Via FLC
"Conspiracy theorists, you probably called this one. The rebels in Benghazi say they’ve reached a deal to send oil abroad in exchange for guns to keep their revolution going. Only it looks like an act of desperation. The rebels’ de facto finance minister, Ali Tarhouni, tells the Associated Press that Qatar will buy oil “currently in storage” in southeastern areas of the country that the rebels hold. What will they buy with the Gulf state’s cash? “Any kind of arms that we can get to,” Tarhouni tells the wire. “We have a list of the arms we need and we’re trying some different fronts to buy them.” That’s a relief for Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who urged lawmakers that “someone else” needs to train and arm the rebels — anyone but U.S. troops. But practically everything about the deal makes it seem improbable. Start with the oil itself. Moammar Gadhafi’s loyalists routed the rebels this week, meaning Qatar would be crazy to believe they’d have a guaranteed supply of oil from people who might lose their hold on oil supplies at any time. Then rebels lack clear routes to get the oil to Qatar, by truck and ship. If that wasn’t enough, the U.N. still has oil sanctions on Libya, making the purchase arguably illegal — and possibly opening up visiting tankers to NATO navies. Then there are difficulties with handing the rebels weapons. As Gates testified on Thursday, it’s not enough to give them rifles and artillery or armored vehicles. Someone’s got to teach them how to use the gear — and that’s going to take a lot of training. Nathan Hughes writes at the U.S. Naval Institute’s blog that the rebels are such an incompetent force (“rag-tag rabble,” he says), that they’re unlikely to keep whatever arms they get secure. “[T]he weapons they have broken out of Libyan military stockpiles will be proliferated around the region and popping up in conflicts from North Africa to Yemen for years to come,” he predicts.
It might be a moot point. On Friday, the continued rebel losses in the field led the chief of the opposition’s interim governing council, Mustafa Abdul-Jalil, to spell out terms for a ceasefire. If loyalist forces pull out of rebel held cities, they’ll agree to lay down their weapons. That would be one way tobring the war to a close. On the other hand, not everything looks bleak for the rebels. A different report found that they “appeared to have more communication equipment such as radios and satellite phones, and were working in more organized units.” (You don’t think…) But if they think all they need is guns from Qatar, all they’re likely to get is weaponry they won’t know how to operate, in exchange for a fire sale on their most valuable natural resource."
Posted by G, M, Z, or B at 3:49 PM
Uprooted Palestinian
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