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🛒 تسوق الآنThe Dynastic Trap: Washington's Realpolitik Gamble Reshapes Libya's Future
The Dynastic Trap: Washington's Realpolitik Gamble Reshapes Libya's Future
US-Brokered Deal Risks Turning Libyan Sovereignty Into a Family Enterprise
A decade and a half after the collapse of the Gaddafi regime, Libya has evolved from a war zone into a structured ecosystem of managed instability. Now, a controversial American mediation track is attempting to break the deadlock — by formalizing what critics call a "dynastic cartel" over the country's future.
The initiative, led by US Senior Adviser Massad Boulos, bypasses traditional multilateral frameworks for a transactional power-sharing formula. It aims to install Lieutenant General Saddam Haftar — heir of the eastern military apparatus — as head of an empowered Presidential Council, while keeping Abdul Hamid Dbeibah as prime minister in Tripoli.
An Economy-First Doctrine With Political Risks
Under the Boulos framework, Washington attempts to trade macroeconomic predictability for elite consolidation. The approach leverages a unified fiscal architecture — anchored by Libya's 190 billion dinar budget — to incentivize cooperation between the country's two most powerful family networks.
Policy analyst Amine Ayoub, writing in The Times of Israel, warns that the core vulnerability of this "corporate peace" is its reliance on fragile, personalized pacts lacking institutional depth. "The Western strategy validates an unaccountable cartel system operating above the law," he writes.
Regional Precedents and Historical Warnings
History warns against such narrow elite bargains. Enforcing dynastic succession without broad societal consensus has consistently paved the way for institutional collapse. Analysts point to the unraveling of Ali Abdullah Saleh's patronage system in Yemen and the fragile elite pacts of post-2003 Iraq as cautionary examples. "When sovereignty is treated as an inheritable asset, the state loses its legitimacy and becomes a vehicle for private enrichment," Ayoub notes.
Internal Friction Within the Eastern Command
The rapid concentration of political, financial, and security authority in Saddam Haftar's hands has generated friction within his own family. His brothers, Khalid and Belqasim Haftar, who command parallel security units and investment funds, view his elevation with deep skepticism. Should internal fractures split the eastern command after the aging patriarch's departure, the stability purchased by the Boulos deal could dissolve, leaving a fractured security landscape without institutional safeguards.
From Militias to Asset Managers
A critical second-order risk is the structural mutation of armed groups across Libya. Instead of competing for territorial buffers, militias are increasingly incentivized to become armed asset managers, competing for slices of the 190 billion dinar budget. This shifts the conflict from a geopolitical struggle into a battle for financial rent-seeking, hollowing out the independence of vital institutions like the Central Bank and the National Oil Corporation.
Misrata Resistance and Tripoli's Paradox
Domestic resistance has been sharpest in Misrata — the historical powerhouse of western Libya's military and merchant elite. For Misrata's leaders and revolutionary brigades, the elevation of Saddam Haftar represents an unacceptable capitulation to the forces that besieged Tripoli during the 2019 conflict.
This creates a paradox for Tripoli: if Dbeibah embraces the Washington compact, he risks mutiny among his armed backers. If he rejects it, he faces financial strangulation and diplomatic isolation. As Ayoub concludes: "Until Washington realizes that sustainable stability cannot be engineered through proxy cartels, Libya will remain trapped in a fragile transition."
— Libya Press / Politics Desk
