Earlier this year, the Arab Spring swept across the Middle East. A civil war erupted in Libya that only recently led to the collapse of its government and the death of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, its dictator. In the Libyan conflict, it was mainly the rebel forces, composed of protestors and Gaddafi army defectors, with the support of NATO fighting against Gaddafi’s army and his mercenaries. The mercenaries used by Gaddafi oftentimes came from other countries in Africa such as Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Niger, Mali, and Sudan. Some of Gaddafi’s mercenaries were also rumored to come from Asia and Eastern Europe (Smith). One of the members of Human Rights Watch, an organization whose mission is to protect the human rights of people around the world, believed that, “In this kind of situation, you can see why mercenaries would be an advantage because it’s easier to get foreigners to shoot at Libyans than to get Libyans to shoot at Libyans” (Smith).
If mercantile forces were overrun by rebel forces, they were lucky if they survived. When captured, many mercenaries were tortured and/or executed. There were reports from Libya of mercenaries being lynched on street lamps, even after surrendering (Meo). The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) received reports that many Libyans had begun to turn against African refugees within their country. “African refugees from Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea have told us that just being a black face in Libya is very dangerous at the moment," said Sybella Wilkes, a spokeswoman for the UNHCR ("UNHCR Braces for Possible Exodus from Libya"). Because of their darker skin, African refugees were being mistaken for being a part of Gaddafi’s mercenary forces.
Many Libyans saw Gaddafi’s use of mercenaries as the ultimate insult--he was fighting his own people with foreigners. “Gaddafi obviously does not have any limits. We knew he was crazy, but it’s still a terrible shock to see him turning mercenaries on his own people and just bowing down unarmed demonstrator,” Reuters quoted from one resident of Tripoli (Smith). As reported by the Telegraph, many of these “mercenaries” were actually forced into fighting the Libyan rebels under the threat of death. Recruiters for Gaddafi’s army would identify vulnerable upon young men and boys and give them a choice: fight for Gaddafi or be killed (Meo). While some mercenaries voluntarily fought for Gaddafi, as Gaddafi’s fight became more desperate, there was an increase in trafficked mercenary forces.
The African Union had a 1977 Convention for the Elimination of Mercenarism in Africa to address its track record of using mercenaries to fight wars (Smith). Despite the convention, mercenaries have continued to fight in African countries such as Liberia, Libya, and Equatorial Guinea.
The issue of mercenaries used by Gaddafi in Libya is an issue of power. Realists would view the situation as the attempted assertion of power through military force, which is, to realists, the most important kind of power capability a state can have (Goldstein). The mental state of Gaddafi during the Libyan uprising has been questioned, so the idea that he was behaving rationally according to a certain “theory” is highly debatable. The idea that he was a “rational actor” as the leader of his country by employing mercenaries to quell the uprising implies that he would be able to identify his interests and his priorities. It also implies that Gaddafi would be able to calculate the costs of bringing in mercenaries to fight his battles versus the benefits of such a choice through cost-benefit analysis.
In Africa, mercenaries have been a transnational issue of security for many post-colonial wars. Motivated by private gains or trafficked to fight, as in Libya’s case, mercenaries can provide a certain level of unreliability based upon incentives. Gaddafi chose to traffic untrained “mercenaries” into his country to fight his own people, a choice that only ended in bitter defeat. As perfectly stated in Mercenaries: an African Security Dilemma, “In effect, any challenge to the state’s supreme authority can only elicit a perpetual condition of anarchy, the solution of which resides in a one size, fit-all conflict management service package and all you have to do is ‘Dial an army’” (Musah 15). Gaddafi’s desperation and questionable mental state seems to have limited or completely inhibited his ability to perform a cost-benefit analysis. The chaos of the Libyan civil war definitely reflects elements of an anarchical society and Gaddafi’s attitude toward mercenaries echoes the sentiment of simply “dialing an army.”
When I began to research about mercenaries in the Libyan conflict, it was a surprise to find that many of the supposed “mercenaries” were actually trafficked into the conflict. I think that the lack of awareness and information about the idea of soldiers being trafficked needs to be amended. There is a great deal of focus upon sex trafficking and the trafficking of child soldiers in conflict, but a simple Google search about mercenary or soldier trafficking yields scant results. It is a clear violation of human rights, but when the issue is rarely addressed, how can it adequately be protected?
The idea that Gaddafi would need to traffic in mercenaries to add to his military force would be a clear indicator that his fight was reaching a desperate level. So few people within his own country wanted to defend him that he needed to threaten and coerce other Africans to fight his internal war. If he ever did a cost-benefit analysis of his actions, the benefits, no matter how small of a chance there was of them actually occurring, clearly outweighed any possible cost to him. However, by desperately fighting his own people, he only infuriated them even more by using foreigners and also stirred up racial tensions between the lighter skinned Africans and the darker skinned Africans. It is still unclear as to whether the status of darker-skinned refugees within Libya will be changed after the rebels establish a truly stable government.
The use of mercenaries in Libya also has consequences for the role of mercenaries in the future of African fighting. The uprisings of the Arab Spring earlier this year has caused uneasiness in the minds of many Middle Eastern leaders and the idea of hiring mercenaries to augment their own armies has become an attractive idea to some. In the United Arab Emirates, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi discussed creating a battalion of foreign mercenary troops with Erik Prince, the founder of Blackwater, earlier this year (Hager). For Africa, this could mean smaller national armies and a greater emphasis upon hired armies. In the future, will only foreign, hired forces be battling other foreign companies’ hired forces? A seemingly ridiculous idea, but certainly plausible and worth pondering.
Works Cited
DeCapua, Joe. "Libya: Gadhafi Has History of Using Mercenaries." Voice of America, 25 Feb. 2011. Web. 9 Dec. 2011. <http://www.voanews.com/english/news/africa/decapua-africa-mercenaries-25feb11-116920113.html>.
Goldstein, Joshua S., and Jon C. Pevehouse. International Relations. New York: Longman, 2010. Print.
Hager, Emily B., and Mark Mazzetti. "Secret Desert Force Set Up by Blackwater’s Founder." The New York Times. 14 May 2011. Web. 9 Dec. 2011. <http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/15/world/middleeast/15prince.html?pagewanted=all>.
Meo, Nick. "African Mercenaries in Libya Nervously Await Their Fate." Telegraph, 27 Feb. 2011. Web. 9 Dec. 2011. <http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/8349414/African-mercenaries-in-Libya-nervously-await-their-fate.html>.
Musah, Abdel-Fatau, and J. ' Kayode. Fayemi. Mercenaries: an African Security Dilemma. London: Pluto, 1999. Print.
Smith, David. "Has Gaddafi Unleashed a Mercenary Force on Libya?" The Guardian, 22 Feb. 2011. Web. 9 Dec. 2011. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/feb/22/gaddafi-mercenary-force-libya>.
"UNHCR Braces for Possible Exodus from Libya." Trust.org. Reuters, 22 Feb. 2011. Web. 9 Dec. 2011. <http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/dont-turn-back-refugees-from-libya-un-appeals/>.
Becca,
ReplyDeleteYou've hit the nail on the head here. We talked about PMCs being a kind of super-empowered 'stateless person' who play the game to their advantage. But as your paper points out, not all mercenaries are globally savvy masters of their fate, and Gaddafi's press-ganged mercenary troops were no exception. Indeed, Sam Nolutshungu's book on Chad - Limits of Anarchy - shows how these groups, stuck with one foot in Libya and one in Chad, have been stateless and buffeted by wars for hundreds of years. A sad tale, for sure.