The Libya conference and the new scramble for Africa
By Johannes Stern
18 January 2020
A major international conference on Libya will convene in Berlin on Sunday. At the invitation of Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel, heads of state and top officials of the leading imperialist powers in Europe and the US will come together to determine the fate of the resource-rich country and ultimately the entire continent. Also in attendance will be representatives of Russia, China and the most important regional powers, including Egypt, Algeria and Turkey, together with the leaders of the opposing factions in Libya’s civil war, Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj and Gen. Khalifa Haftar, and representatives of the African Union.
In both its form and venue, the meeting is reminiscent of the infamous Congo Conference, which was also held in Berlin from November 15, 1884, to February 26, 1885, at the invitation of German Chancellor Bismarck. Its outcome was the “General Act of the Berlin Conference” adopted by representatives of the US, the Ottoman Empire, the European powers and Russia. This agreement accelerated the division of Africa into colonies and ultimately intensified the tensions between the imperialist powers, culminating in the mass slaughter of the First World War that began in August 1914.
Even before the Congo Conference, the scramble for Africa was already in full swing. France occupied Tunisia in 1881, and Guinea in 1884. In 1882, British troops invaded Egypt, which at that time was officially part of the Ottoman Empire. Italy subdued parts of Eritrea in 1870 and 1882. In April 1884, the German Reich annexed German Southwest Africa (today Namibia), moving into Togo and Cameroon in July of the same year.
With the Congo Conference, the colonial subjugation of Africa, accompanied by a previously unknown level of imperialist barbarism, gathered pace. Within a few years, the European powers had carved up virtually the entire continent. The Congo fell to Belgium, most of the Sahara and the Sahel to France, Berlin secured German East Africa (today’s Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda, as well as part of Mozambique) and Britain conquered Sudan by finally crushing the Mahdist Revolt in 1899. This was followed by the subjugation of South Africa by Britain in the Second Boer War (1899 to 1902), the division of Morocco by France and Spain and Italy’s conquest of Libya in 1912.
As at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, the major powers pursued their predatory imperialist interests under the guise of “diplomacy” and “peace.” Today, they act even more nakedly to achieve the same objectives.
In a commentary on the Libya conference, the daily Tagesspiegel states quite bluntly, “Libya’s strategic importance is the reason why so many people want to get involved there—although it is generally not attractive to invest soldiers or mercenaries and billions in a civil war with an uncertain outcome. Libya has oil. Whoever controls Libya controls what is currently the most important migration route to Europe—and thus becomes an indispensable partner of the EU”.
The author, Christoph von Marschall, whose aristocratic ancestors were high-ranking foreign policy-makers of the German Reich, openly expresses the traditions to which Berlin is returning. “Germany now needs the cool perspective of Otto von Bismarck on realpolitik. And it calls for his diplomatic skills as an ‘honest broker.’” But “the role of the honest broker does not mean that he has to be altruistic and cannot represent his own interests. Germany has these: stability in Libya, reducing pressure on Europe through uncontrolled migration.”
Then, as now, the “honest broker” is really an imperialist brigand, who is seeking a “place in the sun.” While the German government did not participate in the NATO bombing of Libya in 2011, it has been all the more aggressive in its involvement in Africa since its about-face in foreign policy in 2013–14. Now, Germany is engaged with more than 1,000 soldiers deployed in the French-led occupation of Mali, maintains a military camp in neighbouring Niger and advances its imperialist aims across the continent with increasing aggressiveness.
Last March, Berlin updated its “Africa Policy Guidelines,” which were first adopted in May 2014. This revision evokes the “growing relevance of Africa for Germany and Europe,” which is due, among other things, to the continent’s increasingly dynamic economy and “rich natural resources.” The government therefore called for the strengthening of “Germany’s political, security and development policy commitment in Africa in a targeted manner,” to act “early, quickly, decisively and substantially” and to “deploy the entire spectrum of its available resources cross-departmentally.”
The other imperialist powers are pursuing similar objectives and have also increased their military and political intervention on the continent in recent years. France has massively expanded its engagement in the Sahel zone, and the US is also escalating its intervention in Africa, especially to curb Russian and Chinese influence. Nine years after the NATO bombing of Libya—which reduced much of the country’s infrastructure to rubble, left thousands of civilians dead and wounded and led to the lynch-mob murder of Colonel Gaddafi—the country is once again at the centre of imperialist intrigues. But now, the stakes are even greater, with all of the belligerents of the previous war arrayed against each other, fighting for control of the booty.
Read more at https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/01/18/pers-j18.html
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