The Redhunter

On Sunday, Dr Liam Fox, the Defence Secretary, said that targeting Gaddafi personally "would potentially be a possibility" under the terms of the UN resolution. When the same question was put to General Sir David Richards, the Chief of the Defence Staff, yesterday, he replied: "Absolutely not. It is not allowed under the UN resolution and it is not something I want to discuss any further."

And the conflict between the UN resolution and Obama's objective is just as bad:

The U.N. Security Council's stated objective is "the immediate establishment of a cease-fire and a complete end to violence." This is entirely incompatible with President Obama's stated objective of getting Moammar Gaddafi "to step down from power and leave." If the violence ends, Gaddafi will not leave. To the contrary, if military intervention succeeds in achieving the United Nations' goal of forcing a cease-fire on the warring parties, it will lock in the status quo on the ground.

Obama's attitude seems to wish that the whole thing would go away. As such, he ran from Washington to South America, where he could be on what amounts to a vacation. Yes, trade with Brazil is important. No it is not more important than a disaster that killed thousands in Japan and a Middle East that is exploding at warp speed.

Obama apparently thought that if he ignored Libya long enough those troublesome foreigners would go away. But the UN passed a resolution, the Arab League wanted a no-fly zone, and France said it wanted to take action. Faced with irrelevancy, Obama had no choice but to go along.

As a result he has inherited a policy rather than made one. Because we are the strongest power, we will bear the brunt of any military action no matter who is nominally "in charge" or "leading."

Right now a lot of things are happening at home and abroad. There are showdowns in several states between Republicans and public sector unions. Democrats and Republicans in Congress are in tense negotiations over the budget. A huge disaster in Japan has killed thousands. Egypt just underwent a revolution, and Libya, Bahrain and Yemen are in the middle of one. Did I miss anything? Iran inches closer to the bomb.

What we need is a president who exerts firm leadership, and instead we have someone who has punted on all of the above. He's more interested in his March Madness picks than in governing. He sent more troops to Afghanistan, but it's clear that he did so reluctantly and his heart isn't in it, something you can be sure the Afghans and Taliban have picked up on (why do you think Hamid Karzai is hedging his bets?).

So now we mount an operation meant to enforce a "no fly zone," but clearly it's gone way beyond that. We're attacking ground targets, military storage depots, and bombing this and that.

As if all this wasn't bad enough, the entire act of going to war against Libya contradicts what candidate Obama said while on the campaign trail:

"The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation."

December 2010

But this is exactly what Obama, now as President, has done. He accepts the UN resolution as enough but doesn't see the need to go to Congress.

Finally, if Gadhafi is killed or captured (and that's what it will have to be, he's not leaving), will we go in and at least try to help the rebels set up a decent government? Did we attempt to approach them before the airstrikes with a sort of quid pro quo; we help you overthrow the dictator, give you aid, and you agree to take our advice on x, y, and z when you win. We condition future aid on you setting up a decent government. Did we try that? Sure, they'd probably reneg on at last some of it, and who knows who we're even negotiating with, but you've at least got to try, I'd think.

My position: The president should have formulated a firm policy one way or the other as soon as the Libyan revolution started. He should have exerted strong U.S. leadership for whatever policy he thought best and got other important countries on board. Either immediate strong unilateral intervention or complete hands-off is better than this half-way confused muddle by a disengaged president we have now.

Where will this go? My guess is it "ends" in a sort of stand-off in which Gadhafi controls most of the country but the rebels have an enclave. We continue to fly strikes and patrols for years. Reminds of of another place not too far away, and look what we eventually had to do there.