Donald Hank says:
If the below report is true, then a reasonable layperson's analysis might be this:
The EU has overextended itself politically, economically and militarily.
1--Politically: It has always been a de facto dictatorship. It was originally touted as a strictly economic scheme and the trusting nations of Europe bought it on that basis. Then, surprise, it started adding massive bureaucratic trappings, mostly of a political nature -- a court of justice, a Constitution, a Parliament, a Commission, a ministry of foreign affairs, etc, whose functions went way beyond the economic realm and into the everyday lives of every European. Result: It now looks a lot like an empire, but without the usual sense of nationhood that has typically supported empires in the past.
No one loves the European flag. Yet, oblivious to the fact that people can be controlled indefinitely only if they love their nation or have some traditional loyalties to it, they have threatened people who refuse to fly the EU flag. They have also made and enforced laws favoring the Muslim minority but discriminating against the Christians majority.
Because of its strong-arm tactics and its contempt for the people the EU pretends to rule, euroskeptics are gathering strength everywhere and the popularity of the European central government is on the wane. UK citizens in a recent poll have said they want out. The analogies with the USSR are too numerous to mention.
2--Economically: The EU started pushing for an end to national currencies. For example, it pushed aside the Deutschmark, which if left intact today, would easily outperform the euro. Then it started taking from the rich nations to give to the poor nations. Keen observers knew, for example, that Greece was not really eligible to join ranks with richer nations with a more mature sense of fiscal responsibility. But the motive was not to have peers join together in common cause but rather to redistribute the wealth Marxian style. Most were deceived into believing the "communism is dead" narrative. They couldn't quite grasp that Marx's wealth redistribution scheme doesn't have to apply only to individuals or groups within nations. It can -- and did -- apply on a nation-to-nation level. The EU Comrades gave "to each according to his need" without concern for the corollary: "from each according to his ability." Italy is the latest domino to have fallen in a cascading collapse and there is no one left to bail it out.
3--Militarily: The EU joined forces with the UN and the US to oust stable leaders in the Middle East and replace them with whoever screamed the loudest, destroyed more property and burned more tires. De facto, parading as "democracy" or "freedom," it was a veritable blood bath for Christians. The Assyrian Christians were forced to flee Iraq. The Copts are fleeing Egypt. 1000 Christians were slaughtered in the Ivory Coast in an area under UN control. And so on. The last nation they attacked, Libya, resisted, and now they -- and their US partners -- are out of options.
On the whole, the sum total of the EU's efforts has redounded to a stinging defeat on all fronts.
Economically, militarily and politically, the EU looks to be headed for the dust bin of history.
Don Hank
The Libyan War ends. Obama makes Moscow peace broker. NATO halts strikes DEBKAfile Exclusive Report July 14, 2011, 11:42 AM (GMT+02:00)
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Pro-Qaddafi rally in Tripoli
Bar the shouting, the war in Libya virtually ended Thursday morning, July 14, when US President Barack Obama called Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to hand Moscow the lead role in negotiations with Muammar Qaddafi for ending the conflict - provided only that the Libyan ruler steps down in favor of a transitional administration.
The US president thus accepted the Russian-Libyan formula for ending the war over the heads of the NATO chiefs who rejected it when they met Russian leaders at the Black Sea resort of Sochi last week.
The US president thus accepted the Russian-Libyan formula for ending the war over the heads of the NATO chiefs who rejected it when they met Russian leaders at the Black Sea resort of Sochi last week.
DEBKAfile's sources note that this same proposal first came from the Libyan ruler himself four months ago: On April 4, just ten days after NATO launched its air operation on behalf of the Libyan rebels, Qaddafi sent emissaries to Athens to propose Greek Prime Minister Georges Papandreou as mediator. The heads of NATO, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister David Cameron, turned him down, certain at the time they were within easy reach of a quick victory to topple him.
By the time Obama had decided to call Medvedev, individual governments which had spearheaded the anti-Qaddafi campaign were quietly melting away.
From Saturday, July 9, DEBKAfile's military sources report, NATO discontinued its air strikes against Libyan pro-government targets in Tripoli and other places. The halt though unannounced was nonetheless an admission that 15,000 flight missions and 6,000 bombardments of Qaddafi targets had failed to achieve their object: Col. Qaddafi, without deploying a single fighter jet, firing an anti-air missile or activating terrorist cells in Europe, had waited for NATO to run out of steam and was still in power.
