The New York Times reinvented history of war on Libya

The Times operates as a quasi-official ministry of state propaganda, featuring misinformation and Big Lies on major issues mattering most—systematically suppressing what readers need to know.

Its two-part misreporting on US-led NATO’s war on Libya was called “Hillary Clinton, ‘Smart Power’ and a Dictator’s Fall” (Part I) and “A New Libya, With ‘Very Little Time Left’ “ (Part II)—a shameless perversion of truth, an utter disregard for the raping and pillaging of a sovereign independent state, the immiseration of its people.

North Africa’s most developed nation was transformed into a cauldron of endless violence, instability, turmoil, deep poverty, mass unemployment and appalling human misery.

Hillary Clinton’s contemptible October 2011 remark after hearing of Muammar Gaddafi’s death, saying, “We came, we saw, he died,” will long define her pure evil. A shocking graphic video showed US-supported terrorists sodomized him to death with a knife.

Clinton was directly involved in orchestrating US-led NATO terror-bombing, wanting Libya’s sovereign independence destroyed, its oil wealth pillaged, its people exploited—its popular government providing social services most Americans can’t imagine replaced by US-installed puppets serving its interests.

Claiming Washington’s aim was establishing a democratic Libya was pure subterfuge. Clinton is a notorious war criminal, supporting all US naked aggression during her roles as first lady, US senator and secretary of state.

The Times claiming she “belie[ved] in America’s power to do good in the world” was pure rubbish. Longstanding US imperial policy tolerates no sovereign independent states, wanting them all eliminated by coups or brute force.

Clinton supports US interventionist policy, flagrantly breaching core international law. She declined to be interviewed for The Times report.

Ludicrously in public she said it’s “too soon to tell” how things will turn out in Libya. It’s a failed state, raped and destroyed by US imperial viciousness, human misery afflicting its people, no end of violence and turmoil in sight.

US, UK and French policymakers knew attacking Libya would create the out-of-control conditions affecting the country today.

Endless wars, turbulence and chaos serve US imperial interests. Peace and stability defeat it. Wherever America shows up, dystopian harshness follows.

Conditions following Washington’s intervention in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Ukraine, Somalia, Libya and elsewhere reflect pure US imperial evil.

The Times claiming Clinton helped orchestrate humanitarian intervention in Libya mocks its US-led rape and destruction.

Times editorial policy endorses all US imperial wars and others planned, ignoring their objectives, mindless of the horrors they inflict.

Protests in Libya preceding US-led NATO aggression were orchestrated in Washington, war planned months in advance. Obama, Clinton and likeminded administration policymakers wanted Gaddafi removed for multiple reasons.

He supported pan-Africanism, a United States of Africa free from imperial domination. He wanted Libyans sharing in the country’s oil wealth, a notion foreign to America and other Western powers.

Under his 1999 Decision No. 111, all Libyans got free healthcare, education, electricity, water, training, rehabilitation, housing assistance, disability and old-age benefits, interest-free state loans, as well as generous subsidies to study abroad, buy a new car, help couples when they marry, practically free gasoline, and more.

Literacy under Gaddafi rose from 20–80%. Libya’s hospitals and private clinics were some of the region’s best. Now they’re in shambles.

Vital public services he provided no longer exist. Pre-war, Libyans had African’s highest standard of living. Homelessness was nonexistent.

Gaddafi believed all Libyans had a right to a home or rent-free apartment, notions unheard of in the West.

He rejected farcical Western-style money-controlled so-called democracy, deplored crony capitalism and neoliberal harshness.

During his tenure, women had the right to vote, participate politically, as well as own and sell property independently of their husbands.

Clause 5 of Libya’s 1969 Constitution granted them equal status with men, notably for education and employment.

In January 2011, weeks before US-led NATO naked aggression, the UN Human Rights Council praised Gaddafi’s instituted political, economic, education, social and cultural rights.

It lauded his treatment of religious minorities. He had nothing to do with downing Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988, nor did falsely accused Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi.

He called his Great Man-Made River (GMMR) development of an ocean-sized aquifer beneath Libya’s sands the “Eighth Wonder of the World”—wanting all Libyans sharing in its benefits.

Washington and rogue Western partners wanted it privatized for exclusive corporate gain.

Under Gaddafi, the Central Bank of Libya was state-owned, the interest-free Libyan dinar used for productive economic growth, not speculation, profits and bonuses for predatory bankers.

Gaddafi funded Africa’s only communications satellite, saving hundreds of millions of dollars for low-cost incoming and outgoing calls.

He provided two-thirds of the $42 billion needed to launch a public African Central Bank, Monetary Fund and Investment Bank.

He advocated a new gold standard, replacing dollars with gold dinars, aiming to provide real monetary wealth and value, free from predatory Western lending agencies.

Washington wants dollar hegemony as the world’s reserve currency maintained, an agenda challenged by Russia, China and other nations increasingly trading bilaterally in their own currencies.

In 1977, Gaddafi transformed the Libyan Republic into the Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya—a “state of the masses.”

In 1979, he established direct participatory democracy, devolving power to tribal leaders. In 1986, Libya became the Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya.

Gaddafi was no dictator. He was a visionary, a revolutionary leader, wanting Libyan society based on equity, justice and fair distribution of national wealth.

He enjoyed strong popular support. He was a marked man. Washington wanted him eliminated, his progressive anti-Western policies replaced by predatory capitalist rapaciousness.

The deplorable Times report reinvented Clinton’s war on Libya, ignored Gaddafi’s vibrant model social state.

It played a leading role in endorsing US-led naked aggression, misportrayed as humanitarian intervention.

It supports Hillary Clinton, backs her presidential aspirations—instead of exposing her war crimes, denouncing her pure evil, and demanding she be held fully accountable.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. His new book as editor and contributor is “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.” Visit his blog at sjlendman.blogspot.com . Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network. It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

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