League expelled Libya. The African Union condemned the “indiscriminate and
excessive use of force and lethal weapons against peace protesters.” 79 On February 26
the UN Security Council unanimously passed Resolution 1970, which called for an
immediate cease-fire, imposed sanctions on Qaddafi, his family, and members of his
government, and referred the attacks on civilians to the International Criminal Court
(ICC). The following day, the Libyan rebels formally announced the creation of an
opposition government based in Benghazi, called the National Transitional Council
(NTC), and NATO began discussing plans to establish a no-fly zone to protect the Libyan
opposition.
NATO leaders were initially ambivalent about the prospects for military intervention in
Libya. NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen asserted that NATO had no
plans to intervene, but British Prime Minister David Cameron and US Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton suggested that plans for a no-fly zone were already being considered.
Clinton also said that the US was in contact with the rebels, and was prepared to offer
them assistance. As if in preparation for military intervention, Italy suspended its treaty
of non-aggression with Libya, saying that Libya had ceased to exist as a state, despite
the fact that Qaddafi was still in control of most of the country, and many of the
government’s institutions remained intact. France’s President Nikolas Sarkozy implied
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that an intervention force would undermine the legitimacy of the opposition movement
in Libya when he asked at a news conference “What kind of credibility would such
intervention bring to the people there?” France’s Prime Minister Francois Fillon later
asked if NATO should be involved in a civil war outside of Europe. Prime Minister
Erdogan of Turkey called the notion of military intervention in Libya an “absurdity.” 80
81
On March 1, the NTC declared itself to be the only legitimate government of Libya. A
week later, on March 7, British Special Forces and MI6 x operatives were captured near
Benghazi by rebel soldiers. "Witnesses said that when the men's bags were checked
they were found to contain arms, ammunition, explosives, maps and passports from at
least four different nationalities.” 82 The operatives were likely sent to establish contact
with the rebel leadership in order for Britain to begin an “advise and assist” role in the
conflict, effectively beginning international military intervention on the side of the
rebels. That same day, President Barack Obama told reporters that the US was in talks
with other NATO members to discuss military options in Libya, and the Gulf Cooperation
Council (GCC) announced its support for a no-fly zone to protect civilians. Qaddafi
responded by inviting the EU to send observers to Libya to conduct an on-the-ground
assessment of the conflict, insisting that the opposition and the foreign press were
exaggerating reports of government atrocities against civilians. Qaddafi’s proposal
received some support from EU nations, but the following day the Organization of the
Islamic Conference (OIC) proclaimed its support for a no-fly zone, and President Obama
and Prime Minister Cameron stated that Qaddafi had to go “as quickly as possible.” 83
France and Britain became the most outspoken advocates for military intervention to
establish a no-fly zone, with France going so far as to recognize the NTC as the
legitimate government of Libya. France and Britain signaled that they were considering
unilateral airstrikes in Libya, but NATO indicated that it would require a clear legal basis
for intervention, meaning a UN resolution, as well as regional support, which came in
the form of GCC, OIC, and Arab League support for intervention. 84
With the main rebel force in Libya under siege in Benghazi, the UN convened a meeting
to discuss the war. The UK and France were now joined by the US in pushing for this
approach, and a further mandate to use force from the air to defend civilians. On March
17 the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1973, authorizing a no-fly zone as well as
the use of force to defend civilians who were under attack. The language of the
resolution clearly authorized the use of force only to protect civilians who were being
attacked, and forbade foreign occupation of Libyan territory. Nevertheless, five of the
15 countries in the Security Council – China, Russia, Brazil, Germany and India –
abstained from the vote. Explaining their abstentions, representatives from China and
Russia both noted the lack of parameters or limitations of the use of force, while Brazil,
x
Britain’s “Secret Intelligence Service,” often referred to as “MI6” for “Military Intelligence, Section 6.”
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
Germany and India warned against the likelihood of unintended regional consequences
of the action, and all five stressed the importance of a peaceful resolution to the
conflict. 85 Despite these objections, none chose to block Resolution 1973, and the
resolution passed. The Libyan government responded by declaring a nationwide
ceasefire and announcing its willingness to negotiate with the rebels, 86 but the ceasefire
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was broken immediately, apparently by both sides.
An international coalition, led by France, the US and the UK, wasted little time before
initiating “Operation Odyssey Dawn” xi and taking the Security Council up on its
authorization to use military force. 87 On March 19, French warplanes hit Libyan forces
around Benghazi, and UK planes and US Navy missiles joined the action later that day. 88
The intervention soon halted the government’s advance in Benghazi and the east, and
forced the Libyan army to fall back and assume a defensive posture in the east while
attempting to consolidate its control over cities like Misrata in the west. 89
Though establishing a no-fly zone inherently involves
The success of the antithe destruction of the target nation’s air-defense
Qaddafi rebels in the 2011
capabilities, from the outset, coalition strikes against
Libyan Civil War must be
Libyan government forces and facilities stretched the
largely attributed to NATO
limits of Resolution 1973, which allowed the use of
air power.
force solely to “enforce compliance with the ban on
flights” and/or “to protect civilians and civilian
populated areas under threat of attack.” 90 Coalition forces hit targets all across northern
Libya ranging from armored columns and air bases to radio towers and Qaddafi’s private
residence. It soon became clear that all Libyan military units and assets were regarded
as fair game, regardless of their location or direct involvement in putting down the
insurrection, and that Qaddafi himself was likely a target of coalition strikes. On March
20, the day after offensive operations began, the Secretary General of the Arab League
criticized the coalition operation because it “exceeded the intent of the League's original
call for a no-fly zone.” 91 On March 21 the United Arab Emirates reversed its decision to
contribute fighter aircraft to the operation, and opted instead to only contribute
humanitarian aid. On March 22 the leaders of Russia, China and South Africa called for
an immediate ceasefire by all sides, including the intervention forces, and Germany
withdrew its participation from all NATO operations in the Mediterranean. A group of
African leaders suggested that the coalition operation represented interference in
Africa’s internal affairs. The next day, on March 23, US officials announced that
Operation Odyssey Dawn had succeeded in decimating the Libyan Air Force. After only
five days, Libya was rendered practically defenseless against coalition air power. 92
xi
“Operation Odyssey Dawn” is the name used by American forces to describe coalition actions between
March 19 and March 31, 2011 when all air operations formally came under the command of NATO’s
“Operation Unified Protector.”
