Libya Shatters the Partisan Divide

MMaineiac:

March 19th, 2011 at 1:31 pm

ZP – I really like this post.  I read M Yglesias on a regular basis,  he got burned on Iraq and now apparently sees military action though that lens. I think the so-called  infantryman’s answer is correct: "It depends upon the circumstances and the terrain".

As to the litmus test thing, I couldn’t agree more.  Left and right is a handy verbal shortcut, as a model it is not useful.

joey:

March 19th, 2011 at 2:52 pm

Hmmm, conserveratives and FP realists on one side,  liberals and Neo-cons on the other.

Iraq seems to have had a decisive infulence on reactions to this conflict. 

MMaineiac:

March 19th, 2011 at 4:10 pm

#5 – I don’t see any evidence that Obama was dragged in.  While Obama’s opponents view him wringing his hands and  dithering I think he  believes it would harm the United States to be seen leading the charge into yet another Muslim country.  Supporting  the Europeans as we are doing seems wiser to me.

I think the bottom line is do you trust Obama’s character and judgment or not. At this point I do. We will see how this plays out.

Cheryl Rofer:

March 19th, 2011 at 5:14 pm

I suspect that the "strange bedfellows" aspect will be forgotten by the guilty parties, just as the "strange bedfellows" supporting the Iraq war seem to have made it a one-nighter, until now. That might make us wonder if the pairing might last, although either "success" or "failure" in Libya is likely to split them.
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I put "success" and "failure" in quotes because those two concepts seem to be poorly defined at this time.
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And that statement puts me in the FP realist camp, although I’m politically a "liberal" (whatever that means). So Joey’s partitions don’t entirely describe the situation.
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Walter Russel Mead has an article making some of Zen’s points, and a few more. Worth reading.

zen:

March 19th, 2011 at 9:21 pm

Gracias MM! I think Obama had very little appetite for this and – I am speculating without evidence here – that he went along with it because HRC was fed up enough to resign. She got her way after a very awkward G8 meeting.
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Thanks Cheryl – I should add Mead to the blogroll. Great catch!

srv:

March 19th, 2011 at 9:59 pm

Is there a single ‘liberal’ on that list who was anti-AUMF?  There’s one classical-liberal (Greenwald).

The Lounsbury:

March 20th, 2011 at 11:32 am

First, where do you read Lynch against intervention? He seemed to turn off on a No Fly proper as a olution after learning that it wasn’t the magic wand that it seems to non-military, but he did not strike me as anti-intervention per se (anti boots on the ground, yes, but that’s a different thing).

If I may, I would note that I turned to supporting an intervention on a single main ground:
Without intervention, it rather looked like Qadhdhafi was going to break the rebels. The result of that did not look to be a restabilised Guide Regime, but rather conversion of Libya into an Algerian East c. 91, only far better armed on the insurgency side, and a Guide with a will and means to look to lash out at traitorous neighbours – notably Tunisia and Egypt. On the first item, I saw a dynamic where the Takfiri movement represented by the amorphous Al Qaeda fil Maghrib gains rocketry, MPSAMs, and the Libyan opposition swings to Takfiri Salafism. At the same time, on the second note – the rather more powerful one, the Guide looked very likely (looks very likely) to move to destabilise Tunisia and give a shot at Egypt. He has an active past history, the money and the will to do so, and in Tunisia, the network. The blowback then is not merely Libya, it is his neighbours. Were he located in The Sudan, I’d say, bollocks, let him stew.

Libya in and of itself isn’t a good driver to intervene. What was a good driver for a Rebel morale booster intervention as appears to be the case is heading off a result that had (has) very good likelihood of resulting in destabilisatation of Egypt and Tunisia.

I should add that outside observers have not been factoring in the working class level of economic ties between Libya and its neighbours, loss of which is also fundamentally significant to their stability.

