Tag: Libya
Libya a decade from now
I got tired of writing about first steps in Libya and decided to lift my sights and write about scenarios ten years hence. Here is the result, published by foreignpolicy.com yesterday.
Ten years after the guns have finally been laid down, will Libya still be a mess?
BY DANIEL SERWER | AUGUST 22, 2011
Libya is currently consumed in that strange combination of joy and residual violence that marks the end of war. But instead of fixating on the events playing out on the streets of Tripoli these days, the world should focus on how the postwar scenario will play out over the next decade. What is the best we can hope for? What is the worst that can be imagined? Where in that is Libya likely to settle?
There are many worst-case scenarios. Muammar al-Qaddafi is doing his best, even now, to promote chaos and continued resistance, which in turn could inspire revenge killing or degenerate into internecine warfare. Continued chaos could tempt someone of his ilk — in the army or among the rebels — to seize power and concentrate it in his own hands, under the guise of restoring law and order. Renewed autocracy could engender continued resistance, leading to a downward spiral of violence and repression. An effort to seize power might also split the country. Indeed, Libya like so many places in Africa, was cobbled together from disparate provinces in the early 20th century; it wouldn’t be the first country to come apart along old fault lines.
Chaos, autocracy, and partition are only three of the perils facing Libya. The country has in the past produced a significant number of Islamist fighters and suicide bombers who targeted U.S. troops in Iraq. If Libya remains anarchic, areas outside the central government’s full control could become havens for extremists. The many unguarded weapons floating around Libya could also reach the international arms market, putting Stinger-type missiles or even chemical weapons into unfriendly hands. Worse, Libya’s new rulers could revive the Qaddafi-era nuclear program and make material and expertise available worldwide. And there has been little accounting of just how many weapons have been smuggled in more recently to aid the rebel cause.
Even if the immediate postwar chaos subsides, major risks lie ahead. Libya’s economy is dependent on oil and gas production. Qaddafi seems to have stowed most of the oil and gas revenue in banks abroad, leaving many Libyans destitute. Very few countries in which the government is able to fund itself from natural resources have developed in a liberal and democratic direction. Transparency and accountability are not easy to establish; perhaps only Norway and East Timor can really claim to have mastered this trick.
Nondemocratic states commonly suffer from competition over revenue gathered from natural resources. This struggle can become especially debilitating if the competition is complemented by ethnic, tribal, or regional fractures. There is ample reason to fear this scenario in Libya: While most Libyans are Arabs, some are what Americans call Berbers, who will unquestionably want to express their identity more openly than they were permitted in the past. Tribal distinctions are not strong in Libyan cities, but they persist in the countryside. Qaddafi was skillful at playing the tribes off against each other, but he was far less successful in co-opting the region around the northeastern city of Benghazi. That may become even more difficult in the post-Qaddafi period, as much of the oil and gas production is in the east.
What is the best we can hope for in Libya within the next 10 years?
The Transitional National Council has set out a constitutional charter that clearly points in a liberal democratic direction, albeit with Islam as the state religion and principal source of legislation. Plans call for preparation of a constitution (Libya had none under Qaddafi) within six months and elections within a year. That is overly rapid in my estimation, but if Libyan institutions cannot keep pace with democratization, there can always be postponements, as often happens in postwar situations. The important thing is that Libya not only develops a constitution that distributes power among its institutions and elections that determine who governs the state, but also a democratic culture of freedom of speech and association.
That will take more than a year or two to develop, but it shouldn’t take a decade. If Libya is to sustain a democratic culture, its government will have to learn the difficult art of accountability and transparency for oil and gas revenue. There can be no real democracy if oil and gas revenue goes to the government without any parliamentary control or public accounting, as happens in most Arab oil-producing countries. All citizens, regardless of tribe, ethnicity, or region, will need to feel that they are getting a fair share of Libya’s natural wealth.
Even if this occurs, Libya will still be in need of a major national reconciliation effort. The Qaddafi regime benefited a single family at the expense of a whole country, but significant numbers of people, especially in Tripoli and Sirte, supported the regime and reaped benefits from it in return. These people are going to be the object of discrimination, disdain, and even revenge in post-Qaddafi Libya. At some point in the next decade, the effort to document, discuss, and disseminate the historical record of the Qaddafi regime will be important to ensuring that the population can move beyond the past and enjoy a more promising future.
