Looks like the US Ambassador to Libya got exactly what he deserves.

Originally posted by milominderbinder
By the way...read up on your history of the Middle East. In the 1950's Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Afghanistan ALL had stable, western-style, secular, democratically-inspired, republican forms of government which WE TOPPLED ONE BY ONE...thus making the Middle East a very, very, dangerous place indeed.

Afghanistan has NEVER had a "stable, western-style, secular, democratically-inspired, republican forms of government." The British started interfering with Afghanistan in the middle of the 19th century.

Iraq has NEVER had a "stable, western-style, secular, democratically-inspired, republican forms of government."
The Republic of Iraq only came into being in 1958...before that, it was called the Kingdom of Iraq in those years following the end of Ottoman rule (WWI) in which it was under British administration.

Iran has NEVER had a "stable, western-style, secular, democratically-inspired, republican forms of government."
It was a monarchy up until 1979 when it became the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Syria has NEVER had a "stable, western-style, secular, democratically-inspired, republican forms of government." It's birth as a republic type government is sometime in the years just prior to the start of WWII.


The Ottoman Empire was toppled...and there was a lot of reorganization going on for decades..but that was worldwide...it was the end of monarchy for all practical purposes....revolutions and world wars and all sorts of unrest...I thought you said you had studied all this stuff?

Originally posted by milominderbinder
All of the modern fundamentalist kookery in the Middle East STARTED when Israel did the unthinkable and declared that the new government of what was formerly Palestine was now going to a Jewish theocracy.

No...before that...was Israel coming into existence...the UN did that...the world mostly agreed...but Israel is not a theocracy...and the theocracy idea was neither unthinkable or new...it was the norm...it might have been the better option, actually.

Originally posted by Todzer

The country is a LOT more violent now that Gaddafi is gone, I am not stating that it was a paradise under his rule, he was brutal but it is worse now, car bombings daily and pro Gaddafi supporters getting killed and thrown in mass graves and who is it thanks to? NATO and whatever BS reasons they gave for going to the country, the majority of Libyans did not want NATO there at all, there was protests against their interference. As I said it wasn't paradise before the intervention but do not imply that Libya is better off since the regime change, they screwed up that country royally by sticking their noses where they don't belong.

Do your homework...this isn't what you think it is...the people there were subjected to a cruel despot for 42 years. They finally got so fed up they protested peacefully...the Libyans were fired upon by the Libyan military because the Libyan dictator of 42 years ordered it...
And it IS going to be worse for a while...worse even than the last 42 years. That's the way it always goes because a power vacuum is created and oppression suddenly and completely lifted. There has not been a true 'regime change' yet...they are working on that.

Originally posted by milominderbinder
Incorrect. He wasn't our "Ambassador" until May of 2012. Ghadafi was killed on 10-20-11. Chris Stevens was in the country and helping to start a civil war BEFORE HE WAS APPOINTED "AMBASSADOR".

In late 2008, Chris Stevens went to Libya as deputy officer to Gene Cretz, who was the first US Ambassador to return since the US withdrew their embassy from Libya in 1972...Mr. Cretz went to Ghana and Mr. Stevens was given his post.

The civil war had nothing to do with Mr. Stevens nor can he be held responsible for his own demise simply for being a diplomat. Yes, he knew what he was getting into. And he went ahead not to stir up trouble but to help Libyans under the horrid rule of Qadafi.

(how do you spell that darn name!?!)

wow, just wow.

apperantly here i was thinking that this community had some sort of brains,.
you guys have no idea wtf it was like under Gaddafi rule due to the limited intel coming out of libia.

the guys that died were everything the name diplomat stood for, and a credit to their country. you know nothing of who they were, what their lives were like, their thoughts, dreams, ambitions, , and yes, i knew one of the men who died.

with the exception of a couple posters in this thread., the rest of you show your true colors, petty ignorant peons pretending to be worldly. when in fact your online IQ would probobly cause you to be chemically castrated so as not to be able to breed.

learn about the world before you post shyte about it.

Originally posted by jimmyx

Originally posted by Elentarri
BTW - If you and your neighbours get bombed back into the stone age just for disagreeing with the USA and Israel, what does that make the USA and Israel??

really?? these people are already living in the 7th century...they kill each other over religous rules. what has been their great gift to civilized society in the last 100 years...how have they advanced mankind? what freedoms and liberties have they instituted for their own people?....you make them sound like some type of poor innocent group that is being picked on.