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NATO commenced “Operation Unified Protector” on March 23, which imposed an arms
embargo on Libya, and announced that overall command and control of the military
intervention in Libya would likely be assumed by NATO. Operational control of the no-fly
zone was transferred to NATO the following day, and a week later on March 31,
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Operation Odyssey Dawn officially ended, and command of the intervention was
93
transferred to NATO. NATO continued and intensified the air campaign against the
Libyan military, even though the forces threatening the opposition stronghold in
Benghazi had been driven back. NATO planes flew thousands of attack sorties, many of
which were directed against targets in Tripoli and other densely populated cities under
government control. The civil war reached a stalemate, as rebel forces were incapable
of contending with the Libyan military in open battle, but the military was pinned down
by NATO airstrikes.
It was at this point that diplomacy could have potentially ended the conflict if the
international community had fully supported negotiation and both sides had been
pressured to make concessions. On April 3 two of Qaddafi’s sons, Seif al-Islam and Saadi
Qaddafi, offered to help convince their father to step down, and to transition the
country to democracy under the interim leadership of Seif al-Islam, once known as a
Western-educated reform-minded Libyan official who had publicly pressed for political
reforms in the past. xii94 On April 9 and 10, an international delegation, including a
delegation from the African Union (AU), met with the rebels in Benghazi and with
Qaddafi in Tripoli in an attempt to negotiate a peace plan, and the following day the AU
proposed a framework for ceasefire negotiations. Qaddafi accepted the AU’s “road
map” for a political solution, but the rebels immediately rejected the offer of a
negotiated settlement because it did not meet their precondition that Qaddafi and his
family leave immediately. 95
If NATO had intervened for the sake of preventing as many civilian casualties as possible,
they could have supported a political solution to the civil war at either of these
junctures in order to bring an immediate stop to the bloodshed. Instead NATO and
Western diplomats were unwavering in their commitment to the rebels’ position that
Qaddafi and his entire family should leave immediately, in spite of the diplomatic efforts
of the resident regional security organization, the AU, to bring about a negotiated end
to the conflict. In mid-April, the leaders of NATO moved their already obvious support
for regime-change one step closer to becoming official policy. The heads of the US,
French and British governments published their shared position that it was “impossible
to imagine a future for Libya with Gaddafi in power.” 96 The British, French and Italian
governments then announced that they would be sending military advisors to assist the
xii
During the war however, Seif al-Islam was indicted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for “crimes
against humanity” based on his position in his father’s government.
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rebels in the ground war with the Libyan military. Emboldened by the full support of
Western posturing and airpower, the rebels rejected any notion of a peace plan that
offered them anything short of unconditional government surrender. In effect, NATO
undermined the efforts of the AU to bring about a peaceful resolution to the conflict by
continuing to provide the rebel forces with diplomatic, strategic and material support,
and enabling the rebels to resume offensive operations. The result was a protracted civil Page | 20
war that lasted many months longer and cost many thousands of lives more than it
might have had NATO encouraged both sides to end the conflict through negotiation.
By June, after months of deadlock, NATO attacks took their toll on Qaddafi’s forces,
weakening the Libyan military to the point where the rebels began to push them back
from the east and take fresh territory from beleaguered government regiments in the
west. NATO never sought to prevent or dissuade rebels troops from attacking and
capturing cities for fear that the assaults might cause civilian casualties. On the contrary,
NATO provided close air support for the rebel offensive, and directly caused civilian
casualties as a result. At the end of June, France admitted to supplying large quantities
of arms and equipment to groups of rebels, but argued that doing so was not a violation
of the NATO arms embargo. 97 Qatar also eventually admitted to providing the rebels
with weapons, as well as sending hundreds of troops to train, command and fight
alongside the rebels. Qatar claimed that hundreds of Qatari Special Forces were present
in all regions of the country and “acted as the link between the rebels and NATO
forces.” 98 British Special Forces reportedly acted in a similar clandestine
combat/assistance role, training and supplying the rebel forces, and coordinating their
actions with NATO. 99
Throughout June, the AU continued to offer to facilitate talks between the rebels and
the government to bring about an end to the conflict, taking no position on the need for
Qaddafi to leave or remain in power. In mid-July the Libyan Contact Group, a group of
roughly 40 nations that had been organized to guide international involvement
throughout the war, collectively agreed to recognize the NTC as the sole legitimate
government of Libya. 100 As NATO strikes on Tripoli intensified and rebel forces began to
break through the city’s defenses, Qaddafi’s government repeated its position that they
were willing to engage in negotiations with NATO and the rebels, but that Qaddafi
would not step down before negotiations began. The rebels maintained their position
that "[t]here are no negotiations with this regime unless he declares his departure and
that he is stepping down, he and his sons, from power." 101 By the end of August, Tripoli
was largely in rebel hands, and Qaddafi’s remaining forces were under siege in cities
scattered across the west of the country, primarily Serte and Beni Walid. Some
members of Qaddafi’s family fled the country in late August and September. Qaddafi’s
remaining sons continued to lead loyalist forces during September and October, and
were eventually captured, killed, or killed in captivity. 102 On October 20, a US Predator
drone and French warplane attacked a convoy attempting to transport Qaddafi out of
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Serte. However, the strikes failed to kill Qaddafi, and rebels soon found him wounded
and hiding in a drainpipe by the side of the road. The rebels filmed each other dragging
and beating him in the street as he tried to surrender. Qaddafi was then shot to
death, 103 and his body was put on ice in a meat market and left on public display for
days. The manner of Qaddafi’s execution was condemned by Western government
officials, who along with NTC officials had pledged to bring Qaddafi to court to answer
for his conduct during the war. 104 However, Western criticism of Qaddafi’s death is
curious considering the number of attempts made on his life by NATO forces during the
war, including the air strike that enabled his execution, as if shooting him in the head
was somehow less civilized than blowing him up.
The success of the anti-Qaddafi rebels in the 2011 Libyan Civil War must be largely
attributed to NATO air power. While Resolution 1973 authorized use of force to protect
civilians, NATO essentially acted as the air force for rebel troops, 105 and as a result
actually caused civilian casualties, both directly through its air campaign, and indirectly
by preventing negotiation from taking place when it might otherwise have ended the
fighting. Rather than pursuing the limited aim of preventing attacks on civilians, the
NATO-led coalition sought to decapitate the regime and destroy the ability of the
central government to control its armed forces, thereby causing the government to
collapse. Thus the international intervention in Libya was less concerned with
preventing a humanitarian crisis and more concerned with supporting and facilitating
the overthrow of Qaddafi’s government.
As explained above, Qaddafi was viewed by the West and much of the Arab League as a
dangerous pariah and a long-time enemy. This antagonism provided the principal
motivation for foreign intervention in Libya; the humanitarian auspices used to justify
the operation were little more than a political means to an end - namely, the removal of
a hostile regime, and the substitution of a new regime thought to be more pliable.
