While Malta cowers and cringes: Greece has volunteered the use of Crete
Published:
March 19, 2011 at 11:36pm
Prime Minister George Papandreou has volunteered to coalition forces the use of the island of Crete.
Right, now take a long hard look at a map of the Mediterranean, and compare the positions of Malta and Crete in respect of Libya.
The problem with the prime minister and foreign minister – and probably ever other politician in both parties – is that when they think ‘Libya’ they think ‘Tripoli’.
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Daphne, it is very fitting that Greece offered Crete for this operation. After all, the coalition called the operation Odyssey Dawn.
Had they called it Calypso Dawn, I would have suggested we offer Gozo. Have they built an airstrip over there yet?
Good one. The Calypso Maidens would love it.
That’s typical of people like you. Spineless cowards.
George, are you from Gozo or from Greece?
Now I know why they never built an airstrip in Gozo: to have an excuse that we only have one airport. I am sorry to have to point this out, but for anyone to claim he or she is part of the human race, he or she must be ready to share the trials and tribulations of this world too.
Don’t even begin to think that when this is all over it’s back to business where we left off in Tripoli.
I’m as baffled by Tonio Borg’s statements, but you’ve got to admit that Gaddafi is more likely to launch a military retaliation from Tripoli than from Benghazi. And we’re the closest to Tripoli, not Crete.
[Daphne – I’ll admit nothing of the sort. Tripoli IS attacking Benghazi. This quibbling about geographical distance is ridiculous.]
@SHTF
Ghaddafi used to be able to deploy mobile Scud B missiles with a 300-600km range depending on modifications. I am not sure if they still possess the ability.
The modified/mobile (key word: mobile) SCUD B is potentially able to hit Crete, Malta and Sicily depending on their area of deployment – I’ll leave you to pick out the coward.
http://www.defense.gov/dodcmsshare/homepagephoto/2011-03/hires_110319-D-XH843-001c.jpg
The Americans are attacking Gaddafi’s surface-to-air defence and attack systems. So hopefully that will “neutralise” (is that word allowed here?) Gaddafi’s means of attacking us.
[Daphne – Gosh, bet the PM and his deputy didn’t think of that one. Excuse No. 1 (neutrality) – up the spout. Excuse No. 2 (Gaddafi will attack us) – blown up by Tomahawks.]
Hold your horses. Just because the allies have “severely damaged” Libya’s surface-to-air defence systems doesn’t mean they have destroyed all the Libyan air force yet, have they? Some jets can evade the no-fly zone restrictions, I’m sure.
That said, it all boils down to schoolyard bullying tactics at this point. Would the Mad Dog pick on someone of his size? Of course not. There’s that helpless whimp cowering in fear in the corner over there…
All this fussing and fretting about air strikes by Gaddafi is just a sop.
I cannot recall an instance when Libyan planes were used to attack Europe, but I can recall many instances when Libyan terrorism wreaked havoc outside Libya.
Gaddafi’s threatened terrorist activity against all sea and air traffic in the Mediterranean. This is entirely in keeping with his history as an actor in and sponsor of terrorism. His son, Saif al-Islam, admitted as much in a 2006 interview with New Yorker magazine.
What’s to stop him doing that now?
Ghadek tahseb li biex tmur minn naha ghal ohra trid il-hmar u l-karettun jew, jew f’dan il-kaz ix-xambekk?
Leo Szilard wrote this. It helps me keep in mind the value of relativism:
“Let me say only this much to the moral issue involved: suppose Germany had developed two bombs before we had any bombs. And suppose Germany had dropped one bomb, say, on Rochester and the other on Buffalo, and then having run out of bombs she would have lost the war.
Can anyone doubt that we would then have defined the dropping of atomic bombs on cities as a war crime, and that we would have sentenced the Germans who were guilty of this crime to death at Nuremberg and hanged them?
But, again, don’t misunderstand me. The only conclusion we can draw is that governments acting in a crisis are guided by questions of expediency, and moral considerations are given very little weight, and that America is no different from any other nation in this respect.”
I disagree – following the Okinawa campaign, America projected a minimum of a million American casualties and at least double that for Japanese civilians and military personnel during a Japan invasion.
Conditional surrender was not an option – Japan was the initial aggressor.
I view that as a tough but moral decision.
The Japanese were warned and they chose to disregard that warning, though one has to understand that the deterrance capability of atomic bombs was not yet established.