From Saturday, July 9, DEBKAfile's military sources report, NATO discontinued its air strikes against Libyan pro-government targets in Tripoli and other places. The halt though unannounced was nonetheless an admission that 15,000 flight missions and 6,000 bombardments of Qaddafi targets had failed to achieve their object: Col. Qaddafi, without deploying a single fighter jet, firing an anti-air missile or activating terrorist cells in Europe, had waited for NATO to run out of steam and was still in power.
In an overview of the war to British air force commanders Wednesday, July 13, British Defense Secretary Liam Fox remarked that while no one knows when it will end, British ground corps, naval and air forces do not have the means to continue the war.
He admitted candidly that sustaining the high tempo of air strikes by RAF Tornado and Typhoons, as well as Navy warships and Army Apache attack helicopters, did "increase the pressure on both personnel and equipment as planning assumptions are tested, and it tests the ability of defense companies to support front-line operations."
In early June, DEBKAfile's military sources reported that NATO was short of warplanes for enforcing the no- fly zone over Libyan air space approved by the UN Security Council, its arsenals of smart bombs and missiles were depleted and its stocks of munitions and replacement parts almost down to zero.
This has now been confirmed by the British defense secretary, who added that British and European military industries lack the capacity for supporting a war effort that goes beyond a few weeks.
This has now been confirmed by the British defense secretary, who added that British and European military industries lack the capacity for supporting a war effort that goes beyond a few weeks.
Our military sources disclose that Italy, a key player in NATO's military effort, last week secretly withdrew its Air Force Garibaldi-551 planes from the campaign - dealing the operation another grave setback.
And in the last 10 days, France has also scaled back the military assets it had invested in the fighting after despairing of the anti-Qaddafi rebels based in Benghazi ever making headway against Qaddafi's forces. First, Paris tried to transfer its backing from Benghazi to the secessionist Berber tribes fighting Qaddafi in Western Libya. On June 30, President Nicolas Sarkozy ordered weapons to be parachuted to the tribal fighters in western Libya, contrary to UN and NATO decisions. But the Berbers preferred to use the French guns for plundering towns and villages instead of fighting government forces.
And in the last 10 days, France has also scaled back the military assets it had invested in the fighting after despairing of the anti-Qaddafi rebels based in Benghazi ever making headway against Qaddafi's forces. First, Paris tried to transfer its backing from Benghazi to the secessionist Berber tribes fighting Qaddafi in Western Libya. On June 30, President Nicolas Sarkozy ordered weapons to be parachuted to the tribal fighters in western Libya, contrary to UN and NATO decisions. But the Berbers preferred to use the French guns for plundering towns and villages instead of fighting government forces.
On Monday, July 11, after that experience, Defense Secretary Gerard Longuet said it was time for talks to begin between Qaddafi and the rebels. Paris, he said, had asked the two sides to begin negotiations.
This was backhanded confirmation of the claim Qaddafi's son Saif al-Islam made to the French media that his father was engaged in contacts for ending the war through emissaries who met with President Sarkozy.
While Minister Longuet said the Libyan ruler cannot stay in power, he refrained from demanding his ouster by force or his expulsion from the country. This formula therefore came close to Qaddafi's terms for ending the war.
DEBKAfile's diplomatic sources hail the agreement Presidents Obama and Medvedev reached on terms for negotiating the war's end with Muammar Qaddafi as a major victory for the Libyan ruler and a resounding fiasco for NATO.
It also knocks over the international war crimes tribunal's demand to extradite Qaddafi and his sons as war criminals.
Instead of sitting in the dock of the world court, they will now take their seats at the negotiating table for a deal one of whose objects will be to rescue NATO from the humiliation of defeat at war. But its main purpose will be to agree on the shape of a regime for the transition to democracy and its makeup. Qaddafi, while consenting to step down, will not doubt insist on his sons and loyalists being co-opted with full privileges to the future administration in Tripoli. The rebels will take up the offer for lack of any other options.
Libyan diplomacy is liable to be protracted and exhausting with many ups and downs and perhaps even limited military engagements on the ground.
Instead of sitting in the dock of the world court, they will now take their seats at the negotiating table for a deal one of whose objects will be to rescue NATO from the humiliation of defeat at war. But its main purpose will be to agree on the shape of a regime for the transition to democracy and its makeup. Qaddafi, while consenting to step down, will not doubt insist on his sons and loyalists being co-opted with full privileges to the future administration in Tripoli. The rebels will take up the offer for lack of any other options.
Libyan diplomacy is liable to be protracted and exhausting with many ups and downs and perhaps even limited military engagements on the ground.
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