Is Gaddafi like Ceaucescu?

In the current edition of History Today (From the Editor, March 2011), we ponder whether the current Arab Revolutions are ’79 or ’89 moments (or neither).

If they are a 1989 moment, then Gaddafi is looking increasingly like Ceaucescu: his brutal, scattergun tactics, the deranged rantings of his son, the paucity of places to flee to, all are reminiscent of the last days of the Romanian dictator. The newspapers and websites are today full of images of Gaddafi exchanging niceties with Tony Blair  – the historian Michael Burleigh lays in to our former premier in the Mail Online and does not even mention that the Blairs accepted five free holidays in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el Sheikh courtesy of the delightful Mubarak.