Predictably, the intervention and the resulting collapse of the Libyan state has in many
ways worsened the living conditions and basic security of Libya’s civilian population.
Indeed, the intervention has caused a greater humanitarian crisis than the one it was
intended to prevent, and the cynical exploitation of the “Responsibility to Protect” norm
has undermined its future credibility.
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
Aftermath and Consequences
The toppling of the Qaddafi regime has created a number of domestic, regional and
international problems. The destruction of Libya’s government has led to a power
Page | 22
vacuum, widespread violence, human rights abuses, a refugee crisis, exacerbated racism
and tribalism, economic instability, and the collapse of social welfare systems. The
manner in which the Libyan government was overthrown has also had grave unintended
consequences contributing to regional instability, such as massive civilian displacement
and death, and arms proliferation. It also has serious implications for international
norms.
Power Vacuum
Principal among the problems stemming from Qaddafi’s removal is the power vacuum
that exists in Libya. Libya has essentially become ungoverned, and ungovernable, as
military power has become so diffuse and command so hyper-localized that the national
military is considered little more than just one among hundreds of militias. 106 Ongoing
clashes between local militias have created such a lack of basic security and rule of law
as to undermine any sense of national political unity. Civilians and fighters alike seem
weary of the fighting, but without any strong, reliable central authority, and with the
sudden dissolution of the central government, they seem incapable of finding peace. 107
The Libyan civil war has so far replaced a repressive, petroleum-fueled welfare-state
with a chaotic, tribalism-fueled failed state.
With no alternative government ready to take power following the collapse of the
Qaddafi regime, the NTC acted as an unelected directorate, similar to the Revolutionary
Command Council that governed Libya after the last coup, making laws and conducting
international diplomacy on behalf of a fragmented nation over which they had
established only partial and tenuous control. The recent election was celebrated as a
step towards democracy, but with the continued absence of any meaningful central
authority and with the NTC having stripped parliament of the ability to draft a
constitution, it remains to be seen how much the election will really matter.
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Violence, Chaos and Human Rights Abuse
The most prominent feature of post-conflict Libya has been ongoing violence and chaos.
Despite almost a year of effort supported by international aid and advice since their
takeover, the NTC was unable to bring unity and security to a diverse, fractious and
Page | 23
armed population. Open fighting has repeatedly broken out in many parts of the
country between Arabs and Berbers, between different factions of Arabs, between rival
militias and between the NTC, former rebel militias, and stubborn Qaddafi loyalists.
Signs of the NTC’s style of rule were not widely reported during the civil war, but they
were certainly there. In August 2011, rebels from the town of Misrata besieged and took
the western town of Tawergha. Old ethnic and political differences separated the
people of Misrata from those in Tawergha, and the rebels’ stated goal in their attack
was to destroy the town completely. The UN Human Rights Council’s Commission of
Inquiry on Libya later concluded that the rebels committed crimes against humanity in
Tawergha, stating that there was widespread and arbitrary killing of civilians with the
goal of rendering the town uninhabitable. Nevertheless, many of those same rebels,
now in militias governed until recently by the NTC, are currently in charge of protecting
Tawerghans, who live in refugee camps across Libya. The Tawerghans are barred from
returning home by militias from Misrata, who accuse the town’s residents of
collaborating with Qaddafi during the war. In February 2012, militias raided a
Tawerghan refugee camp in Janzur and shot seven civilians, three of them children, in
what they claim was a weapons inspection. According to Human Rights Watch, there
has been neither an investigation into the killings nor bolstered security at internal
refugee camps to prevent such attacks in the future. 108
The Qaddafi loyalists were more numerous and organized than many news reports
made it appear at the end of the war; loyalists have carried out multiple attacks on NTC
troops and former rebels in 2012. As of early 2012, some Libyan national army units
loyal to the former government continued to man roadblocks in parts of the north. 109 In
January, militias even seized Bani Walid, a city of about 100,000 people in western
Libya, from the NTC. Some reports branded these anti-NTC militias as highly trained and
well-equipped national army units, 110 but others described them as simply protecting
their communities from abusive NTC troops, who had controlled Bani Walid since the
fall of the government, calling the NTC thieves and vandals. 111 Either way, the NTC was
incapable of controlling Libya’s civilian population, let alone the hundreds of armed
groups that continue to refuse to either give up their arms or integrate themselves into
the burgeoning national military. The consequences of this lawlessness are mounting. In
February, Amnesty International described the militias in Libya as “largely out of
control,” and unwilling to disarm, since, like many Libyans, they were wary of
marginalization in light of increasingly private NTC membership lists and exclusionary
decision-making processes. 112 In March civilian protests broke out all over the country,
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demanding the NTC deliver on promises of transparency, security and compensation for
victims of the civil war. Among other cities, these protests notably occurred in Benghazi,
where rioters smashed windows at the local NTC headquarters and angry students
accosted the vice-president of the NTC when he came to speak at Benghazi University,
forcing him to flee. 113 In a more recent example, on June 6, the US diplomatic mission in
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Benghazi was attacked with an improvised bomb. 114
“Deep-Seated Racism”
Given the level of unrest and the profound disunity
present in Libyan society after the war, the NTC
failed to provide even basic security for the
country’s 6 million people, and especially for the
1.5 million foreign workers among them.
Widespread extrajudicial killing of black Africans by
rebels, who (in many cases, falsely) claimed their
victims were mercenaries working for Qaddafi, was
reported during the civil war, and that trend
continued under the NTC. In areas of the country
supposedly under NTC control, there have been
thousands of reports of brutality and arbitrary
arrests by militias, sometimes resulting in torture,
rape and even summary execution. 115
… the current ongoing human
rights abuses and crimes
against humanity may present
a more daunting and
dangerous problem than
systematic abuses by a central
authority, because no change
in policy by the NTC would be
effective in halting the current
atrocities, as their actual
authority is tenuous at best.
In one illustrative instance caught on video, rebels allied with the NTC forced captive
black Africans into a cage, where they tormented them and forced them to physically
eat the former Libyan flag, shouting (in Arabic) “Eat your flag, you dog!” 116 The victims
of these atrocities were, and are, often poor migrant workers and refugees 117 who came
to Libya before the civil war because of Libya’s stability, wealth and prosperity in
comparison to the rest of the region. Human Rights Watch has warned of “deep-seated
racism” in post-Qaddafi Libya, and the UN Commissioner on Human Rights reported that
as of March 2012, half of the prisoners held by the NTC were black Africans or had dark
skin, being jailed in official detention centers where they were subject to documented
cases of torture, murder and rape. 118 The UN Human Rights Council’s International
Commission of Inquiry found that rebel militias committed war crimes and crimes
against humanity during the civil war, and have continued to commit crimes against
humanity ever since. 119
The UN report pointed out that Qaddafi’s forces committed such atrocities as well, but
as part of a governmentally sanctioned program of repression, with the implication that
those crimes were therefore more reprehensible. However, in light of the NTC’s
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apparent atrocities, the memory of the crimes of the previous regime will quickly
become moot. Furthermore, the current ongoing human rights abuses and crimes
against humanity may present a more daunting and dangerous problem than systematic
abuses by a central authority, 120 because no change in policy by the new Libyan
government would be effective in halting the current atrocities, as their actual authority
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is tenuous at best.
