Libya is an oriental country from a fairy-tale. In a decade or so one of the poorest African countries and a former pariah of global community has turned into a wealthy state that the top Western powers have been flirting with. While immersing into the revolutionary chaos Libya threatens the European Union, which is afraid of the increased inflow of illegal immigrants.
One may stumble upon the name “Libya” in the ancient Egyptian papyri. That’s how Egyptians used to call the territory lying to the West from Nile and populated by the bellicose nomadic tribes. Afterwards, Greek colonies, Roman and Arabian cities were built there. When the Ottoman Empire was defeated in 1912, Italy got these lands and for quite a time they were called the Italian Northern Africa. Twenty years from then, during Mussolini rule — mind that the man was fond of Roman symbols — Italians dubbed this colony “Libya” (that’s how Romans used to call the Berber tribes once populating these territories). After the Second World War Italy gave up its rights for Libya and in 1947 the UN recognized the independence of this territorial formation. In 1951 Libya appeared on the world map as a sovereign monarchic state, ruled by King Idris I. That’s how the fourth largest African state (1.8 million square kilometers) appeared. 90% of Libyan territories fell for deserts and the major part of its 6.4 million citizens populate a narrow Mediterranean coastline.
Having gained independence, Libya became one of the poorest African countries. However, soon it turned out that great treasures are hidden in the Libyan sands. In 1959 deposits of high-quality and easily-extractable oil were explored there. Western concerns — mostly American ones — got the concessions for oil production and they’ve made quite a buck thanks to their rights. Back in the 60s Libya produced 150 million tons of oil annually (two times more than Iraq and several times more than Kuwait did). However, it were Americans who got the most part of these petrodollars which is why King Idris I wasn’t particularly popular among his people. On the 1st of September, 1969 group of young Royal Army officers headed by Captain Moammar Gaddafi took advantage of King’s vacation and conducted a coup d’état. Libya was turned into republic and its domestic and foreign policy took a drastic turn. American and British military bases were evacuated and in 1973 oil production industry itself was nationalized. Despite the formally republican political system, actual power was in the hands of Moammar Gaddafi. Political parties along with labor unions were banned and Libyan political system was changed to “Jamahiriya”. Gaddafi coined this term in his “Green Book”, announcing that this is the third way between the capitalism and communism when the common people directly possess the state power.
He attempted to create a union of African states and supported the so-called “liberation movements” all over the world, having joined the USSR in this “noble” trade. We have to remind that IRA[1], ETA[2] and leftist German terrorists were among the movements that Gaddafi used to aid. This support absorbed certain part of petrodollars yet plenty of them remained for Libya itself. Merely 25 years ago Socialistic Jamahiriya was richer than Italy and South Korea. Despite the fact that Libya imported 75% of provision, its prices were affordable for everyone thanks to the state earmarks. Streets of the Libyan capital were full of Western cars that the government used to obtain and then sold to the state employees for nominal prices. State also paid for the education of thousands of Libyans in the former socialistic countries; government granted each of its citizens $500 of vacation pay and Malta was crowded with Libyan tourists (at the moment visa-free regime between two countries existed). There was plenty of money in the country but it was short of workers. So it became a Mecca of the oil industry workers and Eastern European doctors looking for a job. Thousands of Egyptians, Palestinians, Turks, Poles and Germans from the GDR used to build roads and factories in Libya.
Gaddafi favored the impressive infrastructural projects. An irrigation system made of large-diameter pipes that were produced in Libya was established in the middle of Sahara. Total amount of investments made up $25 billion.
In the 80s Gaddafi’s relations with the West aggravated. In 1981 Libyan army fired at the U.S. planes and in response the USA imposed an embargo for import of Libyan oil. After explosion at the disco club in the Western Berlin U.S. Air Force units bombed Gaddafi’s palace. In 1988 Libyan agents have blew up the PanAm plane with 270 passenger aboard over the Scottish town of Lockerbie, and few months afterwards they blew up the UTA plane that was flying from Chad to Paris. Libya became an outcast of the global community. Reacting to Gaddafi’s denial to hand out the terrorists, the UN imposed political and economic sanctions against Libya. In the 90s oil prices have dropped and being combined with the sanctions, that actually ruined the state economy.