Where will things likely end up a decade from now? My prediction is that Libya will be messy — but closer to the democratic end of the spectrum than to the chaotic, autocratic, or partitioned outcomes. If the international community and Libyans themselves are clear about the goals they seek — a united and inclusive Libya, based on the rule of law, that can defend and sustain itself, using its oil and gas resources for the benefit of all its citizens — then we will come close to achieving the best-case scenario.
There will be setbacks, as there have been during the past six months, but there is no reason why Libya cannot follow in Tunisia’s footsteps toward a more open and peaceful society. With a great deal of effort and determination, it could even become a model for other Arab societies hoping to replace their brutal, unaccountable leaders with more just systems of government.
PS: Hard to resist posting Qaddafi’s rebel-appropriate golf cart:
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Next in Libya
Joshua Foust and I enjoy a tame bloggingheads:
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Rebuilding Libya: the first few steps
Theatlantic.com published my piece this morning:
Aug 22 2011, 6:39 AM ET
The most immediate challenges facing post-Qaddafi Libya
Reuters
Muammar Qaddafi’s finale in Libya is coming faster than even the rebels likely anticipated. They are reported to have arrested Saif al Islam, his favored son. If they take Qaddafi alive, the rebel leadership body Transitional National Council (TNC), or its successor organization, will presumably transfer him and his son to The Hague, for trial at the International Criminal Court. This would be a remarkable end to a 42-year reign as Libya’s chief governing authority and a first opportunity for the court to try a chief of state, even if he did not claim that title.
Some may prefer to try him in Tripoli, but it is going to be years before the Libyan courts are able to meet the necessary international standards. A show trial will not help Libya in its understandable passion to lay the foundations for a freer society.
Qaddafi’s continued resistance risks making the situation inside Libya far more chaotic than it need be. Some of his loyalists may go underground as people harmed by the regime seek revenge, rivalries among rebel groups may emerge, looting and rioting could break out, and criminal gangs are sure to try to take advantage of any disorder. Restoring public order will be job one, with restoring electricity, food, and water close behind. Oil installations will need to be protected, weapons depots guarded, and secret police files preserved. It is certainly a good sign that the rebels are reported to have thrown up a protective cordon around the National Museum.
The rebels say they believe everything will go smoothly, and they appear to have trained some police to protect sensitive infrastructure and maintain law and order. But hope is not a plan. They need to get things under control as quickly as possible, appealing for foreign help if need be.
European governments could step up to this challenge, since they are tied to Libya via gas pipelines that float beneath the surface of the Mediterranean. If Libya succumbs to chaos, it will be to Europe that refugees will flow, and mostly European investments in Libya that will be lost. Unfortunately, Washington seems to have allowed Europe to remain distracted with its own financial problems. There does not appear to be any serious plan for dealing with chaos in Libya, which could quickly turn into a humanitarian disaster. American boots definitely do not belong on the shores of Tripoli, but it has happened before and may happen again.
The TNC will have to be particularly alert to risks of revenge killings against Qaddafi loyalists, and of score-settling among rebels. They have already lost one of their military commanders, apparently to rebel-affiliated attackers who resented his role in Qaddafi’s army. In immediate post-war situations, the urge to exact quick justice is enormous. But allowing vigilantes to even the score will only lead to a spiral of violence that is hard to stop and inimical to democratic evolution.
Virtually overnight, the rebel leadership will need to shift its focus from fighting Qaddafi’s forces to protecting them. In the past few months, the local councils that have emerged in liberated areas have not generally allowed violence against regime supporters. But that is partly because many of Qaddafi’s loyalists have fled from newly liberated towns to Tripoli. Their concentration there and in his hometown of Sirte is going to make the challenge of transition much greater there than anyplace else in Libya.
It is critical that regime loyalists and rebels alike do not grab and “privatize” state assets, as often happens in chaotic moments and takes years to reverse. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, for example, the government has been trying for years to recover valuable mines from those who took possession of them during the civil war. The liberty Libyans have fought for will require massive rebuilding of the country’s infrastructure and economy, which is in miserable condition. Early efforts to ensure transparency and accountability could help Libya avoid the kind of corruption that has plagued Afghanistan and Iraq.