If that is how they choose to live in their OWN country, it is their affair. If they want to kill each other over religious differences and couldn't be bothered to invent more sophisticated plumbing beyond a whole in the ground, that is also their affair. Why must America or any other country for that matter, interfere in their business? Who the hell are you to dictate how a nation/people should live or run their lives? It is THEIR decision. If they don't like the current government, they should remove it with their own efforts - as you said, they don't seem to have a problem murdering each other.

BTW - I was making a rhetorical statement that covered every single war that america and israel (you can't separate them anymore) have instigated or become involved in. The USA and Israel are hypocrites. It's ok if we (USA&Israel) do it but not if anyone else does it.

I was trying to write a semi-civilized post. Personally, I feel that the application of a large meteorite to the middle-east and Washington D.C would probably solve a lot of problems.

Originally posted by flexy123

Do you freaking think that KILLING someone over a movie about Mohammed is even remotely SANE?

Is anything in the middle-east remotely sane anymore?

reply to post by milominderbinder


He was a hero they say?

Well what did he do?

reply to post by syrinx high priest


This image:





and this:




Don't you find it weird?

These signs look xeroxed...a kid 7-9 years old is carrying a sign written in English, and he is clearly local. It's not his hand writing for sure.

Majority of the crowd on the first pic is looking away from the camera. Only this kid and a man next to him, carrying signs in English are looking at the camera and posing.

So is the kid so much involved in the politics and so well educated, or was he given a sign and ordered to pose for the MSM news photo ?


Whatever the story is about the ambassador, this photo number 1 is clearly set up for an agenda.

And you keep on swallowing the MSM breaking news...it's all a show.

As for the ambassador...I feel no sorrow for him. Thousands die daily, all over the world. Men that go out to foreign countries to wage wars or help others wage them, have no sympathy from me.

You can color it anyway you want it...but the truth is...the good ol' US is not in Libya fighting for anyone's freedom, least of all their own. They needed to remove Gadafi, same as they needed to remove all of the "evil" dictators. The capitalist agenda must expand. It must expand in order to survive. Free market needs more territory...more sheep to drain. So the rich corp can get richer. No Libyan will ever profit from this "liberation".

Originally posted by milominderbinder
Sometimes I just sit in absolute awe and bewilderment at all the "shock and outrage" of my fellow American citizens.

The story below is trending on Yahoo right now with the tagline "Slain ambassador a 'hero' during revolution:
Chris Stevens once slipped into Libya on a cargo ship to help rebels overthrow Gadhafi.".

So...basically our "diplomat" was more or less a CIA operative who illegally infiltrated a sovereign government specifically with the intent of assisting a militant overthrow of Libyan government...and we are now somehow all bent out of shape that somebody stamped his ticket for him?

Christ almighty...what did we really expect was going to happen? What we do in this country if the Chinese Ambassador started a civil war in order to make us their puppet state?

Link: gma.yahoo.com...

You have a point, a very good one. The ambassador was not an innocent in this affair it seems, he did his own part in inciting a mob to capture & kill the leader of Libya in brutal circumstances. And now the same happens to him, in the very capital he was storming.

Karma is working.

Also bear in mind no matter how the media liked to paint it, it was a civil war in Libya that America, France & the UK barged into. The war took months with plenty of gains & losses on both sides, question is who was doing all the fighting on Gaddafi's side? They were never reported on, yet the rebels got plenty of sympathetic press while the opposing side were only referred to as "Gaddafi's security forces" and were left faceless, those cruel instruments of a torturous regime. Utter agenda driven garbage of course.

Don't be mistaken, there are tens of thousands of people in Libya who are very bitter about the western countries involvement in the destruction of the country.

I fear its a powder keg.

How about he helped overthrow an unpopular dictator? Yes, there has been all kinds of support, but Ghadaffi must have done a couple of things wrong, to aggravate the population to an extend, that it would rise up against Ghadaffi.

I think no ammount of CIA infiltration could make the british rise up against their beloved queen, or make the people of Lichtenstein chase away their Monarch.

Originally posted by Nite_wing
If you feel that an American ambassador and his staff got what they deserved, then you are not fellow American of mine so don't pretend to be.

