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Muammar Gaddafi — dictator, despot, tyrant. How did he come to power?
“I remain with my people and I am ready to die in agony,” Muammar Gaddafi assured on Lebanese radio in late September 2011. The dictator’s words proved prophetic. A month later, after more than 40 years of authoritarian rule, he was killed by insurgents’ bullets.
October 20, 2021 marked ten years since the death of Muammar Gaddafi. He reigned twice as long as Saddam Hussein, four times as long as Adolf Hitler and five times as long as Idi Amin. He wreaked havoc on the people for more than four decades and ruled Libya indivisibly until the Arab Spring erupted. He ended up like the great dictators. He died at the hands of the rebels in the civil war that had begun a few months earlier. Could he have avoided it?
Muammar Gaddafi — a liberator who became a dictator
Muammar Gaddafi, according to some sources, was born on June 7, 1942, while others point to September 13. Doubts about the Libyan leader’s specific date of birth stem from his background. The dictator was born in a tent in the desert in Sirte as the son of an itinerant camel breeder. Abu Meniar, Gaddafi’s father, as befitted a Bedouin, led a nomadic lifestyle and kept no documents, including Muammar’s birth certificate. Hence, there is much ambiguity on this issue. Some historians and…
