Around 8 months ago, way way back in March Andrew Exum aka Abu Muqawama discussed an interesting report from West Point's Harmony Project. I also wrote about the report which you can read here and get caught up on where I'm coming from when I point you to my next link.
To summarize, if you do not feel like clicking links, in October 2007 some documents were captured in Sinjar, Iraq. Those documents indicated that many foreign fighters coming to Iraq to fight the infidels (that would be the US and its allies) were from Libya, and more specifically eastern Libya.
Back in March I was not sure we could entirely trust the Libyan rebels who had their center of gravity and most support in eastern Libya. What exactly were their motivations? Now that Colonel Gadaffi has been "eliminated", who will really run the show in Libya?
Now we come to the link I mentioned above. The flag of Al Qaeda has been seen flying over the courthouse in Benghazi. Locals are stating "Islamists" are driving around in brand new SUVs waving the flag as well.
I realize that the US government faced a tough decision when it came to the Libyan revolution/insurrection/rebellion (what the hell was it anyway?). Do we back the dictator or do we back the rebels who may or may not be backed by our current boogeyman?
Hopefully this is just an isolated incident, but it appears to this lowly captain that the situation in Libya is looking more and more like what happened in Afghanistan. In 10 years are we going to be backing the Taureg tribe in a civil war against an Al Qaida controlled government? Would we even bother waiting 10 years?
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