I noticed today when pouring over the news reports from Libya that the Rebels and Opposition are calling on people to protest in Tripoli the capital under the control of the Government. The last time such a protest was carried out the Government and allied militia murdered tons of people.

In the latest report it said militia were rounding up protestors and that they are vanishing. The reports also indicate the Government is spying on its citizens and arresting those sympathetic to the rebelion. The report says bodies of vanished citizens are turning up in the streets.

So should the rebels be calling for more protests? Or should they call on protestors and sympathisizers to leave Tripoli and head East into rebel controlled territory.

News reports indicate that the rebels don't have enough numbers and power to over run the Government. But what about all the rebels in Tripoli, sure they are out numbered in the streets of Tripoli but what if they left Tripoli and joined the rebelion in the East.

I mean theirs no doubt this is a civil war, why keep protending Gadhafi is going to listen to more protests. One news report indicated Rebels hope protestors can over throw the Government in Tripoli, but that is unrealistic all that will result from further protests is the Government killing more and more people.

What do you think the rebels should be doing? Calling for more protests, calling for protestors to travel east into rebel controlled territory, or do you have another idea?

What should be the next move of the rebelion?

Sorry for those who read this in the website board, I thought I was in off-topic.

The only issue I can think of, from this, is that if the Libyan forces can focus on just one geographic area, it becomes a whole load easier for them. Not to bring up the now-cliché world-war-2 comments, but one of the main reasons that the Germans lost is that they were trying to fight on too many fronts at the same time.

Misnomer ahoy!

Actually it's a civil unrest not a civil war.

The difference is that there is still law being enforced which the protestors are breaking. ^_^

The other difference is that there is no conflicting ideology or essentially the protestors don't have a plan beyond disrupting the government.

It could be argued that they want a change, but then the question comes up: "What change? How will they go about this change if Khadafy steps down?"

They could surprise me tomorrow and declare war on Khadafy’s regime, which means they are doing more than having a civil war, it would bring a warmth to my heart if they actually for once started a revolution. (It's been so long since the world saw one people seem to have forgotten what one looks like.)

The Declaration clearly has to announce demands for change that they see as impossible with the current regime and so war must be made. ^_^

As it stands now, the US has no business with Libya and it makes me suspicious that the US is getting involved there when they didn't with Tunisia, Bahrain or Egypt. As it's always been and should remain America and Americans should feel morally moved by what is happening there but recognize that it's a different country.

Now if the insurgence requires aide then American interest should be weighed and a response made accordingly.

In accordance to the Genocide Act though which is the only reason the US or any nation should get involved in Libya would be if there are signs of ethnic cleansing or of things leading to genocide. I believe Libyan Arab Jamahiriya is a signatory of that act as well anyway so that would be a legal obligation.

At this point, I think they shoudl form a full revolution and not this protesting as it won't obviously work with Qaddafi.

The other nations were primarily peaceful with a relatively small set of violence. Their leaders had enough sense not to make a war with their people.

Qaddafi seems hell bent on remaining a dictator to his own death in necessary. Well, that means the only resolution, if the people really want full reform, is to pick up arms and fight.

US and others shoudl largely remain neutral. The Arab league has said they might take front stage if needed to stop mass killings / enforce no fly zone and that is preferred as its their region and kin. But, they all have their own turmoils right now and maybe NATO will have to at least enforce a no fly zone to keep it from turning into a genocide.

The Arab League has no business in Libya either, or at least they have as much business as NATO. The League first and foremost must observe their members nations sovereignty.

It would be no different than if the US got involved. At this point if the AL did get involved the US would be forced to as well just for the politics of the matter.

I'm afraid Khadafy so far is within every right to uphold the law of his land and the global community can just sit and watch.

If your reasoning is that simply because of geography and the consequences within that the AL are qualified to be involved in Libya without Khadafy breaking international accord then the US and UN have every right to enter Iran at any point in time or Saudi Arabia; simply because we are on the same planet.

They should equip and train as many peasants and commoners as possible and march on Tripoli.

I think that's what they gonna do. They will overthrow Gaddaffi in a good old fashioned bloody revolution.