Only the most selfish and egotistical leader would fail to make arrangements to transfer power and try to avoid bloodshed. Tunisia’s President Zine el-Abidine ben Ali fled, but left the country with a constitutional succession that is enabling a relatively smooth transition. Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak tried to leave power in the hands of his vice president, a move negated only when the army stepped in. Yemen’s President Saleh has so far refused to allow a constitutional succession, leaving his country seized with violence.
Qaddafi is still calling on his supporters to fight and vowing to restore his own version of law and order in Tripoli. This is Qaddafi’s last misdeed. There is no constitution in Libya, so no clear constitutional succession. The revolutionaries have wisely written their own constitutional charter, but the real challenge will not be on paper. It will be in the avenues and alleys of Tripoli.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Qaddafi’s last misdeed
Muammar Qaddafi and his sons have apparently failed to arrange an orderly transition, leaving at least some of their loyalists lashing out in desperation against the inevitable as rebels enter Tripoli. This risks making the situation chaotic, if not desperate or even catastrophic.
While I certainly hope the rebels who believe everything will go smoothly are right, hope is not a plan. The Transitional National Council (TNC) likely now has a big mess on its hands. They need to get things under control as quickly as possible, appealing for foreign help if need be. Widespread looting and disorder would be a bad way to start the new regime, likely opening the door to someone who claims to be able to restore public order. Continuing shortages of food, water and electricity could also undermine the legitimacy and viability of the new regiome.
I have repeatedly hoped that the Europeans would step up to this challenge, since they are tied umbilically to Libya via gas pipelines that float beneath the surface of the Mediterranean, which is their great lake, not one of ours. We seem to have allowed Europe to remain distracted with its own financial problems. So far as I can tell, my recommendation of a several thousand person EU constabulary force for Tripoli will just not happen. I hope this does not mean NATO steps in, but that clearly is about the only backup capacity anyone has. American boots definitely do not belong on the ground in Tripoli, but it has happened before and may happen again.
The TNC needs to be particularly alert to revenge killing of Qaddafi loyalists, and settling of scores among the rebels. In immediate post-war situations, the urge to exact quick justice is enormous. If my children had died in these months of fighting and repression I would certainly be tempted to claim what justice I could rather than wait for a new regime to catch up with the miscreants. But allowing vigilantes to even the score will only lead to a spiral of violence that is hard to stop and inimical to democratic evolution.
The shift from fighting Qaddafi’s forces to needing to protect them will happen virtually overnight. Libyans have thus far been cognizant of this requirement in the areas liberated in the past few months. The local councils that have emerged are not to my knowledge organizing violence against regime supporters. But that is partly because many of Qaddafi’s loyalists have fled to Tripoli. Their concentration there, and the attachment of the Qaddafi leadership to the privilege and property the regime afforded them, is going to make the challenge of transition much greater than anyplace else in Libya.
Only the most selfish and egotistical leader would fail to make arrangements to transfer power and avoid bloodshed. Tunisia’s President Ben Ali fled, but left the country with a constitutional succession. Egypt’s Mubarak stepped down and tried to leave power in the hands of his vice president, a move negated only when the army stepped in, responding in part at least to a demand of the demonstrators. Yemen’s President Saleh has so far refused to allow a constitutional succession, leaving his country seized with violence.
This is Qaddafi’s last misdeed. There is no constitution in Libya. The revolutionaries have wisely written their own constitutional charter, but the real challenge will not be on paper but in the avenues and alleys of Tripoli.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Planning for Libya 2.0
I continue to plug preparation for post-Qaddafi Libya, which I looked at in some detail in a Contingency Planning Memorandum the Council on Foreign Relations published 10 days ago.
Foreign Policy last night published a new, updated piece I did for them, under the appropriate subhead:
Make no mistake: Qaddafi will be ousted, and probably sooner rather than later. That’s why the hard work of rebuilding Libya must start now.
