The history repeats itself and How (Published in the Hindu as on 23-rd October,2011)

Published in the Hindu as on 23-rd October,2011
as on http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/open-page/article2562907.ece

History has a fascinating way of playing with the human actors in ways that the same actors are unable to comprehend. Human beings play their roles in the great stage of history without knowing that their actions in the present can draw parallels to the long-forgotten actors who have left the same great stage many years sometimes many centuries back. The story of the former Libyan leader Gaddafi also in many ways seem to draw a parallel with a long-forgotten character from the region of North Africa; i.e. the King of the ancient Numidia in what is called modern day Algeria; Jugurtha.
Jugurtha who was the nephew of King Micipsa , the king of Numidians , a powerful ally of the Roman power in North Africa during the late Roman republican period. Jugurtha came to power by removing an existing monarchy, i.e. that of his uncle’s sons or his cousin brothers. Gaddafi came to power after leading a coup to replace King Idris , the British-supported king who was the head of the monarchy that ruled Libya since the end of the Second World War.
Both Jugurtha and Gaddafi started their carriers as military leaders; i.e. Jugurtha started his carrier as a trusted lieutenant of the famous Roman general Sipio Africanus in his African campaigns and of course Gaddafi was a military officer i.e. colonel when he led the palace coup that ended the rule of King Idris.
Another interesting commonality between Jugurtha and Gaddafi is how both used their wealth to manipulate their Western counterparts. Both sensed that money is something that can easily role heads and trump other loyalties in the Western and particularly Romano-Italian political circles. Now days we hear many interesting tales of friendship between the Italian Prime Minister Silvio Barlusconi and Gaddafi which includes among other things lucrative deals for Libyan oil by Italian companies. Jugurtha also found out how often Roman statesmen fail to their desires and ambitions when offered with a sufficient amount of fortunee. He famously described Rome as "urbem venalem et mature perituram, si emptorem invenerit" ("a city for sale and doomed to quick destruction, if it should find a buyer,") Indeed he is said to have purchased the friendship of many Roman generals and senators who came to end his regime with the allure of money.
Both the men had also shown the audacity to take on the superpower of the day. In case of Jugurtha it was the provocation of killing the Roman Italians while attacking the city where his brother was hiding that earned him the enmity of the Roman power and in the case of Gaddafi it was his supporting of groups like the Irish Republican Army and the Palestinian Liberation Organization that earned him the anger of the modern superpower i.e. United States.
The method taken by the superpower of the day to dispose the challenges of Jugurtha then and Gaddafi now has also parallels in between them. In case of Jugurtha , the famous Roman general Sulla who was given the task of removing the threat of Jugurtha once and for all , decided to form alliance with some of the neighbors of Jugurtha whereas in case of Gaddafi it was some of his own countrymen (called as “rebels” by the mainstream International media) who were co-opted by the current superpower and their Western allies for bringing an end to the reign of the man whom the West has called “the mad dog of the Middle East” for a long time.
The end of Gaddafi is much less humilitaing than Jugurtha. Jugurtha was taken to Rome as a prisoner in chains and was paraded before the crowds before being thrown into the dungeon of Rome to rot. When Gaddafi received the last bullet in Sirte , he was actually spared the abomination of being taken to the Hague in chains and rot in his cell towards an uneventful death.
The post-Jugurtha scene is also quite interesting. The ambitious general Sulla who brought an end to the reign of Jugurtha that was troublesome to the eyes of the Roman power decided to fight his boss Marius who was given the main command of removing Jugurtha. Sulla ended Jugurtha;s reign thereby ending an embarrassment for the Roman ruling elite but it was his boss Marius who got all the credits. Sulla was aghast at this with his own boss and this was the beginning of a rivalry between these two men which would ultimately strike a blow at the very core of the Roman republic. Some years later when the time came for the Roman senate awarding the supreme military command to an worthy man; the candidates were only two i.e. Sulla and Marius, the senate first chose Sulla but when Sulla had left with his legions to fight in the East the same body decided to award the overall military command to Marius thanks to the latter’s intrigues with the senate. This led Sulla to turn his legions back on Rome and thus was the beginning of the first Roman civil war and a chain of events which would later go on to end the Roman republic and would lead to the beginning of the Roman empire. Sulla’s example would later lead to names like Pompeii, Ceasre and Augustus declaring themselves as the sole centre of power in Rome.
Until now the stories of Jugurtha and Gaddafi have many things in parallel but whether the aftermath of the two stories will also have some sort of commonality or not it will be really interesting to observe. After all as I mentioned in the beginning, History has a wonderful way of making itself repeat in many ways that we can not comprehend. Let us think about this scenario. A look at the current situation of the American republic leads us to draw a straight line between the last days of the Roman Republic and the current situation in the modern American republic. In the situation of Rome during its last days, the existing institutions of power like Senate were beginning to get irrelevant since instead of exercising their independent authority they tended to follow whatever the richest and most powerful of the elites had to say. The election of Marius over Sulla’s prior election for the same post is a case in point. This particular irrelevance of the institutions of Rome would later go on to encourage ambitious and powerful men to first challenge these institutions and then make them subservient to their wishes. This would go on to the end of the Roman republic and the beginning of the dominance of a single leader in Rome i.e. the Emperor.
The current situation in the USA also has quite a few similarities with the late Roman republic. Since 9/11, the legislative institutions in the USA; the Senate and the Congress have largely transferred a lot of emergency powers at the hands of the executive i.e. the presidency. These emergency powers allow the current American president to order the assassination of American citizens on far away lands without a legal trial (as we have seen it in the case of President Obama ordering the assassination of US citizen Anwar Al-Awlaki in Yemen for allegedly being a terrorist) as well as keeping the stringent laws of surveillance into place. The current political situation also tells us that the two main political parties in the USA instead of following any independent positions of their own follow the guidelines as given by their powerful lobbies who help these American politicians to get elected in the first place with the contribution of their monetary as well as other support (as observed in the bipartisan support the Israeli leaders enjoy in Washington.) The overall political scene gives a picture of gradual decline and irrelevancy of the American legislative institutions. They do not seem to comprehend the economic or political problems faced by their nation and thereby unwilling to contribute to the solution for these problems. Now imagine what will happen if an American general in an emergency situation like a foreign war or a terrorist attack on American soil decides to declare these legislative organizations as worthless and declares himself the supreme ruler aka Sulla.
Does it seem too far fetched? But did I not tell you my readers that History tends to play the fascinating game that very few of us can comprehend.