Master of Mischief

From the burning of the U.S. embassy in Tripoli in 1979 to his outspoken support for the murderous attacks at the Rome and Vienna airports last December, Muammar Gaddafi has left a trail of blood and destruction during the past decade. Acting Ambassador-at-Large Robert Oakley told Congress in February that while Syria and Iran "remain very much involved" in fomenting international terrorism, "over the past six months Libya has become by far the most active, especially against American and European travelers. If it cannot be stopped, others can be expected to follow."

Name a terrorist group, says the State Department, and Libya has probably provided financial assistance, at least. Gaddafi has backed not just radical Palestinian organizations but outfits as distant as Colombia's M-19 guerrillas, which engineered the bloody takeover of Bogota's Palace of Justice last November; the Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front on the French Pacific-island territory of New Caledonia; and anti-Turkish Armenian terrorist groups. Last month, when Gaddafi played host to the ambitiously titled Congress of the World Center for Struggle Against Imperialism and Zionism, his guests included representatives of the Irish Republican Army, the Basque separatist group ETA and the American Black Muslim Louis Farrakhan. Israeli sources say that Gaddafi maintains some 20 terrorist training camps in Libya, where 7,000 people of various nationalities learn the basics of guerrilla warfare. One U.S. intelligence official reports, "They are recruiting right now a growing number of Palestinians, Greek radicals and Latin Americans for terror operations."

Gaddafi's most worrisome ally is the shadowy Palestinian radical Abu Nidal, who is reported to be living in Libya. The U.S. has accused him of carrying out the Rome and Vienna airport assaults, using passports provided by Libya. It also holds Abu Nidal responsible for hijacking an EgyptAir passenger jet to Malta last November, an act that ended in disaster when 60 people were killed as Egyptian commandos stormed the plane in a rescue raid. Much of Gaddafi's mischief has been aimed at his political foes. Since 1980, more than 15 anti-Gaddafi Libyan exiles have been assassinated in Italy, England, West Germany, Greece and the U.S. More than 50 people were injured in two London bombings in 1984 that were presumed to be of Libyan origin. That same year Gaddafi caused an uproar in London, when gunfire from the Libyan embassy / killed a British policewoman and injured eleven Libyan dissident demonstrators.

Gaddafi's reputation as an international meddler was firmly established in 1977, when he intervened to support the nightmare dictatorship of Uganda's Idi Amin. He has invaded Chad twice, prompting French President Francois Mitterrand to send French troops to the landlocked African country. Libya and France signed an agreement in 1984 to withdraw each nation's forces. France did so, but Gaddafi promptly embarrassed Mitterrand by reneging. Libya fought a minor border war with Egypt in 1977 and supplied materiel to coup leaders in Burkina Faso in 1983. Gaddafi is suspected of having mined the Red Sea in 1984 (18 ships were damaged), and continues to use Libyan diplomatic pouches to export weapons. Says the State Department's Oakley: "Terrorism is one of the primary instruments of Gaddafi's foreign policy."

Although most Arab leaders mistrust Gaddafi, he sees himself as a visionary from the desert who is destined to restore Arabs to their lost glory. In his fevered imagination, he expects to succeed in the destruction of Israel and the continued harassment of its principal sponsor, the U.S. "It is too easy and simplistic to dismiss Gaddafi as mad," said a Western diplomat in Tripoli. "He genuinely believes the cause is just, so there's no deflecting him. He'll pursue his fight with the U.S. until he dies."