Ross Douthat makes sense when he turns his attention from policing vaginas to the question of intervention in Libya. Of course, Daniel Larison has been hitting this hard for the last week or so. Here’s one example:
It is “essential” to American credibility and the stability of the region that Gaddafi be overthrown? The last time that interventionists were warning about the de-stabilizing regional effects of a dictator, we ended up with the Iraq debacle in which millions of people were displaced or driven into exile, and hundreds of thousands were killed. Widening and escalating Libya’s civil war into an international one are more likely to contribute to regional destabilization than anything currently happening in Libya. When did Gaddafi’s downfall become “essential” to American credibility? When Obama said that he “must go”? It wasn’t a good idea to say that publicly if there was no intention of following through on it, but this is a bit like saying George Bush was required to attack Iran because he included them in the “axis of evil” or else undermine American “credibility.” Careless rhetoric is unfortunate, but that doesn’t mean that U.S. policymakers have to treat it as if it were an ultimatum.
There really is no way to have a “no-fly” zone without airstrikes, which come with the risk of US casualties or prisoners of war, as well as collateral damage injuring innocent civilians. And if we miss a Libyan jet or helicopter that participates in civilian slaughter, the pressure for further intervention will increase. There are lots of places were application of American force could help overthrow dictators. In the Ivory Coast, for example, the same kind of slaughter of civilians is being perpetrated by a callous dictator. The only difference is that he hasn’t publicly thumbed his nose at the US for decades, so Bill Kristol and the other neocons’ don’t feel butthurt enough to demand his ouster by force.
steviez314
There’s another difference–the Ivory Coast isn’t Israel’s enemy, so Kristol doesn’t give a shit about it.
gypsy howell
The War Pig must be fed, and the administration fears that we are tiring of feeding the one in Iraq and Afghanistan. That’s all this is about.
Bulworth
Agreed. Even George Focking Will was making sense about saying No to the No Fly Zone.
Bill Murray
@steviez314: plus Ivorians speak French, so they don’t really count
Erik Vanderhoff
Qaddafi is paying Sudanese mercenaries a thousand dollars a day. These are not the acts of a man who will be deterred by a no-fly zone, or will hesitate to shoot at American planes. He’s not going anywhere while he’s alive.
And there’s really not much we can — or should — do about it.
Zifnab
And as soon as we start finding massive oil reserves in the Ivory Coast, this will become important somehow. :-p
That said, there’s a big difference between “bombing”, “strafing” and “doing nothing”. France has already begun the process of legally recognizing the rebel government. The country is hemorrhaging refugees, many of whom I’m sure could benefit from international aid. And delivering food and medical assistance to the half-starved war-torn country itself doesn’t sound like a bad idea either.
The Libyan resistance has large factions of the military on their side. They have military support. Offering them additional firepower at this junction really is the least we could do for them, in every sense of the phrase.
sixers
The no fly zone will pay for itself with oil revenue!
Roger Moore
@Zifnab:
This. Let’s not ignore the elephant in the room.
Yes, but legal recognition and humanitarian aid don’t provide a convenient excuse to kill brown people and give massive no-bid contracts to Xe. Let’s not forget the real purpose of our foreign policy, here!
Mnemosyne
As Yutsano said about this the other day, if the Arab League really really wants Gaddafi stopped as badly as they keep saying, they should do something about it and not wait around for the US to step in. You can’t complain about US meddling in the Middle East and then insist that the US act in the Middle East.
I have no problem with the US providing humanitarian assistance to the refugees, but military intervention or assistance is a really bad idea.
soonergrunt
Application of American force could do a lot of things. I’ve said before that there’s nothing in Libya worth the life of a single American Soldier, and that it was just like Iraq in that respect. There’s nothing there that affects US National Security. There’s nothing good to come of it. Just like Iraq was, Libya would be a sink of American blood and treasure to no good end for America, with no justification other than some limited constituency that won’t get their own hands dirty would like it. We wouldn’t even get goodwill of the local populace out of it.