On the Mona site she is trying to give her readers a ‘Libya’ ….thingie. She says that in London nobody knows or cares about what is happening.
I wonder who she was speaking to? I have had people as far away as Russia and northernmost Europe asking me things and they are worried about the situation.
[Daphne – Mona Farrugia does not live in London. She lives in Gudja.]
She did not say that she lives in London. She spoke of colleagues there who have not even heard of the conflict. I don’t know what she means by ‘colleagues’ because as as far as I know she does restaurant reviews.
I am stupid when it comes to this sort of thing, but I had always imagined that If I were reviewing and wanted to be impartial I’d do it incognito and I would not have ‘colleagues’.
Sorry for being off topic.
During the Gallipoli campaign, Malta was more or less a hospital. We could do the honourable thing and treat the injured. Could St Lukes be turned into a treatment centre if needed?
[Daphne – How do you propose bringing the injured to Malta?]
Rickety boats are OK.
Malta offering humanitarian aid to Libya, or treating the injured, can now only be perceived as a cynical act, once Malta flatly refuses to even lend moral support to direct intervention, the objective of which is to prevent the need of humanitarian aid or medical treatment in the first place.
The question that comes to mind now is not whether, but how deeply, certain individuals and different sectors of society are embroiled with Gaddafi and his multifarious front men and organisations.
According to the UN resolution, there will be no boots on the ground. That should mean that there will be little scope for Malta to serve as a hospital for the coalition. I suppose Libyans can be treated in Libya.
Libyans can be treated in Libya if they have access to the necessary facilities and supplies.
So far, the news in that respect is negative. Medical staff and ambulances have been fired on, Red Crescent staff have not been allowed to reach areas of fighting, Medicins San Frontieres decided to retreat to the Egyptian border, hospitals run out of supplies, doctors have to deal with horrific injuries using basic only equipment and supplies.
So Malta’s commitment to humanitarian support is effectively just so much hogwash, particularly when any related discussion centres on how ‘we’ deserve ‘the EU’s’ help when coping with an as yet hypothetical refugee crisis. The real refugee crisis is on the borders with Tunisia and Egypt, and inside Libya where people are unable to escape.
Now that Greece has offered Crete, Malta’s PM has a golden opportunity to save face and make up for all the blunders that he and his deputy have committed, by offering our facilities to the campaign.
And do what, exactly?
Offer MIA as a base?
Where do we offer as a support/maintemamce/ammunition (bombs) storage? Lufthansa Tech or SR tech?
Interrupt incoming civil and commercial aviation while fighters land and take off?
What impact would that have on the overall coalition operations except for a few saved flying minutes?
How can we offer facilities which we do not have?
What advantage would Malta gain with any emerging Libyan government(s) especially if Gaddafi prevails and continues to lead one half of Libya?
What would you say if the PM offered Malta as a base and it backfired on us with dire results? L-ewwel qatilna bil-guh u issa kissirna?
With doubts and uncertainties amongst the coalition countries themselves, why implicate Malta with all the pitfalls this would entail?
I am more troubled by the fact that Gaddafi has mustard gas and thus far there is no mention of this weapon (WMD) has been neutralized and can be used, given the right opportunity, by Gaddafi on his own civil population.
Please note that nowhere have I used the words ‘neutrality clause’ anywhere because my points I consider valid whether the Malta Constitution has that clause or not.
Why can we not thank our lucky stars that we had choices and hopefully we opted for the right one?
I wonder whether he has a ‘dirty bomb’. That would be bad news for us.
Hospital ship or air, if we are treating 100 or 1000 the point is that we would be helping out in an honourable manner. Sad thing is there is an abundance of NOT OUR PROBLEM let them get on with it, more mercenery than good Christian sentiments.
[Daphne – By air? There’s a no-fly zone on, honey. Hadn’t you noticed? And the point of a hospital ship is that it’s…..a hospital ship.]
X’Misthija!
http://www.afrol.com/articles/37610
Libya is reported to have the North Korean Scud-C Short-Range Ballistic Missile (SRBM) variant with a 550 km range and 500 kg payload. The Scud-B has a 300 km range and 985 kg payload.
The CIA reported in August 2000 that Libya had continued its efforts to obtain ballistic missile-related equipment, materials, technology, and expertise from foreign sources- lovely. Easy on the mustard.