In short, Libya is not an Island, nor is Tunisia and Egypt. Tunisia is not itself strategic – but as the MENA country with the best chance of having a positive, liberal economic and political outcome, it has important symbolic value – also as the country that set this all off. Egypt, of course, is Egypt.

joey:

March 20th, 2011 at 11:40 am

I guess you are what you is Cheryl,  I would imagine your socially liberal,  but not liberal in the classical sense,  which seems to have disappeared in the States.My view is it depends on what you took away from Iraq is the big influence.Neo cons and (old style)liberals felt they were let down by poor exceution, that the theory was sound.Conservatives and FP Realists saw it for the utopian delusion it was and rejected it.The same dynamic is at work here, one side views revolution as a creative force, Gadafi gone = Democratic +freedom.The other sees sheer recklessness, as there is next to no information about the opposition.   

onparkstreet:

March 20th, 2011 at 1:16 pm

<em>The other sees sheer recklessness, as there is next to no information about the opposition. </em>
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This is the part that makes me most nervous. We are flying blind. The strategic rationale? Apparently Bush 2.0. Waves of democratic revolution set by example and blood.
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Ghaddafi is put down. Okay, in what fashion? To what extent? Then what?
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Honestly, I am confused by this administration. I don’t know how to read them and I don’t know what to think about this newest  war, except that I am wary and skeptical. Let us hope all goes well. I know people say "hope is not a plan," but it seems to figure in so much of what we do. It must have a spot in there somewhere….
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– Madhu

onparkstreet:

March 20th, 2011 at 1:19 pm

@ joey: on the naming our political philosophy front, I seem to be in the George Will et. al. camp and getting more so everyday.
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I seem to have become an incredibly skeptical person this past decade, given the amounts of domestic spending I’ve seen by seriel administrations and the rather strange way we seem to conduct wars today. Maybe I am over-reacting to bad experiences.
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– Madhu

zen:

March 20th, 2011 at 3:45 pm

Hi Lounsbury,
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Lynch was not a hard opponent of intervention but more of a deep skeptic in his last three Libya pieces, which is fine, I just did not see him as any kind of enthusiast.
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Your point on transnational working class connections is very good and Gaddafite networks in Tunisia. Was not informed on either of those factors.
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I will give you Tunisia but I think Egypt is now well out of Gaddafi’s league for military retaliation. A recent estimate gives him about 1-2 divisions of quality combined arms troops, plus the capacity to raise an armed rabble of tribal loyalists. This compares very poorly with the military forces that Saddam could field in 2003
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http://www.npr.org/2011/03/10/134404618/gadhafis-military-muscle-concentrated-in-elite-units
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Egypt has close to 600 combat aircraft of a better vintage than the Guide’s dwindling hodgepodge, and something over 400,000 regulars. Granted, the Egyptian Army is in no mood for foreign adventures but repelling an attack or giving a punitive response is within their capabilities. Particularly if the US elects to help with logistical and intelligence chores.
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I think the problem is that the US is doing signalling here, using military power to nibble away at Gaddafi’s military capabilities on some kind of rational actor model hope and a dream plan conjured by a politician with no military experience.  Here’s Adm.Mullen, following DNI Clapper’s lead in saying that this strategem is idiotic and is unlikely to work in the politest language possible:
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http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110320/ap_on_re_us/us_us_libya_military
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Military advice, which has no doubt been ignored repreatedly, probably centered on taking Gaddafi’s elite units apart, ending Gaddafi’s command and control communications in one sweep and isolating Tripoli from the rest of the world before doing a kill/capture attack on Gaddafi’s inner circle

Nathaniel T. Lauterbach:

March 20th, 2011 at 4:47 pm

I’m very ambivalent to the whole affair.  Too many questions, not enough answers.
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Supporting free peoples as a norm, is probably a good thing.  But:  How do we know who we’re supporting won’t, in a year, turn out to be a worse version of Gadafi?  Qadaffi, if you recall, was vehemently opposed to Al Qaeda and it’s other syndicates.
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Saying that Kadafi must go is a very bold statement for a president to make.  Not backing it up with corresponding diplomatic and military power makes you seem week.  Getting dragged into a fight by France and a security council resolution sponsored by Lebanon makes it seem like your diplomatic game doesn’t have the mettle to deal with the real world.  At the very least, we don’t have mastery of a situation whatsoever.  We’re being dragged into a fight not of our choosing.  And we’re supposed to take the offensive?
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This is somewhat Korean-War-Esque.  Libya is ourside of our sphere of national interests, until it isn’t.  When we find out it isn’t, we rush headlong into a fight at the request of an outnumbered, outmatched, outgunned, beleaguered army, without establishing what our endstate should be.  Topple Gadaffi?  Enforce a no-fly zone?  Separate the combatants?  I know what we’re doing today, but I have no confidence in what our goal will be tomorrow.
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Is the fighting going to terminate with a De Facto East & West Libya (similar to how we broke Kosovo off of Serbia)?  Or will the fighting continue in a very, very low boil between an East & West Libya (like N & S Korea)?  Or how about this:  An uprising put down by Kedaffi in spite of a No-Fly Zone, we continue the No-Fly Zone as a punitive measure, then wait 10 years and decide Kedafi has to go, and then invade?  It’s all been done before.
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The biggest thing that’s lacking is leadership on our part.  Either go in, and go all in.  If you’re going to take Vienna, then take Vienna.  Or stay out, and let this be an internal Libyan affair, or maybe a purely European affair (which is doomed to failure due to lack of will in maintaining a defense establishment for the last several decades).
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What are we doing?  Why?  With and against who?  How?  How and when will this end?
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As far as the Politics Makes Strange Bedfellows aspect, I am reminded about what Glenn Reynolds had to say about this:
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"They told me if I voted for John McCain, we’d be bombing Arab countries while the supporters of the bombing promised that we’d be greeted as liberators. And they were right!"

The Lounsbury:

March 20th, 2011 at 8:52 pm

Zen:
I was not suggesting Qadhdhafi would take on either Tunisia or Libya via military means.

No, rather by the rather harder to control for agents provacateurs.

In Tunisia, pre Libyan civil war, there were already very credible reports (Fr, Ar) of Libyan agents at work ($$, guns to former Ben Ali police).

The same modus operendi is not far fetched in an Egypt that is still seething and where it is not clear to what extent the pressure groups will be able to negotiate through their differences (or to what extent the Neo Mamlouks of the military will successfully navigate their tricky masquerade ball).

As for the Strategic Imperative that several commentators keep seeking, let me return to Tunisia and Egypt.

As I keep hitting on in my Blog and as I hit on above, while you are looking at this in isolation, I presume that anyone in the White House with good intel reporting knows the same things that I do, notably:
Tunisia has extensive ties with Libya, economic and social, the potential for significant destabilisation is high, even without The Guide undertaking active work with agents provocateurs (which let me again emphasize)
Egypt has less extensive family and busienss ties than Tunisia, but still staggering number of Egyptian guest workers (officially guest workers were 350 thousand although I have seen numbers double that) that are now either trapped – and no longer sending reimittances to impoverished families – or refugees in their own country. Again a significant source of destabilisation (and lost earnings to an Egypt still crippled by lost tourism revenues). Again, without factoring the probability of the Guide seeking revenge (and also seeking to wrong-foot the Americans) by promoting violence (bit of cash to ex-police, pick up old habits…).

I suspect few of you realize the depth of the ties and the potential economic – leave aside the political / agents provacateurs scenarios – blow back re both Tunisia and Egypt.

Analysing the Libyan situation as if it would remain hermetically sealed inside its borders – either  with a scenario (pre-intervention) of Qadhdhafi restablishing unstable control and low level insurgency that likely swings hard-core Takfiri (Al Qaeda fil Maghreb) given sense of abandonment OR a scenario of an outright Algerian situation c. 1992, only better armed – is not clear thinking, it is myopic and ignorant folly.

