Libya: Another Unnecessary War Of
Choice
Mar. 14 2011 - 4:53 pm
By DOUG BANDOW
Eight years after invading Iraq, U.S. forces remain on station.
Nearly a decade after ousting the Taliban from power in Afghanistan,
Washington is more deeply involved than ever. Yet the architects of these
interminable wars are lobbying to embark on another military adventure in
Libya.
The U.S. government long has been tempted to meddle in other nations’
affairs and rarely to good results. It is difficult to transcend
history, ethnicity, culture, religion, tradition and geography to “fix”
other countries. Iraq dramatically demonstrated that social
engineering through war is even harder.
The protests sweeping the Arab world offer hope of liberty for tens of
millions of people long subjugated by a variety of kleptocratic
autocracies. But revolutions sometimes yield worse
repression. Washington also worries about the rise of anti-American
radicalism.
Libya appears to be an easy case, since Muammar al-Gadhafi long was
hostile to the U.S. Thus, the Washington commentariat, the
famed “Sofa Samurai” who cheer on wars in which they do not fight, is now
demanding action against Gadhafi.
Although protestors quickly overran most of eastern Libya, the regime
rallied in the capital of Tripoli. Better armed than the
insurgents, Gadhafi’s forces shot down demonstrators and bombed
opposition areas. The regime has regained some lost territory,
leading to fears of protracted conflict, even civil war.
The Libyan crisis is a tragedy, but is important to America only in the
usual Washington game of threat inflation. President Barack Obama
claimed the Libyan imbroglio posed “an unusual threat to the national
security and foreign policy of the United States.” The former is
errant nonsense. Libya always has been peripheral to American
security, especially after the Gadhafi regime dropped its terrorist
attacks and nuclear program. The latter is irrelevant–much of which
goes on around the world conflicts with the “foreign policy of the United
States.” Neither is cause for war.
The
Weekly
Standard’s
Lee Smith complained that a Libyan civil war “would destabilize
Africa as well as other Arab states, and cause considerable damage to
American prestige and influence.” Actually, Africa has been
routinely “destabilized” by far larger conflicts with little impact
beyond. It is unrest in other Arab states, most notably Libya’s
neighbors, Tunisia and Egypt, which triggered resistance to the Gadhafi
government, not the other way around.
Moreover, the conflict in Libya is irrelevant to “American prestige and
influence” unless U.S. policymakers foolishly put that prestige and
influence at risk. In fact,
Michael Brenner of the University of Pittsburgh makes just such a
bootstrap argument in The Huffington Post: “Great powers don’t
have the privilege of declaring a situation intolerable and then doing
nothing to rectify it when they in fact have the power to do
so.”
Actually, being a great power, indeed, the world’s sole superpower,
allows Washington to do precisely that. If Americans had to spill
blood every time their leaders made intemperate, even stupid statements,
the nation never would be at peace.
Finally, there is much demand for “leadership.” But real leadership
incorporates prudence, and especially a willingness to set
priorities.
It doesn’t much matter to Americans who rules Libya. That nation is
a major oil producer, but whoever runs the Libyan government will want to
sell its most important resource. Protracted conflict might disrupt
exports, but that would mean higher prices, not economic collapse, in the
West. Keeping gas cheap is among the worst reasons to go to
war.
Still, the U.S. probably would be better off with someone other than
Gadhafi in power. Only probably, however. American
policymakers don’t know who would dominate among the divided and
fractious opposition. It may be unlikely that someone worse than
Gadhafi would prevail, but history indicates that it is
possible.
The best argument for intervening is humanitarian. Rachel Kleinfeld
of the Truman National Security Project declared that
“
intervention is likely the only moral option.” If so, why not
intervene elsewhere against the Saudi, Syrian, Iranian or Algerian
dictatorships, for instance? And in Ivory Coast, where the outgoing
president has stolen an election and killed protestors to stay in
power? The demands for action in Libya appear to base foreign
policy on CNN, responding to crises which receive the most international
media coverage.
The military response du jour is a “no-fly” zone. Retired Air Force
Gen.
Merrill McPeak said, “This is a pretty easy problem, for crying
out loud.” The U.S. Senate cast a unanimous vote in favor of
establishing one.
Giles
Merritt, an analyst with Security and Defense Agenda, a Belgian think
tank, asserted, “There’s no reason not to implement a no-fly
zone.”
A no-fly zone combines compelling visuals with minimal risks, at least
when used against a marginal power like Libya. But the tactic has a
mixed record: little value in the Balkans, largely ineffectual in
southern Iraq, more useful when protecting Kurds who had their own
military forces.
Moreover, a no-fly zone would be an act of war. Enforcing it with
aircraft would require suppression of Libyan air defenses modest, but
perhaps more capable than commonly assumed. Stated Secretary of
Defense
Robert Gates: “A no-fly zone begins with an attack on
Libya. That’s the way you do a no-fly zone.”
Libya is a large country, stretching more than 1000 miles east to west
and containing a dozen major cities. Gen. James Mattis, commander
of the U.S. Central Command, said more aircraft would be required than
deployed on a single carrier. Washington could rely on ship-to-air
and air-to-air missiles, but they would be less effective against
low-flying craft. The Center for Strategic and Budgetary
Assessments figures the cost of a no-fly operation would run up to $300
million a week for the most extensive aerial coverage.
Gadhafi might succeed in downing U.S. aircraft. After all, the
bedraggled Bosnian Serbs were able to shoot down an F-16 in 1995 and the
Yugoslav Serbs even downed an F-117 stealth fighter during America’s 1999
bombing campaign. The destruction of American planes and capture of
American pilots would create pressure for deeper involvement.