The countries that want a no-fly zone over Libya should get right on that. Bill Kristol can eat a bag of dicks.
bjacques
@Zifnab:
Logistical support through Benghazi, before it’s cut off. Food, water, baby formula, gasoline. Fresh ammo for the weapons they already have. Stingers would do wonders in helping the opposition enforce their own no-fly zone. Likewise some decent antitank weapons. The more Libyan soldiers and officers defect, the more the last make sense, as the weapons will be more likely to go to professionals who will use them best. Battlefield intel, to the extent we can provide it. Really, anything short of boots on the ground and planes over Libyan airspace.
liberal
@Zifnab:
IIRC France’s record on that continent doesn’t exactly make this a glowing recommendation.
Redshirt
Neocons in the News: I Want a New War.
liberal
@soonergrunt:
This.
liberal
@soonergrunt:
…adding, let’s reflect on what John Quincy Adams said:
Zifnab
@Roger Moore:
*sigh*
@bjacques:
I’d rather just not see any kind of military aid whatsoever. But if you felt the need to give something, yes – bullets would be preferable to air strikes. But bread would be preferable to bullets.
@liberal: :-p I’m simply using their actions as an example of what can be done to support Libya without using high explosives. If you can point to something truly sinister and diabolical about setting up diplomatic ties, I’d love to hear it.
liberal
@Zifnab:
Nah. There’s plenty of oil in Nigeria, and a lot of fighting, yet I don’t see lots of public discussion about invading there.
There’s also lots of oil in Angola, yet the oil companies were doing business with the guys we were fighting against.
And re Iraq, we didn’t invade because of oil. There is certainly cause and effect insofar as without oil, no one would have paid much attention to Iraq, but that wasn’t a direct cause. (I think steviez314 would understand what one of the primary causes was.)
Janet Strange
@Zifnab: Ivory Coast does have oil, although they are apparently in a dispute with Ghana about it. I have a student from Ivory Coast. He insists that Ouattara was not elected (vote fraud is suspected), but is rather a puppet who is operating for those with economic interests. He also says the “massacres” of protesters are faked and sent me this video. My French is not good enough to follow the explanations at the video, but my student says that in the background you hear someone say in the native language, “no, lie down” as is they haven’t yet finished filming her “killing.” (He says that is palm oil, not blood, on her.)
Anyway, I have no idea what to believe about what is happening in Ivory Coast, but I’m getting Judy Miller flashbacks every time I see coverage about what is happening there. FWIW, here’s what the Prime Minister of Ivory Coast says. Ivory Coast Crisis is About Oil
gene108
Lots of cocoa in the Ivory Coast. Maybe there are some chocoholics in positions of power, who’ll start going nuts, when the price of a piece of chocolate triples.
liberal
@Zifnab:
Nothing, per se. My point is rather that while we might wish or expect states would intervene for truly humanitarian grounds, the empirical evidence of history shows this is rarely, if ever, the case. It’s a matter of intentions and eventualities, and my claim is that these things usually don’t work out well. You might call it mere diplomacy; I tend to look at it as the beginning of going down a path we shouldn’t be considering.
liberal
@gene108:
Please speak quietly; otherwise my wife is apt to purchase an assault rifle and head down there herself to fight for her right to consume!
Chris
@liberal:
And re Iraq, we didn’t invade because of oil. There is certainly cause and effect insofar as without oil, no one would have paid much attention to Iraq, but that wasn’t a direct cause. (I think steviez314 would understand what one of the primary causes was.)
I’d say the immediate motive for Iraq was political: make it look like you’re doing something by attacking a known enemy that you can defeat easily (thus drawing attention away from the real enemy that you have no idea how to defeat). Make a great big show out of that, exploit the wave of patriotism to boost your popularity and use the war hysteria as a hammer to smash the opposition (even though most of them voted with you anyway).