I feel jubilant at the military attack on Gaddafi today, though I wish no innocent people were hurt.
Gaddafi bought and manipulated Mintoff, KMB and the MLP to keep any military power far away from him so he would be free to do what he wants.
Gaddafi is no friend of Malta. He refused to let us dig for oil and encouraged boat sub-Saharan people to come to Malta.
Is Joe Grima heading to Tripoli to help Gaddafi? Did KMB warn Gaddafi again about the cruise missiles?
[Daphne – I’m sorry, but there are new questions on the agenda now. Has Malta joined the coalition in getting rid of him? Has Lawrence Gonzi said that he must go (as opposed to making the observation that his time is up)? Has Tonio Borg mentoned him by name? Has John Dalli said that he must take his own decisions? The tragedy of the last few days is that the Nationalist Party (through the government) has placed itself squarely at the level of Labour in respect of Muammar Gaddafi. No more moral high ground.]
Nice one, Daphne. So much for the Labour accusations of being on the PN payroll. Do they still think Gonzi is paying you to say this?
I am also not entirely happy with the observations and the stand taken by the both by the PM and the deputy PM.
However, I do not agree that “Nationalist Party (through the government) has placed itself squarely at the level of Labour in respect of Muammar Gaddafi. No more moral high ground”, because I heard the PM condemning the Gaddafi regime and saying that its end is inevitable.
[Daphne – He did not condemn the Gaddafi regime. He condemned ‘violence’. Saying that its end is inevitable is an observation, not a personal opinion of one’s wishes and desires. Compare the direct statements made by other national leaders with our prime minister’s, and you will see just how oblique our prime minister’s statements really are. Language is my ‘thing’ and so it is the first thing I notice.]
While no one from the opposition is even referring to this tyrant’s rule as regime. So, no I cannot agree that the PN and LP are at the same level.
“Mubarak – will he survive?
Published: January 29, 2011 at 11:17pm
Mubarak’s wife and sons are said to have fled to London. What’s happening is amazing. I get the feeling that 2011 for North Africa is going to be like what 1989 was for Europe. Maybe it’s premature to say that. I don’t know. But definitely, something has snapped.
Gaddafi must be as nervous as hell, sandwiched between Egypt and Tunisia and in a far more precarious position than Mubarak and Ben Ali.
Let’s see what comes next.
One thing’s for sure: that market trader who set himself alight and died started one hell of a revolution, and he didn’t live to find out, though nobody can say now that he died in vain.” ( http://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/2011/01/29/mubarak-will-he-survive/ )
“when they think ‘Libya’ they think ‘Tripoli’”
I go further than that – when they think Gaddafi, they think Libya.
Most cannot distinguish between Gaddafi and Libya. Gaddafi thinks that he owns Libya so much so that he shaped Libya in his own image and refers to the Libyans as ‘my people’ (read ‘my serfs’).
Likewise, when you think about friends and enemies of Libya, think friends and enemies of the regime. Same goes for oil and the rest – in any regime-based system, everything and everyone becomes a utility in the hands of the regime, hence the fight for freedom.
The distinction is important, especially with regards to Malta’s arguments to protect its neutrality status. The goal of the UN Security Council resolution is to neutralise the Gaddafi regime from acting against Libya and not to attack Libya. Pity that Malta looks at things differently.
Judging from past experience of the Libyan missile prowess, we might as well start begging for a few Scuds from those to whom we refuse the use of our territory for military use. Perhaps an additional few Patriot ABMs from the USA would be more appropriate and more in keeping with our non-alignment.
You are right up to a point. The hospital ship (IF USED) takes on patients following field treatment then needs somewhere (Malta maybe) that has the capacity to take more patients. Putting it in simple terms the system works like a conveyor.
Regarding the no-fly zone, is it absolute? Would not a plane load of injured be allowed to leave Benghazi? The Americans have said they want to see access to humanitarian aid take place.
[Daphne – Of course it is absolute. The conditions for take-off and landing have been pretty much destroyed anyway by now, and that is quite apart from the fact that it would be extremely dangerous to airlift the injured because the plane could be shot down from below. Anybody who can’t be treated in Libya would have to be driven across the border into Egypt or Tunisia, and then only if Gaddafi’s forces allow the border to be crossed.]
Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou is also leader of the Greek Socialist Party ( Panhellenic Socialist Movement PASOK).