Militia Clash in Libya

[Susurrus]

http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/8/30834/World/Region/Breaking-Armed-clashes-erupt-in-central-Tripoli.aspx

[Obs]

Well, no-one saw this coming.

[ckaihatsu]

Some witnesses near the scene told AFP that forces from the new government's interior ministry tried on Tuesday to retake the intelligence building, provoking a clash with the militia group that is currently occupying it.


So is the militia group a new, non-NATO-bought-off grassroots fighting force -- ? If so, it would seem that they're *already* making some of those new oil contracts look shaky...!

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

So is the militia group a new, non-NATO-bought-off grassroots fighting force -- ? If so, it would seem that they're *already* making some of those new oil contracts look shaky...!

NATO guns/money doesn't give them mind control powers. There's nothing to stop people from taking NATO's guns and aid and then later on ignoring NATO directives. That's the problem with the simplistic internationalist-dualism whereby there are either NATO or anti-imperialist forces battling it out in an epic worldwide chess game. The militias all have their own interests.

[Obs]

The militias all have their own interests.
And, let's face it, all of them bourgeois.

[Agathor]

And, let's face it, all of them bourgeois.

I'd like to see you back that up.

They are clearly tribal nationalists, an ideology which pre-dates capitalism by maybe a million years. The militias are split amongst different tribes who have begun squabbling for a dominant role in government. The Misratan tribe believe that the fact that they fought hardest and for longest (they liberated Tripoli, killed Gadaffi) should earn them an elevated position in the new Libyan government. The other tribes naturally disagree.

On top of this we have an army run by an ex-Taliban fighter who is said to be keen to stage a coup if the government is insufficiently Islamic; a "transitional" government dominated by ex-Ghadaffi-ite neoliberal politicians and army officers, who are backed by NATO, which says it will attack the militias and army if they don't disarm, who would rather fight amongst themselves and/or go to Syria to fight Assad...

I had a nasty feeling about this war from the beginning.

[Obs]

I'd like to see you back that up.

They are clearly tribal nationalists, an ideology which pre-dates capitalism by maybe a million years. The militias are split amongst different tribes who have begun squabbling for a dominant role in government. The Misratan tribe believe that the fact that they fought hardest and for longest (they liberated Tripoli, killed Gadaffi) should earn them an elevated position in the new Libyan government. The other tribes naturally disagree.

On top of this we have an army run by an ex-Taliban fighter who is said to be keen to stage a coup if the government is insufficiently Islamic; a "transitional" government dominated by ex-Ghadaffi-ite neoliberal politicians and army officers, who are backed by NATO, which says it will attack the militias and army if they don't disarm, who would rather fight amongst themselves and/or go to Syria to fight Assad...

I had a nasty feeling about this war from the beginning.
You are out of your mind if you think any of the militias are anti-capitalist counter-revolutionaries. As for "tribal nationalism" predating capitalism by a million years - while tribal structures were likely present within primitive communism, the familial structure and the structure of the state, while obviously always modified by the mode of production present, is able to transcend this, since tribes traditionally exist outside the formation of the state. In other words, "tribal nationalism" and capitalism are not mutually exclusive. This, by definition, renders the interests of these militias bourgeois.

But yeah, this whole thing's a clusterfuck.

[brigadista]

Well, no-one saw this coming.

yes they did if they didnt read the western press -