LIBYA: Poor & Proud

Homer knew it, the Greeks named it, and for 2,500 years Libya was easy pickings for plundering Phoenicians and Romans, Arabs and Spaniards. Turks and Italians. In dismantling the tinny empire of Mussolini—the last of Libya's conquerors—the U.N. gave the ancient Libyan people their first real independence in 1951. Free Libya's legacy from its past includes rich Roman ruins, live German land mines, and a fierce resentment among Libya's predominantly Arab 1,130,000 population against all things foreign. All things, that is, except foreign money, particularly U.S. dollars. Libya gets more foreign...