The prospect of giving a ton of no-bid contracts to corporate cronies in the military-industrial sector and the oil sector was a welcome bonus and secondary objective. And the idea that this would rebuild Iraq into a prosperous free-market democracy which would help end the appeal of terrorism and anti-Americanism in the region, is what they told themselves so they could sleep at night.
That’s all just my opinion, of course, I welcome any other take on it.
The Moar You Know
The Saudis, Egypt, France, Germany, the UAE, Italy and a slew of other nations who might actually have a stake in a no-fly zone have Eurofighters, F-16s, M1A1 tanks, Apache helicopters…all the goodies we have plus quite a few that we don’t, and a huge population of unemployed Arab youngsters who are standing around waiting for nothing more than to be handed a gun and a direction to point it in, hell, you don’t even have to pay them, just feed ’em and tell them that it’s all for a chance to die in a hail of gunfire and glory.
That they are asking us to establish and enforce a no-fly zone, and not doing it themselves in spite of having all the tools to do so, should tell you something.
PurpleGirl
@The Moar You Know: That they are asking us to establish and enforce a no-fly zone, and not doing it themselves in spite of having all the tools to do so, should tell you something.
That they are lazy and way too accustomed to the US being the policeman of the world. And cheap… they want us to spend the money so they don’t have to. This is enough of a reason for me to say, US stay home and stay out of it. Humanitarian aid is one thing, anything active military is not acceptable.
Nazgul35
One word: OIL
Corner Stone
There is a reason gasoline is as cheap as it is in the US. Because we subsidize oil on the open market with our military.
Now get out there kill some rags!
liberal
@Chris:
Reasonable hypotheses, but IMHO the driving forces were (a) Israel, (b) Bush (Saddam put a half-assed hit on Daddy).
Alex S.
My stance on this issue is changing. I think that Gadhafi should be removed. If he wins the civil war, and that’s likely as of now, he will cleanse the country from his enemies. And what will the international community do after his victory? Ignore him? – Impossible, he’s got oil. Industrialized countries were so very relieved when Gadhafi pretended to be a new, moderate person.
Libya is not Iraq. Gadhafi is not as powerless as Hussein. There is an organized opposition, the country would not face a vacuum of power after his removal. There are no ethnic or religious aspects to consider.
I wanted the international community to close Gadhafi’s accounts and to stop buying libyan oil immediately. At the moment, Gadhafi is able to use his money to finance a mercenary army to fight against his own people. His other big advantage is air superiority. He has already used it to kill civilians and he will use it to reclaim town after town. So now I want a no-fly zone. Destroy his air power. Just like during the first year of the Afghanistan war, the international community can use air superiority to help native troops on the ground.
I have a hunch that the earthquake in Japan is going to save Gadhafi, because the industrialized nations would love to sweep this matter under the rug.
soonergrunt
@PurpleGirl: This. If they can’t or won’t expend their own treasure and risk their own blood, they don’t really think it needs doing.
Dave
@liberal: I think you’re half right on the B) part. It’s not that Saddam put a hit on his dad. It’s that his dad didn’t get rid of Saddam and W wanted to one-up his old man. Their relationship isn’t exactly a great one.
srv
@Alex S.:
What planet do you and the Pat Lang’s new-neocons live on? We have absolutely no clue who the opposition is and there’s no evidence they’re capable of organizing anything, particularly a “government.” At least the neocons trotted out aholes like Chalabi and made a pretense of having a clue, y’all have way less than that.
What evidence is there that airpower is playing a primary or important role in the “rebels” defeat? When a no-fly doesn’t help enough, then what?
Chris
@liberal:
I’d like to hope that the Israelis had more sense than to want the overthrow of a weak, unpopular, already-contained dictator when the long-term beneficiaries would likely be Syria and Iran (both of them much greater concerns for Israel). Maybe not, though.
