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Perhaps Gaddafi's most brazen use of force was his invasion of neighboring Chad in November 1980 in support of President Goukouni Oueddei. Barely a month later, Gaddafi declared a merger of the two countries and kept up to 10,000 Libyan troops in Chad as a virtual occupation force. Then, just as abruptly, Gaddafi removed his troops last November after the Organization of African Unity asked him to do so. But he may not stay out: much of Chad is marked on Gaddafi's own maps as part of a greater Libya that also includes sections of Niger and Algeria.
A man determined to prove his own importance, Gaddafi has suffered numerous rebuffs. They must sting. Gaddafi has attempted to work out ambitious mergers of Libya with Tunisia, Egypt and Syria. His present link with Syria is largely symbolic and may well collapse, as the others did, in recrimination. In 1973 Gaddafi ordered an Egyptian submarine, temporarily under his command in Libyan waters, to torpedo the Queen Elizabeth II, which was carrying hundreds of Jews from Southampton to Haifa to celebrate Israel's 25th anniversary. Sadat, who was then still on speaking terms with Gaddafi, countermanded the order. Over the past decade, Gaddafi has continually tried to get hold of an atom bomb—so far with no success, although Libya has two small nuclear facilities (one built by the Soviets, the other by the French) and is buying up huge supplies of uranium from Niger.
Gaddafi preaches democracy; he practices dictatorship. In April 1980, he ordered all Libyan dissidents living abroad to return home or face "liquidation." By the end of that year, at least twelve Libyans had been hunted down and murdered in England, Italy, West Germany, Greece and Lebanon by Gaddafi-anointed hit squads. Most of the victims were little-known private citizens, and it is doubtful that they posed a threat to Tripoli. Instead, their killings were presumably intended to set an example. So Byzantine are Gaddafi's methods that when Libyan Hitman Abdel Nabih Swaiti, who was tried and convicted for attempting to kill a Libyan exile in Rome last June, was found dead of a heart attack in his jail cell two weeks ago, Gaddafi was immediately suspected of being behind his death. The reason: Swaiti may have been poisoned first. An inquiry is now under way. Suspicions also linger that Gaddafi was behind the attempted murder last year of a Libyan dissident in Colorado; Eugene Tafoya, a former Green Beret and a friend of onetime CIA Agent Wilson, was convicted of third-degree assault two weeks ago for the shooting.