I've always admired your fashion sense, Colonel.
Meanwhile, a good analysis:
You cannot accept the need for reform and start shooting people in the streets. But unless the army keeps shooting it's hard to see how or why the protestors will return home. Even if they did the respite for the regime would, surely, be only temporary. For that matter, shooting people in the streets is also a sign of weakness, not strength. Increasingly it seems that the Gaddafis options amount to choosing the manner and moment of their defeat and eclipse. Eventually, failure carries a price. Even in authoritarian states. The alternative, as Saif warns, might be full-blown civil war. That's something the regime and only the regime can choose or authorise.
Bookmarks