Corner Stone
@srv:
One of the recent skirmishes I read about detailed a flanking maneuver by Gaddafi forces using tanks.
IOW, the snuck up on the rebels from the rear and then pounded the ever living dogshit out of them with heavy/track mounted weapons.
What will a NFZ do about that?
Alex S.
@srv:
1. I have never read anything by Pat Lang. I just had to google him.
2. I am not a new neocon.
3. We have clues who the opposition is. Only your laziness or maybe the bad state of US media is preventing you from finding out. Benghazi is ruled by several commitees that form a provisional government. The leader of the rebel army is Abdel Fattah Younez:
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/02/2011228232312771972.html
4. Younez is not an ‘a-hole trotted out by neocons’. This is a genuine revolution of the people.
5. About the role of airpower, of course it plays a major role, like here:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/gaddafi-retakes-rebel-city-2235747.html
6. What if a no-fly zone does help?
DFH no.6
@Chris:
Yes, Chris, I believe that is an accurate listing of the primary and secondary objectives of “tell me again, why the fuck did we invade Iraq?”.
For the overarching primary reason, I would put it more succinctly, as Davis X. Machina put it early on: Republican electoral strategy, first and foremost.
Both to beat on the Dems in the midterms of ’02 (worked well on all fronts) and, even more importantly, to get Dim Son re-elected in ’04 as “the war president” (also worked quite well, obviously). All else (blood for oil, PNAC neocon foolishness, no bid Halliburton and Blackwater, etc.) was far down the list.
There’s a very good reason we went in when we did in March of ’03 – the inspectors were finding bupkis (of course) on the whole WMD nonsense, so the Bush Admin had to pull the trigger before there was a chance that the alleged cassus belli was shown definitively (enough) to be bullshit.
I told all my friends and acquaintances this at the time, and remember being stunned that anyone gave any credence to Colin Powell’s absurd tragicomic “performance” at the UN just prior to our invasion, but then, I am a DFH (it’s right there in the title).
Much as it pains me to see the Libyan rebels having a hard time of it against Gaddafi, we need to stay out militarily (directly). Surely there are many less visible avenues available for providing supplies of all kinds, though (including guns and ammo – I’m pretty sure we are well set up as a key distributor of such items).
Cris
May I go all DFH for a sec and remind the audience that the risk of US casualties is remote, while the risk of collateral damage injuring innocent civilians is all but certain.
liberal
@Dave:
Yeah, I missed that. Thanks.
liberal
@Chris:
IIRC the Israelis really wanted us to take out Iran first. I think they settled on Iraq for the time being because Iran would be way too hard a sell.
liberal
@DFH no.6:
Nah. All the forces pushing for a showdown with Iraq were neocon.
2002? A large fraction of the Dems in Congress voted for the Oct 2002 AUMF. If it was simply partisanship, why did Henry Waxman vote for it? Not to mention quite a few other liberals.
soonergrunt
I’m going to say this one more time.
There is nothing in Libya that is worth risking the life of a single American service member. NOTHING.
The only thing in that country that has any worth to anyone outside of Libya is the oil, and that will either continue to flow or it will start flowing again soon enough because pumping oil to sell on the international market is what Libyans do.
Further, no matter what we do, or how well we do it, nobody will give us credit for the good things, but we’ll get all the blame for the bad things. This statement specifically includes a number of assholes amongst our own people, but it also includes the people we would ostensibly be helping.
The history of uprisings against strong men is that the successful ones result primarily in other strong men coming to power. They almost never create anything approximating a democracy. So we’ll be blamed if we choose which group to support and we’ll be blamed if we don’t.