Gaddafi started giving the West reconciliatory signs. He publicly condemned the 9/11 attack on the USA and after overthrow of Saddam Hussein he secretly negotiated with the USA and Great Britain. During these talks Libya gave its consent to give up the WMD production and destroy the supplies of its chemical agents. Gaddafi paid $2.7 billion to the families of people killed in Lockerbie incident and $170 million to families of the UTA incident victims. The USA reacted with cancellation of embargo for trade with Libya. Tripoli turned into a pilgrimage sacred place for politicians and entrepreneurs from all over the world; world capitals were glad to solemnly welcome somewhat eccentric colonel Gaddafi, placing his famous tent in the place that suited him. In the age of energetic crisis Libya, possessing 44 billion barrels of confirmed oil deposits — and possibly three times more of unconfirmed ones — has once again became an attractive partner of the industrially developed countries. Colonel apparently felt the need to update the country — preparations for privatization of dozens of leading industrial enterprises were under way, investment activity was resumed. Turkey got the construction contracts for $15 billion, Russia got the railroad construction contracts for $3 billion, and France initiated the modernization of Tripoli airport and was preparing to build a nuclear power plant. Revolt of the Libyan nation — tired of corruption, poverty and absence of basic political rights — has made all these splendid economic plans null and void.
Today’s events in Libya cannot be given any other name but civil war. Never in the contemporary history had the revolts been cracked down upon so brutally. Not a single dictator made up his mind to use the aviation and heavy artillery against rebels. The United States and Great Britain are reviewing an option of invading the country in order to discharge Colonel Gaddafi of authority. Once again, just like in the situation with Iraq, tension between the Anglo-Saxons and Europe emerges — it is rooted it their different approaches to the use of armed forces for the sake of “humanitarian invasion”.
That’s how Silvia Francescon, director of Roman branch of European Council on Foreign Relations commented the situation:
“Europe is staking at Gaddafi’s survival, as long as it believes him to be capable of defeating the rebels. In my opinion, stability at the southern European borders that Gaddafi is to guarantee is merely an illusion, but the EU countries definitely believe in it. Libyan issue will always be reviewed through the prism of African immigration threat — the tidal wave of illegal immigrants may pour from Tripoli. In 2008 Berlusconi’s and Gaddafi’s governments signed a treaty, obliging Tripoli to block the exits of illegal immigration — from the Black Africa, first of all — which has always used Libya as a transit point. Italy promised Libya $5 billion of investments in exchange for this ‘favor’. Gaddafi kept his promise: after signing of this treaty number of illegal immigrants reduced by 80–90%”.
In fact, Gaddafi is openly threatening Italy and other European Union countries that if they try to turn him down, he will unblock the ways of illegal immigration into Europe. Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs Franco Fattini has already stated that Europe shouldn’t attempt to export the Western model of democracy into Libya. We can hardly treat this statement in any other way but as the indirect support of Gaddafi’s regime. Answering the journalist’s question about his actions regarding the situation in Libya, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said that he hasn’t called Gaddafi yet because the latter had plenty of things to do (?).
European (mostly Italian) experts on Libya tend to think that absence of major city conglomerations and dispersion of the population among the scarcely-populated towns may weaken the revolutionary impulse. According to them, Gaddafi’s power is based upon the agreements with leaders of powerful tribal clans and if he manages to keep at least part of their loyalty, it will be much easier for him to strangle the resistance. Benghazi, where the revolts started, is a traditional center of anti-governmental turmoil. In the 90s Gaddafi used to drown all the rising disturbances there in blood of rebels themselves — and that is the exact reason why Italian experts forecast the Colonel’s victory this time as well. Libya is the largest oil importer to Italy and the fourth largest gas importer. Recently Tripoli announced that it is going to invest $30 billion into the modernization of oil and gas industry. This is a tidbit for European concerns that are naturally interested to save status quo in Libya.
Gaddafi is not an Egyptian army, funded by American taxpayers. He has the money and he is brutal in the clearly non-European manner. He’s sly, too, at that — having sensed the threat, he tried to bribe Libyans, having cancelled all the taxes and customs fees. Pragmatic Europeans are unwilling and unable to fight another war. Iraq and Afghanistan were more than enough for them. They are willing to trade and unwilling to see African illegal immigrants on their streets. So Americans and British — if they actually make up their mind for this — will have to fight Colonel Gaddafi without European support. 
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