Finally, it seems that Libya’s rebels have momentum on their side: They have pushed back Muammar al-Qaddafi’s forces on multiple fronts and are poised to encircle the capital of Tripoli. Libyans, and the entire world, will no doubt cheer the country’s liberation, but it’s not time to celebrate yet. Even if Qaddafi falls sooner rather than later, the immediate post-war period will still pose serious risks to both Libyans and the international community.
The stakes couldn’t be higher. A botched transition to a new regime could imperil the security and welfare in a post-Qaddafi Libya, discredit the NATO intervention, provide haven to international terrorists, lead to a new dictatorship, and even break up the country. We know from the experience in Iraq how costly a poorly planned transition can be.
The most pressing requirement will be reestablishing security. There’s no sign as of yet that Qaddafi intends to go quietly. On Aug. 15, he implored his supporters to “pick up your weapons, go to the fight for liberating Libya inch by inch from the traitors and from NATO.” Even if the regime collapses, remnants of his armed forces may take these words to heart. Tripoli presents the greatest challenge. While liberated areas in other parts of the country have stabilized quickly as Qaddafi’s forces and sympathizers fled, there is no guarantee that the same will hold true for the capital. Many regime supporters and mercenaries have gathered there, and could mount the kind of “stay-behind” operation that brought chaos to post-Saddam Hussein Iraq.
Security cannot be maintained for long without at least a rudimentary system for police, courts, and incarceration. These new institutions will be forced to grapple with internecine warfare among rebel or tribal factions, revenge killings, and criminal gangs. The Qaddafi-era institutions may suffice in the immediate post-war period, but thorough reforms will be needed if the rule of law is to be established on a more permanent basis.
Humanitarian requirements are also likely to be acute in Tripoli as well as other newly liberated population centers. Even in liberated areas, casualties and humanitarian requirements have not yet been fully assessed. Electricity outages are already reportedly severe in Tripoli, while Misrata has been in need of food shipments. Following Qaddafi’s fall, it will be vital to quickly restore basic services to these neighborhoods. Providing food, water, shelter, and health care for the most vulnerable — including what may amount to hundreds of thousands of internally displaced people — will also be key. An angry citizenry does not make for a smooth transition.
Kickstarting Libya’s economy will require getting its energy production and exports back online as quickly as possible. But it is not just a matter of getting the oil and gas flowing: A more transparent and accountable system for spending the resulting revenue, much of which used to disappear into Qaddafi family accounts, will be needed to help forestall quarrels over the proceeds and set the country on a more sustainable path. The post-Qaddafi regime will need to do a full accounting of its assets and try to ensure that some of them are not “privatized” by officials seeking to line their pockets.
Establishing transparent, accountable, and inclusive institutions of governance will be the responsibility of the Transitional National Council (TNC), which has now received diplomatic recognition from the United States as well as much of Europe and the Arab world. This will be key to determining Libya’s political future. The TNC’s inclinations are clearly in the democratic direction, but it has been rent by factionalism and disorganization. The killing of the rebel military chief Abdel Fatah Younes by what appears to be a dissident faction within the rebel ranks is only the most visible example of this internal chaos. In order to maintain its claim to legitimacy, the new government will need to swiftly incorporate new people from recently liberated areas and heal long-standing tribal and minority wounds.
The TNC should consider including officials formerly belonging to Qaddafi’s army and security services, who otherwise may try to spoil the transition. Just as de-Baathification harmed international efforts to construct a stable government in Iraq, premature de-Qaddafiization could create more problems than it solves. On the institutional level, it needs to lay out a roadmap for preparing a constitution, organizing national and local elections, and convening a parliament. This is a tall order for a government that recently disbanded its executive committee in the wake of Younes’s murder. Even in Egypt, where a solidly unified military remains in charge, the timing and order of these political events has posed knotty issues.
The international community has a role to play in this transition as well. It must lend its help to Libyans in overcoming the many challenges that they will face. The process should begin at the United Nations, where the coordinated effort to protect Libya’s civilians first began. A Security Council resolution could affirm that Libya should remain a single country, should be able to sustain and defend itself, should be committed to using the wealth of its natural resources in an equal and beneficial manner, and should be governed by inclusive institutions that respect the will of all its people and their human rights. This kind of internationally supported transition framing will help to ensure common purpose and coordination among the dozens of governments and hundreds of organizations likely to become involved, some of which are already providing assistance in liberated areas.