The racial feuding in Libya has not been limited to the north, nor has it been limited to
human rights abuses; in many cases, it has boiled over into open fighting. Tribal battles
in Sabha in the south, and ethnic clashes between Berbers and Arabs in Zuwara in the
west, killed almost 200 people in the first week of April alone. 121 As of May, all across
the country, from Zuwara to Sabha to Kufra, tribal and ethnic animosities that had been
suppressed under Qaddafi had violently reemerged. The very forces that ousted Qaddafi
had in many places turned on each other, as neighboring towns and communities
battled one another with tanks and other weapons scavenged from the civil war. The
NTC attempted to resolve some of these conflicts by pressuring all sides to accept the
NTC’s authority, but ultimately failed to end the fighting. In some places the racist
undertones of the continuing civil strife are particularly overt. This is especially true in
the case of Kufra, where Arab militias from the north have traveled across the country
to help Arab tribes fight the Toubou tribes in southern Libya, who have in turn received
reinforcements from other black Africans from farther south. 122
Economics
Much of Libya’s considerable wealth came from its
oil production – before the war, Libya pumped at a
rate of 1,800,000 barrels of light crude per year, a
substantial amount of a particularly high quality of
oil. The government used the income from the sale
of their oil to build an impressively developed
social welfare state, vastly improving their standing
in the world within a decade of the 1969 revolution.
After going to great expense to
ensure the NTC’s rise to power,
NATO countries will seek to
profit from their relationship to
the new government in Libya.
Prior to the February 2011 uprising and subsequent civil war, Libya was, statistically
speaking, the most developed country in Africa. Alongside the Seychelles, Libya ranked
at the top of the list of African nations in the Human Development Index, the standard
measure by which the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) xiii assesses
quality of life between countries worldwide, putting them squarely in the category of
xiii
The Human Development Index combines life expectancy, literacy, education levels, and other quality
of life statistics into a number, represented as a fraction of 1.
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“high human development.” In the specific areas of literacy and life expectancy Libya
excelled, rivaling those indicators in Western nations. Nearly the entire population had
access to medical care, clean water and sanitation. In 2009 Libya also had the highest
gross national product at purchasing price parity (GNP-PPP) xiv on the continent, and the
World Bank ranked Libya as a “high middle income” country. 123
Information on many development statistics has not been available since the National
Transitional Council (NTC) took over, but there are already indications that the transition
will take a grave toll on quality of life and human security in Libya. A mere six months
after Qaddafi’s death, Libya was predicted to slide by 10 ranks in the UNDP’s Human
Development Index. 124 Due to the short amount of time since the NTC takeover and the
current level of instability, impartial data on quality of life is unlikely to emerge any time
soon. However, even in the absence of reliable information, the transition can be
expected to have a catastrophic effect on Libya’s quality of life, at least in the short
term.
The prospect of foreign influence makes the situation of Libya’s poor even more
precarious. After going to great expense to ensure the NTC’s rise to power, NATO
countries will seek to profit from their relationship to the new government in Libya. 125
That profit can be expected to come largely in the form of oil contracts; as early as
August, 2011, before the fighting had even ended, British, Italian, French and Austrian
gas companies had already positioned themselves to better their existing oil contracts in
Libya. Qaddafi had been a willing but troublesome business partner, as he often
demanded extra taxes and fees for oil contracts, money that ostensibly went to social
welfare programs or directly to the Libyan people. 126 The NTC, however, indicated that
in the aftermath of the war, it would “remember their friends and foes, and negotiate
deals accordingly.” 127 As Abdeljalil Mayouf, a representative of the rebel Libyan oil
company put it: “We don’t have a problem with Western countries like Italians, French
and U.K. companies… but we may have some political issues with Russia, China and
Brazil.” 128 Russia, China and Brazil had done business in Libya prior to the revolution, as
had many countries in the West, but the former three had spoken out against military
intervention against the Qaddafi regime during the civil war.
By May 2012, the levels of oil production in Libya were back up to pre-war levels, and
several European oil companies, including Britain’s BP, said they were ready to resume
operations. 129 In addition to cheap extraction of oil, economic deals and international
loans will likely include structural adjustment reforms, which will force privatization of
Libya’s industries and eviscerate any social welfare services that might remain following
xiv
GNP is a measure of the market value of all goods and services produced in a year by the labor and
property of residents of a particular country. PPP adjusts this number to the buying power of currency in
that country.
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
the war. Reduction, privatization or elimination of social safety-nets would put Libya’s
most vulnerable populations squarely between the hammer and anvil, since the violent
transition from a previously stable system and widespread violence can be expected to
raise civilian needs for food, housing and medicine.
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Civilian Displacement and Death
The Libyan civil war, and international intervention in that war, indirectly and directly
resulted in an incalculable human toll. The excessive violence employed by the Qaddafi
regime against civilian demonstrators and rebels was well documented and publicized in
order to provide the rationale for a large-scale international intervention. What has
been less well documented and publicized are the human costs of the war resulting
from international intervention. In the immediate wake of the conflict, between
February 20 and March 2, 2011, some 180,000 people fled Libya. 130 In the four months
following international intervention, that number more than tripled, with hundreds of
thousands seeking refuge in neighboring countries as the conflict spread and
intensified. 131 After coalition and NATO forces entered the conflict, Qaddafi attempted
to use the growing refugee population as a weapon by deliberately sending boats full of
refugees across the Mediterranean to punish Europe (Italy in particular) for the NATO
intervention. 132 Though the US and Europe sent humanitarian and logistical support to
the refugees in the initial stages of the conflict, 133 once NATO joined the war it did not
do nearly enough to rescue those who fled the conflict.
