Gaddafi’s death - Now Libya can build a good future

ONCE NATO gave military support to those Libyans who wished to depose Col Muammar Gaddafi, the tyrant who had run that country as a plaything for 42 years, his fate was sealed.

His reign of terror would end and the only thing he might influence was how he would surrender power. He had a chance to shape the terms of his removal, possibly even survive it, but he chose a bloody, reckless and futile rearguard resistance.

That unsurprising denial of reality has cost thousands of lives. It has also cost billions in military funding, almost €365 billion for Britain alone. Not one of those Libyans would have died, the destruction wreaked on towns and cities might have been avoided, had he experienced a fleeting moment of clarity and accepted his position. By this refusal he joined a long list of overwhelmed autocrats disposed of in the most violent and final way by the people they terrorised.