So then, your allegiance is to your country (good or bad) and not to the whole of humanity or the moral ideal of right and wrong...have I stated that correctly?

reply to post by Merinda


There is always people rising against government, just because the NATO and the states decided to help the "rebels" (sometimes they call them terrorist if they are not on their side) to take over a government does not mean all the people were not happy

Imagine the current America but it was not full developed, the army was small and the whole GDP of the country was low, now imagine American citizen that hate the government for so ad so reason(there is a large sum of people) and if a country like Iran(who in this scenario, a world power) decided to help these American folks that hate the government to fight and kill the president. does that mean entire American hated their government?

Believe it or not, Libya, Iraq was stable for their type of living, some people hated it and media took those haters and exaggerated to the west.

Freedom fighter and a terrorist is much more similar than you think.

Originally posted by Merinda
How about he helped overthrow an unpopular dictator? Yes, there has been all kinds of support, but Ghadaffi must have done a couple of things wrong, to aggravate the population to an extend, that it would rise up against Ghadaffi.

I think no ammount of CIA infiltration could make the british rise up against their beloved queen, or make the people of Lichtenstein chase away their Monarch.

OK, I'll ask you this. What business is it of the United States?

The answer is that its none of your business and yet you make it so, as a result you must suffer the inevitable blowback when it does occur and not act the innocent.

This is all aside the point of support for Ghadaffi. The population did not rise up against him, a portion of the population did. As this portion spread through military gains (aided by a no fly zone for Libya's planes yet bombing from western planes, not to mention bucket loads of arms) from town to town, inevitably their numbers grew. This happens in all civil conflicts, people will switch sides they have a name for it, self perseverance.

The Americans were in there for one reason & one reason only. (Hint: it was not to free the people from the clutches of an evil dictator.)

Its not as clear cut as the 24 hour news cycle tells you.

reply to post by luciddream


very good point man. We need to realize that we never know the full picture. Only bits we are fed through the media. As I am sure there were many that hated Gadafi, I'm also sure there are more in the US now that hate Obama.

Officially lost faith in ATS. Used to be a place for constructive discussion, not country-bashing or wishing DEATH for others. If controversial ideas can't be discussed in a civil manner then this site is now officially a joke. Does anyone REALLY get what they deserve? Did this man DESERVE TO DIE? My answer is no. Of course we were all cheering when Libya was overthrown, now we're condemning a man to death for helping do so.

It's one thing to say "did this man deserve death?" but its a horrible thing to say "slain ambassador got what he deserves." Who are you to say that? Do you know the subtle intricacies of foreign policy? Have you spent time working in military defense and intelligence at the pentagon? No. All of you keyboard-mashing super heroes don't know a thing about the world and how it really works, and until you are willing to admit that you are just pandering to your own egoistic views that coincide with your delusional self-righteous thought patterns.

This wave of new members makes me sick.

Originally posted by LiberLegit
Officially lost faith in ATS. Used to be a place for constructive discussion, not country-bashing or wishing DEATH for others. If controversial ideas can't be discussed in a civil manner then this site is now officially a joke. Does anyone REALLY get what they deserve? Did this man DESERVE TO DIE? My answer is no. Of course we were all cheering when Libya was overthrown, now we're condemning a man to death for helping do so.

It's one thing to say "did this man deserve death?" but its a horrible thing to say "slain ambassador got what he deserves." Who are you to say that? Do you know the subtle intricacies of foreign policy? Have you spent time working in military defense and intelligence at the pentagon? No. All of you keyboard-mashing super heroes don't know a thing about the world and how it really works, and until you are willing to admit that you are just pandering to your own egoistic views that coincide with your delusional self-righteous thought patterns.

This wave of new members makes me sick.

Hear Hear. Well said. I couldn't agree with you more. I too have noticed this new wave of posters (most who won't even get an avatar...wierd right?). One wonders what goes through the minds of some of these people.

Originally posted by LiberLegit
Officially lost faith in ATS. Used to be a place for constructive discussion, not country-bashing or wishing DEATH for others. If controversial ideas can't be discussed in a civil manner then this site is now officially a joke. Does anyone REALLY get what they deserve? Did this man DESERVE TO DIE? My answer is no. Of course we were all cheering when Libya was overthrown, now we're condemning a man to death for helping do so.

