Hillary Emails Reveal True Motive for Libya Intervention

My thoughts on this recent article in the Foreign Policy Journal.

It's really nice to get to see commentary that was firmly in the realm of consipiracy theory become mainstream knowledge in so little time. In a way, we should maybe thank Clinton for mishandling of classified government information :)

Things that are known to be true:

(1) The "popular uprising" was heavily fueled by western operatives, who supplied “a seemingly endless supply of AK47 assault rifles and ammunition.” It can be assumed they were also given funding, intelligence, and, most importantly, moral support.
(2) The reason given for the no-fly-zone, to prevent genocide by the Gadaffi regime, was not genuine, as the rebels themselves routinely committed genocide against black and dark-skinned Libyans, including an entire town of 30,000.
(3) Libya was overthrown by the west, for western benefit, particularly the French. Most importantly, Libya's self-reliance (thanks to its oil reserves) and efforts to create North African economic zone, was considered intolerable to the elites of the western world. (That sounds like conspiracy talk, but it's basically the gist of the intelligence emails being sent to Clinton).
(4) Hillary Clinton, as Secretary of State, was provably in the know about all of these things, yet has repeatedly lied and misled about the events.


What may still be true, or I believe to be true:

(1) Western operatives were influential in compelling protests in the first place. Many accuse the Arab Spring of being largely a CIA operation, and it seems there is likely a bit of truth to that.
(2) While people like me rant until we're red-faced about the utter failure that was Libya, to those who drove events it was a wild success. The threat to the Francosphere has been muted, and Libyan oil has been liberated. We often think of the US and west as starting wars to get oil, but in this case it was most important to stop the oil, because it was not in our control. It is better that there is no oil, than to have it in the hands of those who rebuke western hegemony. The worst case going forward, for the western elites, is the same thing they proclaim as the ultimate goal: a new robustly democratic Libyan government. This is not likely to serve western interests any better than the democratic government of Iraq has served the US. Generally chaos is the best bet, so that north Africans won't stand united, and oil production will be, in the worst case, minimal. (In the best case, contracted to western energy companies.) Even a jihadi takeover isn't the worst case, so long as it's reasonably contained. If some Islamic warlord became very successful pumping and selling oil, they would simply be bombed in the name of the War on Terror. As you see, the Libyan oil reserves are now reasonably under control, and the aspirations for a north African economic zone have been squashed.
(3) For Hillary Clinton the whole operation was a big success. Not because she made the world a better place (she didn't) or because she dutifully served the American people (she didn't), but because she went to bat for the global order. She has proven herself to the sort of "establishment within the establishment" kind of people, the kind of people who can get unlimited arms and air support sent to Africa to protect innocent civilians, knowing damn well what the real story is. The goal for Libya was simply for disorder, and the mission was a brilliant success. It's only too bad that Clinton can't brag about her greatest achievement to the people she pretends to represent.