Finally, if all of those countries of the Arab League and Europe want a no-fly zone over Libya (which almost invariably ends in invasion, at least of “peacekeepers”) then they should be clamoring to do it themselves with their nice, shiny, unused air forces with well-rested crews backed up by nice shiny unused armies with well-rested soldiers.
srv
@Alex S.:
1) You’ll find a new hero there. Big fan of Omar Sulieman (literally worked with the guy), don’t-listen-these-Egyptian-crackpots in Tahir because we don’t know what will happen next, but I’ve always had a hair up my butt about MQ, so let’s go get him!
2) erm, yep, you are. It’s a term I made up to define the latest set of psuedo-moralists war supporters who have arguments far weaker than the neocons.
3) Several committees… With primarily anonymous leadership. Younis? Former interior minister? You mean former torturer-in-chief should be our new ally? You’ll note your heroic Gen. Younis seems to be missing here:
http://ntclibya.org/english/council-members/
I presume this revolutionary can’t wait to submit himself to one of these councils…
4) He’s a genuine revolutionary who has been part of the Libyan regime for just… 40 years! Amazing. At least Chalabi hadn’t made a career of torturing people for 40 years.
5) I’ll cede that the article makes a psychological benefit of airstrikes “Today’s airstrikes appeared designed to intimidate the rebels rather than kill them”, but the destruction doesn’t require them: “The government heavily shelled the city with tank artillery and mortars, according to one witness who said Gaddafi’s tanks were roaming the city and firing randomly at homes.”
6) This isn’t a strategy. This is a feel-good, what-if-it-were-all-so-easy response. Look at what a NFZ over the last dictator in Iraq caused over a decade. There’s no evidence it will turn any tide. Even Pat Lang and crew don’t think so – they just want it as a cover for ground operations.
liberal
@Alex S.:
Only your laziness is preventing you from reading enough history to know that it’s very difficult to predict the outcomes of revolutions, regardless of who the major apparent players are at any one time.
Mnemosyne
@liberal:
Because they didn’t want to be campaigned against as nervous Nellies who didn’t want to take out a horrible dictator who was pointing his nukes right at us! See also: how John Kerry’s vote against the first Gulf War was used against him in 2004.
As with so many maneuvers set up by the Republicans, it didn’t help Democrats to vote for the AUMF since the Repugs claimed all the Democrats were soft on Saddam anyway.
toondeef
Janet at #18, for what it’s worth that video is from the state radio and television, run by president Gbagbo.
Gbagbo is the bad guy here. You student is on his side, as is the prime minister throwing in the oil red herring.
Ouattara won the election and Gbagbo refused to quit. The fraud you student sees is that same old fraud of the other side winning.
General information note, it’s Ivory Coast not the Ivory Coast. They had to keep the colonial name because there are too many local languages to choose from, but putting “the” in front is impolite. One reason most of us don’t know this is that US media have hardly ever reported anything about Ivory Coast, and it is not at all surprising that they aren’t reporting on it now. The country has very strong ties with France, and in fact the first president of Ivory Coast had been a member of parliament and minister in the metropolitan French government, so it likewise not surprising that the story is reported there.
srv
@Corner Stone: It might make you feel good in place of having any coherent strategy?
Alex S.
@srv:
1) I don’t know what you’re aiming at with this. I think that Omar Suleiman is an attempt of the Mubarak regime to safe their power. Just assuming that I would support him, too, shows that you are making it all-too-easy.
2) I didn’t support the Iraq War – whoops, there goes your argument. But you need it to find a place for me in your two-dimensional world view.
3) Primarily anonymous leadership? And then you give me a link that shows who these leaders are? Somewhat self-contradictory. Just because you and I don’t know the local leadership doesn’t mean that the Libyans don’t know either.
4) You know why such a figure is at the top of the rebellion? Because not many other people would be able to. Who else but a general to lead the army? Does this mean that he should be the future leader? No, but consider Gadhafi’s history of violence against his own people and support of international terrorism and you’ll be hard-pressed to imagine how anyone could be worse. Younez was one of the first major figures to abandon the regime. That has to do. You won’t find a Luke Skywalker among the rebels, because most likely they’d be dead already. Once the Gadhafi regime is toppled, the deck will be shuffled again. And I don’t think that the Libyans would defeat one dictator to support another one.