It's one thing to say "did this man deserve death?" but its a horrible thing to say "slain ambassador got what he deserves." Who are you to say that? Do you know the subtle intricacies of foreign policy? Have you spent time working in military defense and intelligence at the pentagon? No. All of you keyboard-mashing super heroes don't know a thing about the world and how it really works, and until you are willing to admit that you are just pandering to your own egoistic views that coincide with your delusional self-righteous thought patterns.

This wave of new members makes me sick.

First off I have not wished death on anybody, if you could kindly point out to me where I have I will gladly retract.

Secondly, criticizing your country for getting involved in the affairs of other nations, to the detriment of that nation (Libya will be in a mess for decades), is not "country bashing", this is akin to saying any criticism of America is anti-American. Which we all know is plain rubbish.

If this is hard for you to handle, if it goes against the values of what you consider America to be, I suggest you stay off of forums where independent thinkers reside, as you will find plenty of it while America's foreign policy still engages in the illegal invasion or covert overthrow of other nations, and rightly so.

"Of course we were all cheering when Libya was overthrown."

This is such a generalization and very presumptuous on your part. No, we were not all cheering, I and many more like me were far from cheering when Libya was overthrown. We could see it for what it was & did not buy into the crap peddled by the news cycles in order to justify their participation.

And lastly while being a minor nit picking point; my ATS registration date is 4/5/2007, while yours is the 5/1/2010, so between us it is you who is the "new" member, my friend.

I can accept that he wasn't exactly on the up and up and that maybe what he was doing was wrong, but NO ONE deserves to be assassinated.

Originally posted by marker3221

First off I have not wished death on anybody, if you could kindly point out to me where I have I will gladly retract.

Secondly, criticizing your country for getting involved in the affairs of other nations, to the detriment of that nation

None of my post was directed at you. I didn't have you or your thoughts/opinions in mind when I made my post. Sorry if you got that impression. OP registered in 2012, that was where my statement came from. You registered in 2007, good for you. I don't have a problem with criticism of America, that is encouraged at a place like this. When I say country bashing I mean "omGz Amurca is a WaR MoNGer" drivel, statements made with little or no knowledge of foreign affairs. Do we REALLY know what happened in Libya? Do we? I'm not afraid to admit I don't, all I know is what I've read or been told.

Maybe it's the self-righteousness that gets to me. Or maybe it's the concept that for some reason after the mounds of bloodshed and death that happened in Libya some are cheering for even more death, that of an ambassador of their own country. That makes me sick. It's like we preach respect and understanding without bloodshed, yet it's okay when someone dies because we think they "deserved it" no, no I don't buy it at all.

Do we REALLY know what happened in Libya? Do we? I'm not afraid to admit I don't, all I know is what I've read or been told.

Maybe it's the self-righteousness that gets to me. Or maybe it's the concept that for some reason after the mounds of bloodshed and death that happened in Libya some are cheering for even more death, that of an ambassador of their own country. That makes me sick. It's like we preach respect and understanding without bloodshed, yet it's okay when someone dies because we think they "deserved it" no, no I don't buy it at all.

None of us know the full story of what went on in Libya, the day to day, week to week events that led up to the fall of Gaddafi would be very intricate, delicate and complicated.

However, the motivation, the reason they (they: America, Britain & France) undertook this task is at its core, very, very simple: Libya's oil reserves, their black gold.

Now, onto the question of the ambassador. While I have sympathy for anyone who dies in tragic circumstances and I would have unwavering sympathy for their innocent families who must bear the brunt of their loss, I must admit I have less sympathy for those who partake in less than savory behavior, a consequence of which would be their death.

Unfortunately the ambassador falls into the latter category. He knowingly partook in an armed rebellion where, under his direction & guidance (and not only his), hundreds, perhaps thousands, of nameless people met their death including the country's previous leader who died at the hands of a lynch mob. This man was no innocent.

You live by the sword, you die by the sword. I am a firm believer in that philosophy. If you choose to make rebellion, insurrection war & death your line of business you cannot feign innocence when you meet a grisly end. Now one may argue that he was the ambassador & so his role was peaceful only & I would agree, if that was all he was. But we learned he was not, he played a key role in the rebellion.

However, of course it is tragic for his family who deserve all the sympathy in the world, but one must keep perspective here. It is not healthy to lean too heavily one way or the other, so while we shouldn't condemn his name into the ground, we also shouldn't be sugarcoating his role & pretending he was a wholly innocent man either.

edit on 14-9-2012 by marker3221 because: (no reason given)