Gadhafi also might look for other means to retaliate, including
terrorism. If Gadhafi succeeded in killing Americans, pressure for
airstrikes and even an invasion would soar.
Another problem with a no-fly zone would be its limited utility.
For instance, Yugoslavia was able to deploy sub-sonic aircraft and
helicopters despite the allied no-fly zone in Bosnia.
Ivo Daadler, America’s NATO ambassador, noted: “No-fly zones are
more effective against fighters, but they really have a limited effect
against … helicopters or the kind of ground operations that we’ve
seen. Which is why a no-fly zone, even if it were to be
established, isn’t really going to impact what is happening there
today.”
Indeed, Gadhafi may have enough forces on the ground, a mix of
paramilitary and elite army, to prevail, or at least to maintain control
of the west and significant oil production. Gen. James Clapper,
Director of National Intelligence, confounded conventional wisdom when he
opined that Gadhafi “seems to have staying power” and is likely to
“prevail.”
Tepid intervention like a no-fly zone might offer just enough aid to
prolong a civil war, causing even more casualties and destruction.
Then the U.S. would have to decide whether to double down, creating a
“no-drive” zone for Gadhafi’s tanks, armored personnel carriers and
artillery, arming the rebels, training insurgent forces, attacking Libyan
airfields and air units, inserting Special Forces and/or sending in
ground troops. In both the Balkans and Iraq, no-fly zones acted as
steps to much more extensive military involvement.
At least Rachel Kleinfeld acknowledges “the likelihood of a long
‘occupation’ of foreign troops” resulting from any serious
intervention. However, getting involved in a civil war with 150,000
U.S. troops still stuck in Afghanistan and Iraq would suggest that
American policymakers are as nutty as Gadhafi.
And who to back in Libya? Not every opponent of the regime is
a nascent Thomas Jefferson. France has recognized the Transitional
National Council , the main opposition group. But there is no
guarantee that it will govern Libya if Gadhafi falls. Libya’s
regional and tribal divisions run deep. Jihadists are active even
though they do not predominate. Analyst Alison Pargeter pointed to
“the almost complete absence of functioning institutions in Libya,”
including even a ruling political party.
Thus, Gadhafi’s ouster is likely to trigger additional brutal and
unpredictable power struggles. Unfortunately, the good guys often
lose such post-revolutionary battles.
James Hackett of the International Institute for Strategic Studies
observed, “You are probably dealing with a range of different tribes and
communities that have very different agendas once Gaddafi goes.”
If the U.S. backs one or another faction, it will own the outcome.
Which will force American policymakers to choose winners and losers,
manipulate political actors, and otherwise meddle endlessly in Libya for
years to come.
How the Libyan people would respond to U.S. or Western intervention is
not clear. Some want a no fly zone or even air strikes, though many
insist on UN approval. Others reject any outside intervention, even
suggesting that they would oppose foreign troops as well as Gadhafi’s
minions. American intervention would risk discrediting friendly
forces in any succeeding power struggle.
Nor is it clear how U.S. action would be perceived elsewhere.
Washington has a well-earned reputation for supporting and ousting
regimes to serve its interests and not those of subject peoples.
George W. Bush’s freedom initiative is not why the Arab street is now
rising against its oppressors, mostly governments long backed by
Washington.
Daniel Pipes points out in The National Review that so far the
U.S. has been “conspicuously absent from the sloganeering” in the Middle
East uprisings. Yes, because Washington has not been directly
involved. Intervening in Libya would change that dynamic.
Secretary of State
Hillary
Clinton emphasizes the importance of winning international support
for military action, preferably from the United Nations, but the latter
remains unlikely due to Russian opposition. Relying on NATO or the
EU would be correctly seen as mere American fig leafs.
Dov Zakheim complained that the alternative to acting “is to sit back
and let events dictate what the United States should do.” Stephen Grand
of the Brookings Institution claimed “doing nothing is not a viable
alternative.” Sen. John Kerry, chairman of the Foreign Relations
Committee, opined that the U.S. “should not be on the
sidelines.”
Actually, that is precisely where Washington should be. Peace
should be America’s default position. Obviously, there are times
when war is tragically necessary. That is not the case in
Libya.
Even in better economic times, Washington cannot afford to police the
world. With a $1.65 trillion deficit this year, trillions of
dollars in red ink expected in coming decades, and over $100 trillion in
unfunded liabilities piled high, the U.S. government needs to relearn
humility in foreign policy, as candidate George W. Bush argued so very
long ago.
More fundamentally, the lives and treasure of Americans, especially those
in the armed forces, should not be risked without something important at
stake for their own society. Military personnel are not gambit
pawns to be sacrificed in some global chess game played by ivory tower
warriors. For good reason nearly two-thirds of Americans say they
want to stay out of Libya.
We should wish the Libyan people well. But their war is not our
war. And military intervention risks their future. Wrote
Gideon Rachman in the Financial Times: “in the long-run, it
would damage the only real chance for lasting peace and stability in the
region–the hope that the future of the Middle East will now be determined
by ordinary citizens, rather than by local dictators or outside
powers.”
President Bush’s militaristic agenda was never necessary. Democracy
is spreading in spite of catastrophic policy failure in Iraq.
Andrew Bacevich of Boston University noted in the Cleveland Plain
Dealer that, “by liberating themselves, [the Muslim masses]
will also liberate us. Our misbegotten crusade to determine their
destiny will finally end.” Americans should reject another war of choice
in another Muslim nation about which they know nothing.
http://blogs.forbes.com/dougbandow/2011/03/14/libya-another-unnecessary-war-of-choice/
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