5) Congratulations for finding the least relevant sentence. Here are other quotes:
“Gaddafi’s regime has been using its air power advantage more each day to check a rebel advance west toward Tripoli on the main road leading out of the opposition-controlled east”
“The increasing use of planes underlines the vulnerability of the rebel forces as they attempt to march in open terrain and could prompt world powers to impose a no-fly zone over Libya to deny Gaddafi that edge.”
“On a separate front in the east, Libyan planes launched at least five new airstrikes today near rebel positions in the oil port of Ras Lanouf”
6) You’re once again comparing the situation in Iraq to the situation in Libya. It is not so easy. And I do not support ground operations.
Alex S.
@liberal:
I do not support the no-fly zone because I want the West to control the post-revolution Libya. I support it to give the Libyans themselves the chance to determine their fate.
JAHILL10
Things are just a tad bit more complicated that you guys are making out. First off, there are a lot of options between doing nothing and a neocon wet dream, push button war that Kristol is advocating. I don’t think the administration is worried about its “credibility” as much as the neocons, who turn every foreign policy issue into a school yard taunting match, are.
The reason the Arab League isn’t throwing their planes up in the air to enforce a NFZ this second is that the Arab League is made up of many nations, some of whom (Syria, Saudi Arabia, and others) are scared shitless of this type of revolution happening within their own borders. As they should be. It was hard enough for Egypt and some of the forward looking countries to get the resolution out of the AL meeting this weekend. But even the Arabs are recognizing the rebels as legitimate representatives of their people. This is an enormous step forward and one I don’t think Qaddafi can ultimately survive. How many people he kills in the meantime…..
It seems to me that the Obama administration is cooperating with European and Arab nations in building consensus around the notion that a dictator that kills his own people has lost legitimacy, but he’s not about to strap on the six guns and belt out “Bring it on!” Of course, he probably wouldn’t object if a French military plane bombed the Tripoli airport runways so that Qaddafi couldn’t get his air force off the ground.
You could argue that the only reason we care is because of the oil. I would argue that the only reason that this revolution (compared to others in N. Africa) has become so bloody is BECAUSE of the oil and the sort of support that kind of money buys. But we chose the side of the protestors in Egypt and it doesn’t have oil. In fact, all the realtively short and relatively peaceful revolutions of this winter/spring happened in countries without oil resources.
Ultimately though, this isn’t about us or our oil addiction. It isn’t about implementing some grand U.S. scheme to spread democracy around the globe at the barrel of a gun. It isn’t even about Israel, believe it or not. It’s about them. It is about people getting sick of being ruled for decades by crazy despots and choosing to take their lives in their hands trying to change that. If you don’t want to risk blood or treasure to support that, fine. I don’t know how we could if we wanted to at this point anyway. But I sort of marvel at how we’ve been made so cynical by W. and company twisting every value we hold dear to the point that we can’t even appreciate or morally support real revolution when we see it.
Corner Stone
@srv: It’s simply obvious to me, at least, that people advocating for a Western monitored NFZ have never once considered what happens next.
Do they think Gaddafi will give it up if his planes are grounded? And take up checkers?
JAHILL10
@Corner Stone: Doubt it. The man is as crazy as a bed bug. But it would help even the odds between rebel forces and those “loyal” to Qaddafi’s money if Qaddafi did not have bombing capabilities.
Corner Stone
@JAHILL10: We would have to send A-10’s in to even the odds.
Alex S.
