The Times explains why it supports military intervention in Libya:
Libya is a specific case: Muammar el-Qaddafi is erratic, widely reviled, armed with mustard gas and has a history of supporting terrorism.
Right, that’s clear enough: he’s a one-off, sui generis, something the like of which we’ve never seen before.
…unless I’m forgetting something…
No, nothing comes to mind. Anyway, no worries — I’m sure we’ll be out of there lickety-split, and all the other Arab states will be very grateful to us for helping.
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I sense a whiff of sarcasm, Malcolm … but I must be wrong. After all, The Gray Lady is the paper of record; and everyone acknowledges the infallible splendidness of The Obama’s certitude …
“…erratic, widely reviled, armed with mustard gas and has a history of supporting terrorism.”
I hasten to add… “sitting on top of a lot of oil.”
You take the Times quote out of context, and then make an inference which is unsupported both in logic and in fact.
The sentence in question concerned whether military intervention in Libya is different than intervening in Bahrain or Yemen, and the reasons cited explain the difference among them. It follows four paragraphs detailing the reasons why “there is much to concern us.” It is subordinate to the final sentence, which is the core reason why the Times is (half-heartedly) supporting military action in Libya. It has a much different meaning within its context than taken in isolation.
The inference that the Times is being inconsistent in (correctly) opposing the war against Iraq while supporting action in Libya fails the logic test because the criteria of being “erratic, widely reviled, armed with mustard gas and (having) a history of supporting terrorism” are necessary but not sufficient conditions. The sufficient condition is in the (omitted) last sentence, and relates to the exigencies of the current situation, where a nascent Arab movement away from dictators — and possibly towards democracy — “would chill pro-democracy movements across the Arab world” if there is no line drawn on the desert sand of Libya.
The historical facts which differentiate Iraq from Libya are varied and numerous. Saddam Hussein did not have WMD at the time of invasion, and Qaddafi does. Hussein was not a supporter of international terrorism on the scale of Qaddafi. There was no support for invading Iraq outside of the US and Britain. The casus belli in Libya is based on the facts on the ground, and not phony intelligence or false inferences that Iraq was involved in 9/11. We are not sending ground troops into Iraq. We are not looking to occupy Libya. There was no popular uprising against Hussein forcing us to decide on whether to support them or see them fail. There was no bloodshed in the streets of Baghdad when we invaded, and there is plenty of it now in Libya. In short, there was no immediacy with Iraq, and it was a war of choice. We are now faced with a situation which demands an immediate response, with perilous consequences for making the wrong decision. Given what is happening in Libya and elsewhere in the Middle East, the administration’s course of action strikes me (and other right-thinking Americans) as the approach with the greatest likelihood of a successful outcome, and the Times is correct in recognizing this.
Sorry, meant to write: we are not sending ground troops into Libya.
And when the Saudis et al. suppress rebellion with military force, that doesn’t have a “chilling” effect on pro-democracy movements, I take it?
Saddam Hussein not only had poison gas, but had exterminated entire communities of his own people with it.
True — we had already dropped that ball after the first war, when we encouraged popular uprisings, then abandoned them, and watched as they were brutally suppressed. After that display of ruthlessness on Saddam’s part, and faithlessness on ours, the people were too cowed to attempt another uprising, knowing that they’d get no support from us. So it was back to business as usual in Baghdad: rape rooms, dropping dissidents feet-first into plastic shredders, etc. — for another twelve years, and another futile series of unanimous and toothless UN resolutions. And yes, of course we didn’t have the support of countries like France and Russia back then (though the coalition of nations supporting the war was actually more numerous than the coalition against Qaddafi is now), because they were too busy profiting from back-channel deals with Saddam.
You’re right: the moral distinction is clear.
A point of logic: I will charitably assume that you are not arguing that preventing chilling effects on pro-democracy movements is not by itself sufficient justification for the US to involve itself in yet another war in a Muslim country (especially since you seemed so indignant about the last one), and that you are arguing instead that the various factors are cumulatively sufficient. Bill Vallicella made exactly that case back in 2004; you might find it interesting.
I note with some amusement that here you are, defending US military action against a despicable tyrant (and make no mistake, Saddam was every bit as vile as Qaddafi, and a far more dangerous opponent of US interests than the Libyan dictator, whom we had effectively brought to heel with the example we made of Saddam), while here I am, playing the dove to your hawk.
By the way, what’s our mission in Libya again, exactly?
1) When the Saudis suppress peaceful protest with force, of course it has a chilling effect. I am no fan of the Saudis, having been there.
2) Hussein had poison gas years before we were there. He had no significant quantities of it (or maybe none at all) when we invaded.
3) George H W Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld definitely dropped the ball after the first Gulf war. Agreed.
4) Creating (not preventing) chilling effects on pro-democracy movements is not in itself sufficient cause for war.
5) I am not a pacifist. I think our involvement in Libya is justified for the same reasons that our involvement in Bosnia was justified. I’m not sure whether Hussein was more dangerous, let along far more dangerous, than Qaddafi — after all, Qaddafi did shoot down one of our planes, and he was an active player in the nuclear trade. Moreover, Hussein was valuable to us insofar as he was a counter-weight to Iran, whereas Qaddafi has no usefulness to us. Nonetheless, the invasion and occupation of Iraq were wrong for too many reasons to mention, while hopefully the much more limited military action in Libya will have a much more positive outcome.
Well, we’ll just have to see how “limited”, and how “positive”, it turns out to be.
As my dear departed mum used to say, “I hae me doots.”
…and so does Mona Charen.
It will turn out to be as “limited” and as “positive” to permit continuing praise of the Infallible Won by the leftists.
Also: shouldn’t we have gone to Congress about this? President Bush did, and didn’t strike Saddam until he had Congressional approval (bipartisan, I might add).
Congressional approval does not apply when your guy walks on water.
Starting with the Korean War, there is established precedent for instances when the necessity of immediate military action (e.g., the North Koreans crossing the 38th Parallel) trumps a Congressional declaration. Hence the Korean War was never declared, although one could argue that it was endorsed by Congress because they continued to fund it.
Certainly if the North Koreans attacked South Korea today, we would come to their immediate defense, with or without a declaration of war. Ditto for Libya.
It all depends on what your definition of “immediate” is. How long did it take to deem it immediate in Libya?
I agree that the President sometimes must act quickly and decisively, without taking the time to seek the approval of Congress. The usual criterion, however, involves an imminent threat to the United States, or at the very least to an allied nation.
We really have no serious interests at stake here. There is also very little reason to imagine that anything good is going to come of it should Qaddafi’s opponents prevail.
Meanwhile, the way forward is far from clear. Already the Arab League, who detest us, and who see our military presence in Muslim lands as a humiliating offense against their cultural and religious pride, have already backed away from their grudging support in the wake of inevitable civilian casualties; it is already almost impossible to distinguish combatants from civilians. When the conflict no longer involves aircraft firing upon vehicles in the open desert, but switches to urban warfare, then what?
We have no clear mission, no criterion for victory, no exit condition. We don’t even have, as far as I can tell, a coherent chain of command. If Qaddafi digs in — and he has plenty of money to hire mercs — what then?
I have a feeling this is going to be a big mess, that we are going to end up owning the place, and that we are going to wish we had just stayed the hell out for once.
As George Will said:
Your points are valid, and I don’t expect a cakewalk. I think the course we are on is the least bad option, and I think the risks over the long term are greater if we do nothing.
We shall see. To borrow from Zhou Enlai: it is too soon to say.
Some links to read for further reflection: here, here, and here.
Top Ten Rejected Names for Libyan Operation