That doesn’t of course make the No Fly Plus a brilliant choice. I would argue it is la reasonable "Least Horrible among Horrible Choices" choice.

In any case, if one is critiquing Obama, I’d suggest one has to address the problems I note here as to the scenario.

Of course the Exit Strategy problem is there, and unless the powers are willing to back an arming of the Rebellion, there will be a divided Libya. However, contra naive Iraq analogies, unlike say with the Kurdish situation (roughly analogical to Ben Ghazi)there is not an important ethno-linguistic cleavage (there is East-West tribal differences, but they’re not strictly strong, and we already see with Misrata, while the Guide has real support in the West, it’s hardly 100% (maybe 25%?).

The Lounsbury:

March 20th, 2011 at 9:05 pm

Further to the point of military advice: I believe that the military advice you imagine there would be catastrophically wrong. Perhaps in a tactical sense militarily correct, but virtually guaranteed to produce the opposite effect relative to The Guide’s support and the Rebellion’s viability.

Either the Rebellion can be built up to win, or… it fails. A massive American bombing campaign is rather likely to provoke such blowback and anti-American sentiment to Qadhdhafi’s favour as to make it rather pointless.

onparkstreet:

March 20th, 2011 at 9:14 pm

<em>Of course the Exit Strategy problem is there, and unless the powers are willing to back an arming of the Rebellion, there will be a divided Libya.</em>
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Hmm, that’s quite a problem though, isn’t it? But I bow to your greater knowledge, wisdom, and humility as so amply demonstrated.
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Let’s hope you are correct.
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– Madhu

zen:

March 20th, 2011 at 10:04 pm

Hi Lounsbury,
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", I presume that anyone in the White House with good intel reporting knows the same things that I do, notably:
Tunisia has extensive ties with Libya, economic and social, the potential for significant destabilisation is high, even without The Guide undertaking active work with agents provocateurs "
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I am not as confident that the willingness to listen to contrary data points is much higher at the political level now than five years ago. This gets to desired end states – if removing Gaddafi poses huge risks of subversion/destabilization then attacking and existentially threatening Gaddafi while leaving his levers of power intact with which to retaliate is not particularly smart. The situation you describe is not like boxing in Saddam with sanctions/NFZ where Iraq was additionally surrounded by mostly hostile regimes, excepting Jordan.  Gaddafi’s regime, taking your description as a worst case scenario, would seem to be deeply integrated in the region and "un-boxable and probably not a personality who would react as well to being slowly cornered in the fashion that Saddam did ( and having Saddam’s example foremost in mind will not inspire Gaddafi to be tractable). Unless there are some good diplo cards to be played here, I’d prefer we either kill him quickly or have kept our involvement dialed down in the first place.

The Lounsbury:

March 20th, 2011 at 11:19 pm

Yes, that is a problem

But again, the problem is to be compared to the probable Real World alternatives.

The alternatives do not appear to include "Stable Libya" or quiet Libya that doesn’t destabilise its two major neighbours.

onparkstreet:

