Global NATO and the Catastrophic Failure in Libya, Looking at Africa
Primary tabs
Baobab Cultural Center
Presents Horace G. Campbell
Author of Global NATO and the Catastrophic Failure in Libya
Talk and Book Signing
728 University Avenue, Rochester, New York
Horace Campbell is Professor of African American Studies and Political Science at Syracuse University. He is on the Board of the Syracuse Peace Council, and has been an activist and scholar for over forty years.
NATO intervened in Libya in March 2011, one month after the successful revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt. Was the NATO intervention designed to provide a base for the future NATO military operations in North Africa? This question can be answered in the affirmative in relation to the role of US intelligence services in Benghazi and the recruitment of fighters from that region of Libya to engage in the war in Syria. However, the operation has backfired and this slow and deadly war has created complications for the credibility of the forces working with NATO. We have recently heard of efforts of NATO to redeploy in Libya in the wake of the fact that the society is now ungovernable. Over 1700 militias are intimidating citizens in all parts of the country. US citizens learnt of this level of militia activity when the U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens was killed in a CIA safe house in Benghazi in September 2012.
In his new book Horace Campbell brings out the hypocrisy of the West in presenting the NATO intervention as a humanitarian exercise when the goal of the mission was regime change and the execution of President Gaddafi. The increasing Western military intervention in Africa is the context for Dr. Campbell’s passionate critique of the NATO Mission in Libya. This mission reduced to rubble one of the most prosperous countries in Africa, with the highest standard of living in the region. This intervention has since moved on to Syria, and in a different way, to Mali. Campbell explores the questions: “Who are the terrorists?” and “Whose interests do Western ‘humanitarian’ missions actually protect?”
Horace Campbell is also the author of the book, Rasta and Resistance: From Marcus Garvey to Walter Rodney. His work and commentaries on international issues can be viewed on http://www.horacecampbell.net. (He is on twitter @Horace_Campbell)
For information contact: Terry Chaka at the Baobab Cultural Center (http://www.thebaobab.org/email.php)
Or Judy Bello of Rochester Against War (judith@papillonweb.net)