Some 1,500 Africans fleeing Libya during the NATO bombing campaign died at sea in
NATO-patrolled waters, in some cases dying of exposure and thirst as NATO ships sat
idly by. Amnesty International has called for an investigation into whether this apparent
indifference to the victims of the humanitarian crisis constitutes a violation of
international law. 134 Thus far, NATO has been unwilling to admit any wrongdoing in
these cases. When NATO Secretary General Anders Rasmussen was asked about a
particularly egregious case in which 68 Africans died of exposure after repeatedly
signaling NATO ships for help, he answered “we have nothing to hide.” 135 The true
scope of this type of human tragedy has not been adequately assessed or scrutinized. In
light of these documented examples of callous disregard for human life on both sides
during the war, it is especially important to consider the degree to which international
intervention, and NATO’s military action in particular, may have actually worsened the
humanitarian crisis, and if anyone can or should be held responsible.
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Despite repeated acknowledgements of
unintended civilian casualties during the war,
NATO has failed to conduct a serious investigation
of the civilian casualties caused by the thousands
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of sorties it conducted to attack ground targets in
Libya. Many of NATO’s airstrikes were directed
against targets in Tripoli and other relatively
densely populated metropolitan areas in Libya, making collateral damage unavoidable.
The UN recently produced a study which found that NATO killed at least 60 civilians and
wounded 55 others during the intervention. 136 However, this finding was based on a
study of only 20 airstrikes out of 9,970 total strikes conducted by NATO/coalition forces
during the war (108 strike sorties and 162 cruise missile strikes conducted by coalition
forces during “Operation Odyssey Dawn,” 137 and 9,700 strike sorties conducted by
NATO during the “Operation Unified Protector” 138). Thus the UN study covered a sample
of barely 0.2% of cases! It would be absurd to conclude that any study of such a small
sample of cases would provide a close approximation of the total numbers of civilian
casualties resulting from all NATO/coalition airstrikes. Yet the report of “at least” 60
civilians killed and 55 injured has been presented repeatedly in the media without
proper contextualization, as if those numbers represented a plausible final count. It
would be more reasonable to use the findings of such a study to extrapolate the average
ratio of airstrikes to civilian casualties, and use that ratio to derive an estimate of the
number of total civilian casualties resulting from NATO strikes.
… it is reasonable to conclude
that NATO and coalition
airstrikes directly caused
civilian casualties numbering in
the thousands.
Of the 20 airstrikes investigated in the study, five strikes (a quarter of all cases studied)
resulted in the 60 civilian deaths and 55 injuries reported by the UN. 139 If this ratio of
airstrikes to civilian casualties xv is extrapolated to include all cases of coalition airstrikes,
it would indicate that NATO-coalition strikes may have directly caused nearly 30,000
civilian deaths and over 27,000 injuries. As stated above, these numbers are merely
indicated by the trend provided by the most rigorous study of civilian casualties
conducted to date by the UN in the wake of international intervention, and do not
represent a finding or an assertion of probability. Obviously, the type and location of
targets varied widely, and not all airstrikes were conducted in densely-populated civilian
areas, so the rate of airstrikes to casualties must vary. Unfortunately, analysts can only
work with the available data. If NATO or the UN conducts a more thorough assessment
of the deaths and injuries caused to innocent civilian bystanders as a result of
international intervention, they may be able to demonstrate that their actions were not
as damaging in terms of human life as indicated by the data they have collected thus far.
However, until such a study is conducted, it is irresponsible to assume that a sample of
xv
The average rate of civilian casualties indicated by the UN study is 12 civilians killed/11 civilians injured
per every 4 strikes, or 3 civilians killed/2.75 civilians injured.
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barely 0.2% of cases would provide anything other than a tiny fraction of the real civilian
toll of NATO-coalition airstrikes. Rather, it is reasonable to conclude that NATO and
coalition airstrikes directly caused civilian casualties numbering in the thousands.
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Regional Instability
International intervention and the toppling of
Libya’s government also led to a massive influx
of weapons into the black market. Illicit arms
sales and trafficking in Libya and its surrounding
countries has greatly increased since the
conflict, as military arms caches suddenly
became available to looters and rebels, 140 and
as weapons like shoulder-launched anti-tank
missiles supplied to the rebels by Qatar and
141
France during the conflict have lost their usefulness in Libya. For example, weapons
from the war in Libya have been found in the hands of smugglers crossing Egypt presumably for sale to Palestinian militants or other armed groups in Egypt and the
Middle East 142 - and Somali pirates. 143
…the members of the
international community that
supported and carried out the
intervention, NATO in particular,
bear much of the responsibility
for the regional instability it
caused.
The collapse of the Qaddafi regime has also had specific and dire consequences for
stability in the region. The massive influx of displaced people and heavy weapons has
given increased confidence and capabilities to the Tuareg rebels currently carving out a
new country for themselves in the north of Mali. Tuareg militias had a long-running
alliance with Qaddafi, who offered Tuareg fighters the opportunity to serve in the Libyan
military as an alternative to battling the governments of their home nations, primarily
Mali and Niger, where the Tuaregs have long felt marginalized. Qaddafi previously
helped negotiate a truce between the government of Niger and Tuareg rebels in that
country, which earned him the gratitude of both sides of that conflict. 144 The Tuaregs
have also been fighting on and off for years in the north of Mali in an effort to found an
independent homeland for their people in an area of the Sahara called Azawad.
However, the collapse of the Libyan state has turned the low-level insurgency in Mali
into a full-blown war of secession.
During the Libyan civil war, the government of Mali made clear its belief that the
collapse of the Qaddafi regime would badly destabilize the region, xvi in large part
because of the number of Tuaregs who would likely return home from Libya in the wake
of such a collapse, and thus stressed its support for the kind of negotiated solution
xvi
This same objection was voiced by Brazil, Germany and India when explaining their lack of support for
international military intervention, which indicates that this consequence was entirely foreseeable.
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advocated by the AU. 145 Unsurprisingly, the Tuaregs were among those targeted for
persecution by the Libyan rebels during and after the conflict, even those who were just
in Libya to work and were not involved in the fighting. Despite a specific agreement
between the NTC and Nigerien, Malian and Tuareg leaders ensuring the fair treatment
of Libya’s Tuareg population, the NTC failed to live up to its commitment to protect the
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Tuaregs from the same type of abuse visited on other black Africans by the Libyan
146
rebels. As a result, tens of thousands of Tuaregs fled the country or went into hiding.
