Category: Law, Constitution, and Jurisprudence

WHY DID THEY KILL KADHAFFI

They killed Kadhdafi because he bombed a plane. Plain and simple. Why? Because he violated ‘the peace of Westphalia’ and violated its extension ‘the postwar consensus’. He violated 5000 years of western ethics.

And yes, the disaster caused by killing him despite the fact that the predictable outcome was disproportionately bad. Why? Because Kadhaffi like Saddam were killed in order to prevent more of their kind breaking the peace of Westphalia and its extension the Postwar Consensus. Until Putin came along with Ukraine, no country had done so. And he did not need to break the consensus had he not panic’d and simply made a few phone calls – but russians feel that they cannot ‘educate’ foreign people. It is not in their nature.

Westerners don’t take threats or actions lightly and don’t forgive. They especially don’t forgive the murder of citizens.

Kadhaffie like Hussein simply provided a convenient time to kill him.

THE BROADER ISSUE

The question isn’t whether any group controls their resources, but whether they sell those resources on the common market (which is what the USA enforces, or whether they will use oil as a military and economic weapon (as Putin threaten to do with Europe), (and as Iran threatens to do if it can obtain enough power in the middle east).

From the world’s perspective oil is a commons you may benefit from distributing. It is a resource of the earth, like sunlight, air and water. if you interfere with air, water, light, or oil, then you are making an act of war, not selling a domestic resource.

The reason for western skepticism was the (moral) objective of preventing the Marxists from using territory, resources, and oil as a means of warfare against modernity,

Just like the Muslims are using oil as a weapon against modernity.

Frankly, everyone would be happy if African leaders controlled their neighbors and their continent – or at least some part of it. We all just don’t want a world war started over it. And markets prevent wars at the expense of local people taking advantage of profiting from human commons.

FWIW: Moral equivalency is a very bad tool for making moral judgments. it’s a demonstration of selection bias: finding excuses for doing what you want.