I've seen four different spellings of Gaddafi in this thread, so I'll stick with my own.

We are now beyond the point where protests are going to achieve anything. A resistance movement has been created. Granted, it doesn't really seem to have any ideas beyond "Down with Gaddafi" (or maybe that's just what the media is telling us), but in any case, protesting will just lead to more innocent deaths, and Gaddafi isn't the sort of man who would be stopped by that sort of thing.

What the rebels need to do is:

1) Write up a manifesto. It's all well and good to complain, but they do need to think of how to fix the country's problems.

2) Form a political party that represents the views of the enormous majority of rebels. If this is not possible, form multiple parties, allied together to fight Gaddafi. The latter will not be nearly as effective. It will be like the Russian Civil War, but it's better than nothing.

3) Speak on the world stage. Let people in other nations know what is happening. Ask foreign leaders for help. Obama put a lot of faith in the revolution when he called for Gaddafi to resign. Use that, and build upon it.

If they don't do these things, sure, they might topple Gaddafi. But they won't be any better. It will either be:

a) Complete anarchy.

b) Full civil war.

c) Another tyrannical government.

Look at the Bolshevik Revolution. Strong leaders. A single cause with hundreds of thousands of followers. Strong propaganda. Decisive action at the right time, and they took power with very little difficulty. Sure, it caused civil war, but they still won. And it led to tyranny only because that was what Marx had been saying from the very start.

Except... the Arab league seems to want Quaddafi to stay in power.  They've been fighting against a no fly zone and against any attempts to force support through.

They seem to WANT a genocide.

Umm when another Government is formed within the same country and the rebels and protestors are uniting to form a new armed forces to fight the Libyan Government militarily then I think that is called a civil war. Fact is in Benghazi a new Government was formed according to the news reports I'm watching. The Government is made up of defectors from both Libya's Government and armed forces.

According to a news report I saw yesterday the defecting military units are arming protestors and trying to create an army. They are organizing units and fighting with weapons against the Libyan regime. Also news reports indicate that this new Government wants democracy once Gaddafi is gone. So I'd say while not well organised they do have an indication as to where they want to go.

The fact that the protestors are uniting into military units and fighting with tanks and have over 10,000 tons of ammunition and even more weapons. Indicates this has evolved from a protest into a full blown military operation. Now I'd consider that a civil war, when a large group of a countries population take up arms to over throw their Government that is a revolution or civil war.

Thats why I don't understand the fact that the rebels are calling for more protests. I guess fighting an all out civil war is still a last resort and they are hoping Gaddafi will step down willingly (Which he won't)!

As for US intervention, why didn't they get militarily involved in Bahrain, Egypt and Tunisia? Simple all three countries while they may have gotten alittle violent stepped down fairly peacefully. The Egyptian army didn't start mowing down protestors, Bahrain did not start dropping bombs on innocent civilians. Even in the case of Libya the US is still reluctant to start any kind of military intervention, if they do do so it will be after the UN orders action.

As for the Arab League, it would be nice to see them involved in an operation to help the Libyan people. Not to mention why should the west always clean up the worlds messes, it would be nice to see other countries stabalizing the world.

One can always argue that something is one way but could be something else.

For example the in 1969 Ireland had gone into heavy rioting for government reformation, though they had the loyalists versus armed militia versus eventually the Royal Regiment of Wales:  Just because an organized armed group of ex or paramilitary decide to fight their government doesn't escalate the mood from civil unrest to civil war.

The only fair argument that could be made is that it is a civil war because they are in another region while Khadafy is in his own with his supporters. This may answer your quandary as well, if the people in Tripoli do protest Khadafy it means that this is still a uprising or riot perhaps even a revolt but not a civil war.

This is based strictly on definitions where societal arbitration that is to say not in anyway my own conjecture are in question should you pursue I would readily reference them.

If you think that civilian toll is the context from which I'm addressing chunky then your mistaken.

It wouldn't be too hard to argue why Bahrain is of key interest for the US given it's location and keenness with US interests. Fact is they didn't even though the US quite possibly had much more reason to have pushed aggressively diplomatically in Bahrain.