@JAHILL10:
Yes, yes and yes. It amazes me how quickly you are branded as a neo-con nowadays. Neoconservatism is an academic school of thought thoroughly distanced from the world. They believe that people embrace democracy even if it is carried into their country by foreign armies and even if the results of this democracy is pre-determined by the same foreign country. But Libya is different. And yes, there are lots of possibilities between isolationism and neoconservatism.
srv
@Alex S.:
1) I’m simply pointing out the obvious contradictions your fellow travelers have so you understand the background. I get it that you are an anti-Iraq war, but let’s destabilize pro-Libya and see what happens democrat.
2) If I presumed you supported the Iraq war, I’d have called you a neocon, not a new-neocon. I actually respect the neocon view more, because it at least put some reasonable looking drapery around the crazy. I could come up with something less respectful, Emos-for-War, TWITerati, Death-From-Above Hippies other than new-neocon, maybe we could ask Larison.
3) erm. Let me help you with that. First, act like you’re a guru on these guys and how ignorant I am, when I’m the one with the links. Would that you and your Emos-4-war would dig a little deeper on any of these folks for any pre-existence in Teh Google before February (check Advanced search functions). You’d note that these rebels for the most part practically don’t exist via any english media source. So unless you’ve been reading Libyan papers or expect me to pick up Arabic for you, you have no clue on these folks other than their own self-written CV’s. I get that this is all the expertise you need to support intervention. But please don’t tell us how this is a true revolution of the people.
4) “imagine how anyone could be worse.”
Other than the guy who really had to do the torturing. Me, I’ll take Mubarak over Sulieman and the crazy guy who’s winning over his former lackeys with the torture equipment. The deck will be reshuffled – yeah, by the guy with the guns and the torture equipment.
5) Actually, I posted the objective parts of the story.
“Gaddafi’s regime has been using its air power advantage more each day to check a rebel advance west toward Tripoli on the main road leading out of the opposition-controlled east” – so the anonymous writer is the expert here? Or is this an official observation from the rebels or MQ? It sounds more like a foreign military specialists observation – of course they wouldn’t regurgitate that without providing us a quote, would they? Can you spell propaganda?
“The increasing use of planes underlines” – this is an editorial comment directly followed by a justification for intervention. Pretty objective that – not.
“five new airstrikes today near rebel positions” – uhm, near, but not on? Why not drop bombs on the rebels themselves? You want a NFZ because they’re not bombing the rebels themselves?
6) It’s called learning from history. If you don’t support ground operations, you don’t support Libyan freedom. At least the real neocons had the courage to really “win.” When MQ isn’t toppled, how long are you going to want a NFZ and sanctions enforced? 10 years? How many babies did that kill in Iraq?
soonergrunt
The biggest way this is just like Iraq is that nobody is even trying to answer the question “what happens tomorrow?”
Sure, we could wipe out the Libyan air force in about a day. Wouldn’t even break a sweat doing it.
What happens tomorrow?
srv
Alex, my full response in moderation. I didn’t use soshulist.
Bill Murray
@Mnemosyne: wasn’t there also a heaping helping of let’s get the AUMF off the table so that the elections will be about domestic policy, which worked out just as peachy as the we aren’t weanies caving you mentioned.
srv
@Corner Stone: At least GW thought he had a plan in Iraq. These people have nothing. My last point in my response in moderation is how long will a NFZ or sanctions be enforced if MQ wins?
10 years? Anyone remember how many kids that killed in Iraq?
Dictators suck. I get it. But namby-pamby NFZ’s and sanctions never work against these guys. If you support freedom, go fly to Cairo and make your way to Libya. Don’t suck me into another multi-$100B/year hellhole.
DFH no.6
@liberal:
Being old, I remember 2002 like it was yesterday (intervening time just flies anymore). It most certainly was domestic partisan electoral politics, first and foremost.
I recall many Dems, including liberals like Waxman and Hillary, clearly running scared in 2002 before the drums of war, primarily due to the conflation made between the “threat” of Iraq and terrorism, with WMDs the lynchpin to it all (I don’t think the Iraq invasion, or even the prior AUMF, would have happened without 9/11).