March 21st, 2011 at 1:45 am

The alternatives do not appear to include "Stable Libya" or quiet Libya that doesn’t destabilise its two major neighbours.
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Oh, now I understand! That is an interesting point. Er, sorry about the slight irritability of my last comment. I have a bad habit of doing that. Don’t know why.
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Raman’s strategic analysis writes this:
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7. The only effect of the Libyan adventure will be that the march of democracy, which started in Tunisia and spread to Egypt, will be stopped.The Arab despots, who have jumped into the Western bandwagon against Gaddafi, have done so not because their hearts bleed for the civilians in Libya and for their human rights. They have done so because they calculate that the diversion of the Western attention to
Libya enables them to crush the human rights and aspirations for democracy of their own people.
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8. The Western need for Arab support in Libya in order to show it as a truly international coallition of Western crusaders and Islamic people has already led to a cruel suppression of the pro-democracy agitators in Bahrain with Western voices and conscience remaining muted as the Sunni ruler, with the help of 2000 ground troops from the States of the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC), crushes the Shia protesters. Western near-silence in Bahrain today and in Saudi Arabia tomorrow is the quid pro quo for the Arab support in Libya.
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9. Whatever be the outcome in Libya, its echoes will be heard wherever American lives are threatened and American interests are endangered—whether in the Af-Pak region, or in Yemen or in Egypt or elsewhere. We have seen the resurgence of the Afghan Taliban in Afghanistan with a Neo Taliban keeping the NATO troops bleeding. We will be seeing a resurgence of Al Qaeda with a Neo Al Qaeda endangering American lives and interests everywhere. Anger breeds terrorism. More anger will breed more terrorism. 20-3-11)
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Not reassuring, but I do not know this region of the world at all and so can be talked into pretty much anything. With that, I’ll just hang out and stay away from this thread.
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– Madhu

onparkstreet:

March 21st, 2011 at 1:49 am

I forgot the link:
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http://ramanstrategicanalysis.blogspot.com/2011/03/libya-obamas-iraq.html
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– Madhu

The Lounsbury:

March 21st, 2011 at 11:40 am

First, a correction. Mark I did not say that Libya is deeply integrated – I am highilighting economic and social ties that seem to be substantially ignored by Eng lang commentators who are by and large not familiar with the Maghreb. In ordinary times, I would be of the opinion that both Egypt and Tunisia could manage (see, e.g. Jordan re Iraq, which was in a similar situ vis-a-vis econ & social ties with Sadaam era Iraq). However, they do not have stable governments and are themselves only centimetres away from chaos.

Second, returning to your desire to see a full out assault to take out Qadhdhafi, I reiterate my point that this would be a political disaster, and in the end the goals are political. I seriously doubt that, without serious Western troops on the ground, Qadhdhafi could be taken out, which would be a collosal mistake. AJC (Ar& Eng) has already shown (back in the early days) a captured bunker network in Benghazi that belonged to Qadhdhafi, with underground tunneling, etc.

Too much Western military action and you will see Libyans and the wider Arab world turn against it – rendering the effort futile.

The best scenario is one in which clandestine, low-key but focused support on high-value areas (anti-tank, training, assist with Western back-country Rebellion – the mountain flank to the West of Libya (~90% Amizigh Berber as I recall, absolutely loathe Qadhdhafi), Misrata to assist Western rebels) is given to the Rebellion. Having Libyan rebels take down Qadhdhafi is a vastly superior approach and outcome to a dubious Western campaign, that is likely to generate heavy civilian casualties and turn opinion back towards The Guide, playing into his narrative.

As to Raman:
7. The only effect of the Libyan adventure will be that the march of democracy, which started in Tunisia and spread to Egypt, will be stopped.The Arab despots, who have jumped into the Western bandwagon against Gaddafi, have done so not because their hearts bleed for the civilians in Libya and for their human rights. They have done so because they calculate that the diversion of the Western attention to
Libya enables them to crush the human rights and aspirations for democracy of their own people.
Lounsbury: What bollocks. The two countries that have jumped on are Qatar and the Emirates, neither of which have serious domestic issues. Neither Qatar nor Emirates are in need of distractions to crush anything. That the writer wrote this illustrates his depth of knowledge.  Or in the alternative, his desire for Spin.

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8. The Western need for Arab support in Libya in order to show it as a truly international coallition of Western crusaders and Islamic people has already led to a cruel suppression of the pro-democracy agitators in Bahrain with Western voices and conscience remaining muted as the Sunni ruler, with the help of 2000 ground troops from the States of the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC), crushes the Shia protesters. Western near-silence in Bahrain today and in Saudi Arabia tomorrow is the quid pro quo for the Arab support in Libya.

Again bollocks. There isn’t a quid pro quo because there is no need for one. The West – and indeed everyone – being so fearful of the blowback from civil war in KSA and Bahrain, at the heart of the petrol, over Sunni Shia divide is going to say little regardless of what Qatar and the Emirates do. Again this is pure idiocy or rather dishonest spin.