The rebels in Mali were bolstered by a sudden surge of disciplined veteran fighters
returning from Libya, and were consequently able to push Malian government forces
out of most of the country using weapons brought to Mali in the wake of the Libyan Civil
War. After defeating Malian government forces, the Tuareg rebels declared the
independence of the new state of Azawad, 147 and the government of Mali was
overthrown by a military coup in response to the army’s humiliating defeat. The Tuareg
rebels now fight amongst themselves for control of Azawad, and the government of
Mali may yet attempt to re-conquer its lost territory, prolonging the conflict and
exacerbating the suffering of civilians in Mali and Azawad. Azawad appears likely to
become a new haven for Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), and will therefore
pose a lasting danger to security in the region. 148
The devastating civil war and subsequent anarchy in Libya served as a boon to illicit
arms sales throughout the region, and specifically as a catalyst for a brutal ongoing civil
war in Mali. Members of the UN Security Council and the AU warned NATO in advance
that exactly this type of regional destabilization would occur as a result of sudden,
violent regime change in Libya. The civil war, in turn, would not have been successful in
forcing a regime change without international intervention. Thus the members of the
international community that supported and carried out the intervention, NATO in
particular, bear much of the responsibility for the regional instability it caused.
Undermining international norms, “R2P”
The international intervention in Libya may have
lasting consequences for UN-sanctioned
humanitarian intervention, and the developing
norm of “Responsibility to Protect” (R2P). The
Security Council authorization to use force comes
from the “Responsibility to Protect” clause,
adopted by UN member states in 2005, designed
to prevent the world’s powers from doing
nothing in the face of blatant genocide, ethnic cleansing or crimes against humanity. 149
Military intervention in Libya was and is promoted as an exemplary R2P operation; the
UN mandate authorized NATO to take “all necessary measures to protect civilians under
Framing regime change
operations as R2P operations is
ultimately detrimental to the
credibility of the states that call
for and conduct such operations,
and of the R2P norm itself.
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threat of attack” 150 from Qaddafi’s forces, “excluding a foreign occupation force of any
form on any part of Libyan territory…” 151 The resolution did not advocate the targeted
killing of Qaddafi and his family, or the unrestricted destruction of the Libyan military
and government. The UN froze the assets of Libyan government officials, and called on
the Libyan government to uphold its obligations under international law to protect
civilians. It also called for both sides of the conflict to observe an immediate ceasefire.
These measures would not have been taken if the UN Security Council intended to
authorize the targeted killing of Libyan government officials, or the destruction of one
side’s forces for the benefit of the other. Therefore, in theory the UN Security Council
authorized an R2P operation exclusively to protect civilian non-combatants threatened
with ruthless military force, and not to take sides in the civil war.
In reality, NATO operated as if the rebel fighters were the “civilians” they had come to
protect, and treated all government forces and facilities as legitimate targets regardless
of any discernible threat to civilians. At the beginning of Operation Odyssey Dawn,
NATO/coalition forces immediately began attacking targets in Tripoli and other parts of
the country. NATO cooperated closely with rebel forces to help them resume and
maintain offensive operations. States like France, Britain and Qatar sent money,
weapons, equipment, 152 and in some cases ground forces 153 to help the rebels take on
Qaddafi’s superior forces.
NATO and international forces clearly conducted operations far in excess of the UN
mandate to protect civilian life, even going so far as to directly harm civilians, as
discussed above. The UN mandate was worded broadly enough to provide intervention
forces with maximum flexibility in terms of the tactics they used to guard civilians,
including establishing a no-fly zone, which inherently involved attacking Libyan planes
and ground-based air defenses nation-wide. However, NATO exploited the international
support for a humanitarian mission, justified by the R2P norm, to press home an
opportunity to remove a long-time foe.
Realpolitik observers should not be surprised to see an alliance of some of the world’s
most powerful states capitalizing on a political opportunity to further one of their longterm strategic objectives, namely undermining and removing unfriendly regimes around
the world. However, for those interested in the promotion of international laws and
norms, the implications of this type of cynical “bait-and-switch” intervention should not
be taken lightly. Framing regime change operations as R2P operations is ultimately
detrimental to the credibility of the states that call for and conduct such operations, and
of the R2P norm itself.
One need only look at the example of Syria to illustrate this point. In Syria, the UN,
NATO and the Arab League would have a stronger argument for intervention than they
had in Libya if the cases were compared purely on humanitarian grounds. The Libyan
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
opposition was originally quite limited in size, and turned violent almost immediately,
burning and looting and attacking police - behavior which would invite a violent
government response practically anywhere in the world, including the United States.
The Syrian opposition, on the other hand, remained predominantly peaceful for months,
turning the proverbial cheek to completely disproportionate and inexcusable
Page | 32
government violence.
However, even with an arguably more compelling case to be made for serious action to
be taken against the Assad regime in Syria, the same actors who pushed the
authorization for intervention in Libya through the UN Security Council have been
unable to convince Russia and China to acquiesce to similar initiatives for strong
international action in Syria. Granted this may be because Russia and China value the
Assad regime more highly than they did Qaddafi. Nevertheless, it is also undoubtedly a
result of the way in which the authorization for a limited humanitarian intervention was
exploited to force a regime change in Libya. The international intervention in Libya has
discredited NATO as a good-faith agent of UN-sanctioned humanitarian intervention,
and has therefore undermined the development of R2P as an international norm. The
international military intervention in Libya has demonstrated the potential for abuse of
R2P as simply another tool used to create political cover for powerful and influential
states to pursue their geostrategic interests.
Another circumstance which lends weight to this view was the way in which some NATO
members and members of the AU decried the appearance of Western paternalism
inherent in the intervention, 154 and warned in advance of the likelihood that
intervention would result in untold civilian casualties and predictable regional
destabilization. 155 Even members of the Arab League, some of Qaddafi’s most vocal
opponents, who originally lent legitimacy to the intervention by giving Resolution 1973
their political support, quickly criticized NATO for its heavy-handedness, and its
apparent abandonment of the spirit of the resolution. 156
NATO’s failure to support the AU-led efforts to bring both sides to the table further
underscored the paternalistic character of its intervention. NATO intervened in an
African civil war for the purpose of determining its outcome, while demonstrating utter
disdain for the norms and values of the African Union. One of the guiding principles of
the AU is to maintain stability on the continent by supporting the norm of regime
security - preventing the violent overthrow of African regimes, by internal or external
forces - and facilitating dialogue whenever possible to resolve political problems. This is
a source of bitterness on the part of many AU members towards NATO and the NTC in
the aftermath of the war. 157 For example, South Africa and other AU members long
refused to recognize the NTC as the legitimate government of Libya, and resisted
attempts to unfreeze Libyan state assets to make them available to the NTC. 158 South
Africa’s President Jacob Zuma delivered a speech to the UN in January 2012 in which he
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expounded upon the underrepresentation of African interests and opinions in the
conduct of the UN sanctioned NATO intervention, claiming that “[t]he AU’s plan was
completely ignored in favour of bombing Libya by NATO forces.” 159 South Africa’s
Ambassador to the UN has also called for an investigation into the war crimes
committed by all sides in the war, including the rebels and NATO. 160
Elections in Libya
The stated goal of the NTC was to transition Libya
to democracy by stewarding the country until
elections could take place. Considering the state of
Libya since the civil war, it is unsurprising that the
elections were repeatedly postponed amid
mounting violence against the electoral process.