But 9/11 did happen, sadly, and in its aftermath if you didn’t support going strong after Iraq (and everyone knew that almost certainly meant war) then you weren’t a patriot. Since one of the main attacks on Dems has always been they are “soft on defense”, that left Dems little room to move politically, and the Republicans knew it and used it to the hilt.
It’s not just that a lot of congressional Dems were “sucked in” in some fashion by this conflation and WMD fearmongering, so was much of the goddamn country (including just about the entirety of the media). And these Dems (some fairly cravenly, I have to say) voted and backed up Bush accordingly, giving him just about everything he wanted. Some had to know Iraq was no threat (I’m thinking Hillary here).
No, the Republican electoral leadership (with Rove very much at the top) worked the Dems quite astutely, I’m afraid, and the Republicans got just what they wanted from the Iraq war (winning elections, so from their standpoint it was a rousing success, at least for the first 4 years).
By 2004, the country still had not yet soured on our little imperial adventure (look at our own esteemed blog host). That didn’t really turn until well into 2005, and by then it was too late – Commander Codpiece had his second 4 years. Yeah, the 2006 mid-terms put the Dems (somewhat) in charge of Congress, and I think that Iraq War fatigue by then factored prominently in that, but the Republican’s war/electoral strategy was primarily presidential, anyway.
In any event, I found the always perceptive Davis X. Machina’s outlook on this to be dead on, and I still believe it to be the simplest and best explanation on why we went in to Iraq (unless someone really thinks any of the war’s architects actually believed the WMD, and Al Quaeda/Saddam “connection”, bullshit they peddled).
I’m much less concerned right now that we will do something stupid in Libya. That’s today, anyway. Who knows about tomorrow?
Alex S.
@srv:
Obvious contradiction because I support a no-fly zone in Libya but not the full-scale Iraq War? There is no obvious contradiction if the two cases are different.
And you respect the neocon view more? It shows that you have a wrong impression about what I think can be done. I do not care for intellectual stringency in this case. Each case is different.
“The one with the links”? Childish…
You don’t think that the rebellion in eastern Libya is a revolution of the people? Are you assuming that a few generals are behind it all? Don’t forget how it started – with small scale protests that grew in size and slowly forced authorities to reconsider their position.
Point 4 is the only good point you made. There is a chance that the revolution will lead to another military dictatorship. However, in contrast to Suleiman, the ties between Gadhafi and everyone supporting the rebellion are severed.
About the effectiveness of a no-fly-zone, even the rebels themselves are calling for it:
http://www.reuters.com/news/video?videoId=193833247
The duration of a no-fly-zone? Until the end of the civil war. If Gadhafi wins, there is no more rebellion to support. I like that you like the neoconservative view even more, it’s all either-or for you.
Corner Stone
@Alex S.:
Now c’mon.
IrishGirl
Two major differences for why they are pressing so hard to cover Libyan protesters but not Ivory Coast protesters is 1) they’re browner in general and 2) they supply less Oil than Libya. What else needs to be said….
El Cid
It is certainly cynical, but it’s not for nothing that governments like Venezuela kept discussing the situation in terms of Qaddafi’s being the actual legally recognized government of Libya, vaguely talked about the importance of all Middle Eastern peoples to determine their own path, and the ill-intentions and ill-effects (or CIA puppetry) of US & Western involvement.
It’s because the nation-to-nation deals they make are very significant to each’s government as moderately strong 3rd world nations, and because Venezuela’s Chavez has to consider the very real likelihood that Qaddafi would retain power.
Venezuela, for example, has a very good overall human rights record under Chavez*, not to suggest that there aren’t some serious problems; but when he’s signing deals to get tractors from Iran, he doesn’t give a shit what Iran’s doing to its people.
* As always, a comparative measure. Some really disgusting things going on. But you’d be sane to choose Venezuela over, say, Honduras, or Colombia anywhere outside its big cities.