9. Whatever be the outcome in Libya, its echoes will be heard wherever American lives are threatened and American interests are endangered—whether in the Af-Pak region, or in Yemen or in Egypt or elsewhere. We have seen the resurgence of the Afghan Taliban in Afghanistan with a Neo Taliban keeping the NATO troops bleeding. We will be seeing a resurgence of Al Qaeda with a Neo Al Qaeda endangering American lives and interests everywhere. Anger breeds terrorism. More anger will breed more terrorism. 20-3-11)
Whatever. I presume the person writing here is from the "AfPak" region.  No Fly Plus in Libya, if it is not accompanied by the kind of W. action that Zen is calling for (which I consider foolish) is not going to have any blowback in Afghanistan or Pakistan. The Usual Suspects will integrate it into their rhetoric, but it will have no real added impact.

to the contrary, if the Rebellion eventually removes Qadhdhafi, with a wee bit of Western help, but largely on their own, the result is rather the inverse. If they do not, there is still the support to highlight (we tried, in contrast to the alternative scenario, doing nothing and standing on one’s toes)

Dave Schuler:

March 21st, 2011 at 3:36 pm

I would only add a couple of points to this discussion.  First, the French language news coverage of this situation is immeasurably better than the English language coverage.  I got a much clearer view of what’s happening from the French news outlets.  I recommend them.  Second, if the objective is to remove Qaddafi from power, Pat Lang’s approach, which I see as complementary to Lounsbury’s, should be favored.  If the objective is the preservation of human life, as the wording of Res. 1973 would suggest, I honestly see no way to accomplish it, particularly no way to accomplish it with Tomahawk missiles as seems to have been the bulk of the effort to date.  Although I deplore the loss of life in Libya and agree with Lounsbury’s concerns about possible destabilization, I am concerned about the present effort because I don’t believe it rises to the standards of a just war.  To make it into a just war President Obama would need to legitimize the effort by seeking Congressional authorization, conflicts of intent would need to be resolved unambiguously, and the likelihood of success would need to be raised.    I also have concerns that in the event of a collapse of Qaddafi’s government as a consequence of British, French, and U. S. military intervention that Britain, France, and the United States would in fact and in law become occupying powers responsible for preserving order in Libya.

zen:

March 21st, 2011 at 4:39 pm

" if it is not accompanied by the kind of W. action that Zen is calling for (which I consider foolish)"
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Let’s be clear – the approach we are seeing today is NOT what I was in favor of and never was, particularly an institutionalized NFZ vs. a selective demonstration of air power; I was making the point that it was not very smart to go out on a limb, wack the hornet’s nest a few times and ignore the fact that the hornets still have their stingers.
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Having done that, if the end game includes Gaddafi’s removal, then remove him quickly – I am worried though that there really isn’t an end game and the administration attacked as a muddling-through way of placating London and Paris. Would it have been better to Reagan Doctrine this crisis with CIA and JSOC aid and training to Gaddafi’s opponents and potential enemies to do the heavy lifting. Yes, infinitely better and what I had argued previously should have been done – and no I do not want a US-led ground invasion of Libya.
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STRATFOR came out with some info on the Libyan opposition leadership, such as it is ( thanks to Morgan for sending this in) Most of the names are meaningless to me. Maybe Lounsbury recognizes some of them:
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"LIBYA’S OPPOSITION LEADERSHIP COMES INTO FOCUS
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Summary
Libya has descended to a situation tantamount to civil war, with forces loyal to Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi in the west pitted against rebels from the east. However, one of the biggest problems faced by Western governments has been in identifying exactly who the rebels are. Many of the rebels, including former Libyan Justice Minister Mustafa Abdel-Jalil and former Interior Minister Gen. Abdel Fatta Younis, defected early on from the Gadhafi regime and represent what came to be the Transitional National Council (TNC), which promptly lobbied Western government for support after its formation. In light of logistical and maintenance capabilities militarily, further defections would certainly help the rebels achieve victory, though there has been no sign of such defections.
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The structure through which the Libyan opposition is represented is formally known as the Interim Transitional National Council, more commonly referred to as the Transitional National Council (TNC). The first man to announce its creation was former Libyan Justice Minister Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, who defected from the government Feb. 21, and declared the establishment of a "transitional government" Feb. 26. At the time, Abdel-Jalil claimed that it would give way to national elections within three months, though this was clearly never a realistic goal.
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One day after Abdel-Jalil’s announcement, a Benghazi-based lawyer named Abdel-Hafidh Ghoga held a news conference to refute his claims. Ghoga pronounced himself to be the spokesman of the new council, and denied that it resembled a transitional government, adding that even if it did, Abdel-Jalil would not be in charge. Ghoga derided the former justice minister as being more influential in the eastern Libyan city of Al Bayda than in Benghazi, which is the heart of the rebel movement.
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….Just as the executive team represents the TNC’s foreign affairs unit, the council also has a military division. This was originally headed by Omar El-Hariri, but the overall command of the Libyan rebels has since reportedly been passed to former interior minister Gen. Abdel Fattah Younis. Younis’ name arose early on as the man with whom the British government was engaging as it tried to get a grip on the situation unfolding in rebel-held territory. He was not included in the original TNC membership, however, despite several indications that he did in fact retain widespread support among eastern rebels. This, like the clash between Abdel-Jalil and Ghoga, was another indication of the rivalries that exist in eastern Libya, which paint a picture of disunity among the rebels.
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Younis, however, now appears to have been officially incorporated into the command structure and is presiding over a TNC "army" that, like the TNC itself, is the sum of its parts. Every population center in eastern Libya has since the uprising began created respective militias, all of which are now, theoretically, to report to Benghazi. Indeed, the most notable of these local militias, created Feb. 28, has been known at times as the Benghazi Military Council, which is linked to the Benghazi city council, the members of which form much of the political core of the new national council. There are other known militias in eastern Libya, however, operating training camps in places like Ajdabiya, Al Bayda and Tobruk, and undoubtedly several other locations as well.

zen:

March 21st, 2011 at 4:46 pm

Hi Dave,
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I think your worries are quite valid – this whole enterprise has a political process perspective fingerprint that eschewed thinking about substantive and strategic effects. That Gates, Clapper and Mullen are all spinning that the way military force is being employed won’t be a magic wand is a good sign that DoD advice has been studiously ignored.

The Lounsbury:

March 21st, 2011 at 7:07 pm

I meant precisely the muscular action you’re calling for, not the present action.

The Lounsbury:

March 21st, 2011 at 7:13 pm

Responding to Dave:
(i) I would only add a couple of points to this discussion.  First, the French language news coverage of this situation is immeasurably better than the English language coverage.  I got a much clearer view of what’s happening from the French news outlets.  I recommend them. 
I absolutely agree. The French coverage is indeed vastly better.

Second, if the objective is to remove Qaddafi from power, Pat Lang’s approach, which I see as complementary to Lounsbury’s, should be favored. 

Having lost track of his blog, what is it? I presume, given his background he is favourable to special forces support.

If the objective is the preservation of human life, as the wording of Res. 1973 would suggest, I honestly see no way to accomplish it, particularly no way to accomplish it with Tomahawk missiles as seems to have been the bulk of the effort to date. 

I see the resolution as more or less a polite fiction.

    I also have concerns that in the event of a collapse of Qaddafi’s government as a consequence of British, French, and U. S. military intervention that Britain, France, and the United States would in fact and in law become occupying powers responsible for preserving order in Libya.

All the more reason to maintain the fiction of non-intervention and pursue a project that involves purely supporting the Rebellion, without pursuing direct action against Qadhdhafi.

The political criticism. eh.