On July 1, for example, “[h]undreds of armed
protesters… attacked the offices of Libya’s election
commission in two cities, Benghazi and Tobruk, in
anger over the way seats in next week’s [July 7]
planned election for a constituent assembly were distributed among the country’s
regions.” 161 The protesters smashed computers needed for the election, and burned
ballots and ballot boxes. 162 On July 6, a helicopter carrying ballots for the twice
rescheduled July 7 election was attacked by militias near Benghazi, killing one person. 163
Parliamentary elections were held on July 7 with an estimated 65 percent turnout,
despite boycotts by some groups. The parliament consists of 200 seats, with 80 of those
set aside for political parties, while the other 120 were open to individuals. Violence
plagued the elections, with multiple reports of shootouts around polling stations in the
east, and non-uniformed militias supervising voting at other locations; in some areas of
the east and south polling stations had to be closed, or never opened. Though they
admitted there were multiple cases of violence, along with incidents of theft and
burning of ballots, 164 international observers from Europe judged the election to be
“reasonably free and fair.” 165
The violence leading up to the
elections, particularly in and
around Benghazi, has
demonstrated a strong sense
among eastern Libyan’s that
Cyrenaica should hold more
power than Tripolitania in the
new government.
The NTC Officially re-divided the country into Tripolitania, Cyrenaica and Fezzan for the
purposes of parliamentary seats, which shows that the NTC acknowledged the reality of
those regions’ differences. That may have been be a mistake though, as local groups
clashed over the amount of parliamentary seats granted to each region right up until the
election, dredging up more ethnic animosity. The violence leading up to the elections,
particularly in and around Benghazi, has demonstrated a strong sense among eastern
Libyans that Cyrenaica should hold more power than Tripolitania in the new
government. This is based on their perception that the outcome of the war was largely a
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victory of the east over the west. Therefore, many in the east remain distrustful of
western Libyans, and object to any political arrangement based on the democratic
principle of proportionate representation for the more populous west.
The party that won the most votes was the National Forces Alliance, headed by former
Page | 34
Qaddafi government technocrat and defector, Mahmoud Jibril. Jibril, who received a
Ph.D. and taught at university in the US, served in several NTC leadership roles, including
Interim Prime Minister, during the civil war. Prior to the election, Jibril was characterized
as staunchly pro-Western and anti-Islamist. His party’s win is viewed as a victory for the
NATO governments that enabled the NTC to take power, but Jibril’s politics and
secularism run a high risk of sparking Islamist ire – the party that came in second is allied
with the Muslim Brotherhood. The majority of contested seats to the new parliament
were outside party lines though, with the likely consequence of local representatives
having been elected along tribal rather than political lines.
Despite the spectacle of elections, the extent of the new government’s power is still
unclear. Despite officially transferring power to the new government, Libya is still using
the interim constitution drafted by the NTC. (It is worth noting that the NTC twice
managed to run afoul of its own constitution, with the Supreme Court appointed by the
NTC declaring two of the NTC’s laws unconstitutional, including a law punishing any
praise for the previous regime, or any criticism of the revolution or the NTC, with
imprisonment.) 166 The interim constitution was intended to serve as the basis for law in
the country until the elected government could draft a full constitution. However, in one
of its last official acts, the NTC removed the new government’s mandate to draft a
constitution, instead assigning that job to a separate council to be selected at an
unspecified date. 167 The new constitution is scheduled to be drafted sometime next
year, but it remains unclear exactly how or when the committee will be selected.
While the abilities of the newly elected government are yet to be seen, they will have to
placate multiple, disparate and armed militias while the population looks to them to
deliver much-needed services and rebuild Libya’s infrastructure. The election could be a
positive step towards stability, but the act of voting for a parliament in and of itself
means almost nothing. The ability of the new government to improve the lives of
Libyans, rein in the disparate armed groups, including militias formerly controlled by the
NTC, and to succeed in forming a legitimate and functioning constitution will be critical
for Libya’s future. If they cannot accomplish these feats, it seems realistic that another
civil war, this time of secession, is likely to be waged by whichever regions feel the most
excluded from the political and economic pie.
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Conclusion
On October 20, 2011, Muammar Qaddafi was killed
by opposition forces following a NATO strike on his Page | 35
convoy, essentially ending a nine-month civil war
for control over Libya. Many media outlets hailed
the death of Colonel Qaddafi and his regime as the
end of an oppressive dictatorship and a victory for
human rights in the Arab World. The transition to a new government was to be popular
and democratic. However, this narrative conceals a much more complicated and chaotic
reality.
The consequences of the civil
war have been devastating to
human security in Libya, and to
security in the broader region.
There were undoubtedly many people who took part in the demonstrations that rocked
Libya in the early days of the revolt, and in the war against Qaddafi, who saw the role of
the revolution as liberating the Libyan people from an autocrat. But the cultural,
political and religious rifts that sparked the rebellion did not begin with Qaddafi’s rule.
In fact, Libya had historically been not one but three distinct nations – Tripolitania,
Cyrenaica, and Fezzan – each with its own history and cultural affiliations. When the UN
created the unified state of Libya in 1951, King Idris, formerly the Emir of Cyrenaica, was
put in charge of the whole country, but his popularity with Libyans never made it far
beyond the borders of Cyrenaica. Likewise, when an Army officer from Tripolitania led a
successful coup in 1969, fewer people cheered in Cyrenaica than in the rest of the
country. After attempting to foster greater cultural and national unity, Qaddafi soon
reverted to ethnic and tribal politics to strengthen his grip on power. Qaddafi faced
simmering unrest in Cyrenaica, particularly in its old capital, Benghazi, during his entire
reign. It was this historical rivalry that exploded in February, 2011, paving the way for a
civil war that would plunge Libya into turmoil.
The consequences of the civil war have been devastating to human security in Libya, and
to security in the broader region. An unknown number of civilians, probably many
thousands, lost their lives in the conflict, and many more were internally displaced or
fled to neighboring countries as refugees. Furthermore, there were widespread reports
of extreme violence on the part of NTC troops against Qaddafi loyalists, rival ethnic
groups, and black African immigrants, including extra-judicial detention, torture, rape
and murder. The shock waves of the civil war have gone far beyond the borders of Libya.