The United Nations, which authorized the NATO intervention, has both the funding and the credibility with Libyans to play a leadership role in the transition. From Washington’s perspective — which is no doubt to avoid getting embroiled in more nation building — it is also a relatively economical way to get things done, as the United States usually pays no more than one-third of the U.N. costs.
The European Union also has serious capabilities — in particular, the ability to deploy hundreds of paramilitary police needed to stabilize a city like Tripoli — which will likely need to be brought to bear. Several important European Union members, such as Italy, France, and Germany receive oil and gas supplies from Libya or have invested in Libyan energy production, and therefore have a vested interest in seeing the country manage its transition effectively. Europe, however, is preoccupied with its own financial difficulties. Libyan assets frozen in the United States and Europe will eventually provide ample financing, but wealthy Arab oil producers may be needed to meet Libya’s most immediate requirements.
The United Nations and the European Union should lead in assisting the Libya transition, but that does not exempt the United States from contributing. American logistics and intelligence have been vital to the NATO military operation and will likely also be crucial in the post-Qaddafi period. The United States is not completely devoid of interests in Libya, after all — it does not want sensitive materials from Libya’s nuclear and chemical weapons programs to get loose, for known terrorists to seek haven there, or for any Stinger-type anti-aircraft weapons to escape into the world arms markets. The United States will also want to make sure that NATO is prepared to step in if chaos threatens to break up Libya, re-install a dictator, or unleash a humanitarian crisis across North Africa and the Mediterranean.
Libyans have much to look forward to celebrating after a long and difficult conflict. But the really difficult challenges still lie ahead. The more we think through the challenges and prepare for them now, the easier it will be to meet the requirements later.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Qaddafi near the end, Bashar still bumping along
It’s only been a week or so since I published a Council on Foreign Relations paper on preparing for post-Qaddafi Libya. It looks as if we are going to be there before the end of the month, if not in Tripoli itself in most of the rest of the country. A high-level defection, talks in Tunisia between the regime and the rebels, an ineffectual Scud missile launch by Qaddafi’s forces and rebel penetration of more western Libyan towns all signal that Qaddafi is near the end of his road.
That will of course be cause for celebration, but the really tough challenge–a successful transition to a more democratic regime that can govern and defend united Libya while respecting the rights of all its people–lies ahead. The Transitional National Council (TNC) that Europe and the United States have recognized as the legitimate governing authority has good intentions and even some good plans, but implementation in the confused period after the fall of Qaddafi will be difficult at best.
It seems to me that the international community is already well behind the curve. It needs a new UN Security Council resolution laying out the goals, parameters and leadership for the post-Qaddafi period. The EU, preoccupied though it is with the problems of the euro, needs to be thinking about deployment of a paramilitary police force at TNC request to ensure public order in Tripoli, at least temporarily. Hoping it won’t be requested or needed is not a good plan.
The internationals are in worse shape in Syria, where they haven’t managed to pass even a Security Council resolution denouncing Bashar al Assad’s horrendous assaults on his own population. The Turkish national security council is planning to meet Thursday to consider “radical” moves on Syria. Foreign Minister Davutoglu has pronounced what he terms the “final word,” which presumably means that action is coming soon. Speculation centers on a Turkish military incursion across the border into Syria, presumably to protect civilians in neighboring villages. In that event, all Bashar has to do is concentrate his attacks on the population in areas the Turks would find it hard to reach.
The more important move could come in the form of Turkish economic sanctions that signal clearly to businesspeople in Damascus and Aleppo that they need to convince Bashar al Assad to stop. But that isn’t easy for the Turks, who are enjoying their role as the burgeoning economic power of the region and will not want to give anyone reason to think twice about doing business with Turkish companies. It would be far easier for the Turks if any economic sanctions were multilateral and decided at the United Nations.
I am in Istanbul this morning–it really is a thrilling city of fabulous economic activity. Turkish geopolitical confidence is growing, but taking on Syria either militarily or economically when your foreign policy is focused on “zero problems” with neighbors is not easy. Still, I have to hope Ankara decides this week to save Europe and the United States from their own ineffectiveness.
PS: A demonstration in Aleppo, this evening:
RSS - Posts
