Breakdown of Transnational Repression 97 and defected, claiming that they had been ordered to bomb Benghazi. Saif alIslam responded by threatening to crush the uprisings in a televised address, which signaled the “final chapter in the comedy that was reform,” according to one of his advisors (Pargeter 2012: 229). On February 22, Gaddafi also gave a long-winded speech; blaming foreign powers and drug-addicted protesters for the disruptions, he promised to “cleanse” Libya of “rats” and “cockroaches.” This proved to be a huge mistake, as it justified a multilateral and militarized intervention against him (see Chapter 7). Regime violence also induced widespread defections in the military, which all but imploded under the force of the exodus. Defectors formed what became known as the Free Libya Army, a loose conglomeration of underequipped fighting forces. In response, Gaddafi supplemented his loyalist forces with foreign mercenaries. Some protesters had secured small arms from abandoned military depots, but they were badly outgunned and largely untrained. These developments were followed by a series of high-ranking defections by figures such as Mustafa Abdul Jalil, Gaddafi’s former justice minister, on February 21. He warned the international community that Gaddafi would not hesitate to annihilate entire populations, claiming, “When he’s really pressured, he can do anything. I think Gaddafi will burn everything left behind him” (Al Jazeera English 2011a; Black 2011). International institutions and heads of state condemned the “callous disregard for the rights and freedoms of Libyans that has marked the almost four-decade long grip on power by the current ruler,” as Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, announced (Al Jazeera English 2011b). Within a week of the initial protests in Benghazi, the protester-regime standoff had escalated into a nationwide war that left approximately one thousand Libyans dead. On February 27, elite defectors and commanders announced the formation of the National Transitional Council (NTC) in Benghazi, giving the Free Libya Army official representation and what was to become an internationally recognized government-in-waiting. As described in Chapter 3, Libyans in the diaspora had been largely silent on matters of home-country politics and regime change due to the threats posed by transnational repression. For this reason, the emergence of the rebellion was insufficient to automatically induce public mobilization in the diaspora. Libyans who were not previously “out” against the regime had to carefully consider whether or not to lend their faces and names to the cause out of concern for their family members at home. And yet, the majority of these respondents came out publicly against the regime in protests, community gatherings, and online forums during the onset of the revolution for three reasons. The primary reason cited by respondents for using voice was because the conflict rapidly engulfed their relatives. When their family members joined the revolution, fled the country, or were harmed by the regime, this released persons in the diaspora from the obligation to hide their anti-regime sentiments. For example, Sarah – introduced in the Introduction – decided to attend https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009272148 Published online by Cambridge University Press