Arms and refugees have poured across Libya’s borders with Tunisia, Algeria, Niger,
Chad, Sudan and Egypt. Nearby Mali has fallen into a crisis following the seizure of most
of their country by Tuareg rebels – many of whom had been trained and employed by
Libya – and the subsequent military coup in the capital of what remains of Mali.
Weapons from Libya have found their way as far as Somalia and Egypt, and armed
Libyan fighters from elsewhere in Africa have scattered across the region. The full
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impact of these developments may not be fully felt or realized for months, and even
years.
These consequences – lawlessness and chaos, widespread human rights abuses,
economic turmoil and regional instability – were entirely foreseeable, because they are
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almost universal symptoms of war. In fact, these consequences were predicted by
168
foreign policy experts from major think tanks, and by countries like Germany, India
and Brazil, all of which refused to endorse NATO-coalition intervention in Libya based on
their foresight regarding the impact of such an intervention on domestic and regional
security. These outcomes were especially predictable in the case of Libya, where it was
well known throughout the conflict that the fledgling rebel leadership was far from
cohesive, and lacked the resources and legitimacy to control the rebel forces, let alone
the general population. No matter how righteous their cause might have been, the
Libyan opposition was clearly unprepared to govern the whole of the country. The
transition to a new government has been violent and tumultuous. Since the NTC was
never able to gain control over large swaths of the country, let alone govern effectively
or defend Libya against external threats, the new government is at best inheriting a
partially unified country.
The members of NTC are certainly culpable for the crimes that were committed on their
watch. Many members of the NTC were responsible for convincing the international
community to train and equip forces over which the NTC had no real control, and to
provide them with decisive support in overthrowing the government of Libya. They also
made commitments to restore law and order to the country, and to stop atrocities from
occurring, and they failed on both counts. 169 Human Rights Watch has pointed out that
the ICC has ongoing jurisdiction in Libya, and that any crimes against humanity could be
referred there. 170 However, the NTC and its allied militias treated the ICC with disdain,
and at times, open hostility. For example, the ICC and the NTC both attempted to put
Seif al-Islam Qaddafi on trial for war crimes, but the NTC virulently disputed the ICC’s
claim to jurisdiction. Since the NTC so clearly failed to establish a fair and functional
justice system, the ICC could not yield jurisdiction over Seif al-Islam’s case to them.
When the ICC sent a team to interview Seif al-Islam, in part to ensure that his legal
rights are protected, the ICC staff were arrested and detained for a month. The incident
“raised further doubt about the government’s competence and its understanding of the
legal process.” 171
If this aggression could be attributed to any sort of strategic calculus, it was likely
intended to signal the tone of Libya’s future relationship with the ICC. Former members
of the NTC and members of the new Libyan regime may themselves be at risk of
prosecution by the ICC for all the crimes committed by the forces ostensibly under their
command. However, it is important to note that unlike other cases in which the ICC has
been able to indict high-ranking leaders for the crimes committed by troops under their
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
direct or indirect command, it would be more difficult to establish a clear line of
accountability for the disparate militias and armed groups operating in Libya today.
Indicting NATO members and states like Qatar for arming and protecting these groups
might be an alternative approach, albeit a politically unrealistic one. Ultimately, NATO
and other members of the international community who supported military action bear Page | 37
direct responsibility for creating this completely predictable humanitarian crisis. NATO’s
intervention not only undoubtedly prolonged and intensified the Libyan Civil War, and in
doing so achieved its ultimate goal of toppling the Qaddafi regime, but it knowingly
allowed the country to fall into the hands of incapable and inexperienced
administrators.
It follows that NATO leaders and planners either:
(a) were unable to foresee the predictable political and security problems that their
actions would help create;
(b) understood the ramifications of their actions and were indifferent to the harm that
might come to the people of Libya and Africa more broadly; (or)
(c) calculated that whatever the potential negative consequences of their intervention
were, they would be outweighed by the goal of removing Qaddafi from power.
The latter seems the most likely scenario, and for better or for worse, gives NATO
leaders and planners the benefit of the doubt. It is, however, entirely possible that a
combination of all three circumstances may have been true at different levels of
command, and during different phases of the operation, especially considering the fact
that NATO was willing to take actions that were certain to cause collateral damage and
kill or harm civilians. Thus, it must be concluded that at the very least, NATO likely
considered the predictable consequences of the war to be acceptable costs for the
removal of Qaddafi.
The UN also bears responsibility for authorizing an R2P operation and then failing to rein
in overly aggressive rules of engagement amounting to a regime-change mission. R2P
was designed to facilitate international intervention in cases of genocide or other types
of dire human rights abuses, such as Rwanda in 1994, when nearly a million people were
murdered by machete while the UN and the world stood idly by. NATO’s abuse of this
new international norm for the purposes of supporting one side of a civil war will mar
the case of future peoples asking the international community for protection against
atrocity. Members of the UN Security Council that are interested in protecting
perpetrators of human rights abuse will now be able to plausibly accuse others of
sponsoring intervention for the purpose of imposing regime change for their own
geostrategic gain. This has played out already in Syria, where Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian
president, has counted on Russia’s UN veto against military intervention in Syria to aid
civilians. Russia’s case for protecting the Assad government would surely be weaker
without the precedent of Libya, where NATO appears to have made the case for
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
protecting civilians in order to replace a disliked leader. Thus the Libyan Civil War will
have a lasting impact on the role of international interventions in internal conflicts.
Causing the collapse of any government without adequate planning and preparation to
effectively manage the aftermath of such a collapse is irresponsible and morally
reprehensible. This includes ensuring a sufficient dedication of manpower, resources
and political will on the part of intervening powers before upending an entire society.
One would think that the persistent violence resulting from the regime change
operations and under-resourced occupations of both Afghanistan and Iraq should have
driven home this lesson for NATO members. Instead, NATO’s actions in the 2011 Libyan
Civil War have discredited the organization as a good-faith broker of R2P intervention,
and increased the dangers of Islamist extremism in the Maghreb over the long run.
Furthermore, the international intervention in Libya has further tarnished the
reputations of the UN and the ICC as stewards of international justice. The failure of the
UN to support the AU’s efforts to forge a peace plan or to rein in NATO once the true
nature of its intervention became clear has highlighted a general disregard for African
interests and sovereignty. The failure of the ICC to uniformly prosecute offenders of
international law from all factions involved in the Libyan Civil War has further
undermined the international credibility of that court, and the laws it purports to
uphold.
Ultimately, the most dire and immediate consequences of the war will continue to play
out for ordinary Libyans, and for Africans across the region. NATO apparently considers
these consequences to be acceptable. The question that remains is whether or not the
judgment of history will agree with their assessment.
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The Libyan Civil War: Context and Consequences
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