It's fairly unlikely. Libya and Afghanistan are not really similar at all. Afghanistan is and always has been completely tribal and third-world in nature. They've never had real infrastructure or any sort of effective central government. They've never had a functioning economy. Libya, on the other hand, is more of a modern country (relatively speaking). There is a lot of talk about the "tribal" nature of it, but people don't live in caves. They have centralized government. They have functioning infrastructure, education, etc. They have real cities similar to what you have elsewhere in the world. They have available natural resources as a country (oil). They may go through a lot of turmoil figuring out their new governing structure - and it may be one that we don't like - but they aren't likely to end up as some kind of renegade lawless place where anything goes.
But that's not really what I asked - what I meant is "how likely is it that we help them to power, only to have them turn against us (in an even worse way than Gaddafi) after they gain power"? There are already credible reports that Al Qaeda people are among the rebels.
According to the Congressional Research Service, the first six days of military operations in Libya cost somewhere between $400 million and $1 billion. That's not a lot of money in the grand scheme of the federal budget. But the longer we stay, the more we'll spend. And what are we getting in return for this ongoing investment? That's hard to say when even President Obama doesn't seem to know why we chose to get involved. But in general, when it's a struggle to justify some form of spending, it probably isn't worth it. http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/R41725.pdf
I hope not. Honestly, I don't share ATW's concern that we're supporting a future enemy. I'm worried that we will again subject a country to a decade of crippling sanctions that are ineffectual at getting Gaddafi out but does impede the Libyan society's ability to correct itself. The rebels don't seem to be capable of winning even when it's gift-wrapped. I'm not worried so much about Bush 2's Iraq as I am about Bush 1's Iraq.
Precisely the point. We don't know who we're supporting so why get involved. We got sucked into it to support our Nato Allies who has oil interests. I get that. But now BHO is touting this as lesson in coalition building. Nice try but there is no defined mission except enforcing a no fly zone and supporting an unknown resistance for humanitarian reasons. By his own doctrine Syria should be next to recieve assistance. BHO is setting himself up to fail miserably. I'm not his biggest fan but I don't want to see the leader of the United States look foolish. This whole uprising in the middle eastern countries may turn and bite the Western world in the arse. These countries are ripe for hardline theologic parties to grasp. But I see on CNN that BHO's staff is giving Obama credit for the uprising. I hope they are as eager to take the blame if these countries end up with regimes less friendly to the West.
We've seen the flop. May as well play the turn. I think it's a good oppurtunity to know who we're dealing with if not even infiltrate them. How the heck does a 'secret order' get out to the public so quickly? Is there anybody in that administration with experience that can step up advise this team? There is no sense of clear direction in anything this admin has set out to do.
If oil is our primary interest, our best option is to support Ghaddafi. Brutal dictatorships provide stability which are great for lowering oil prices. Creating uncertainty is not good for oil prices.
Well one thing is for sure the military industrial complex wins either way. They get to replace tomahawk missiles at $1.5 million a piece , probably on a no-bid cost plus basis. In addition Qadafi's forces are fighting with arms we sold them when he was one of our dictators prior to a couple of months ago. After the fall of Qadafi we will need to give "defense" aid to the new Libyan government. The game is sweet for the military contractors. Sucks for Texas teachers and kids.
The US didn't sell many arms to Libya. It mostly was spare parts for non combat planes and some riot gear. http://www.aolnews.com/2011/02/25/us-imposes-sanctions-on-libya-what-it-means-for-arms-sales/ [rquoter]It's unclear precisely how much U.S. defense equipment has been sold to Libya since the restrictions were lifted five years ago, but it appears to be mostly minor equipment. "The majority [of licenses] were for aircraft spare parts," a State Department spokesperson told AOL News. The Libyan air force flies mostly Soviet Bloc-produced aircraft, but it also has U.S.-built transport aircraft, such as the C-130 lift aircraft, and smaller Gulfstream aircraft.[/rquoter]
Really? You prefer the situation where we lost practically no US troops and weren't occupying to where we have lost 4K + troops and have been occupying the country for 8 years now and will likely still have thousands of troops on the ground indefinitely.
This is certainly a success in regard to coalition building. We have several allies involved including Turkey and Arab States, we have a UNSC resolution and our European allies are not only willingly stepping forward to play a role they are pushing for it themselves. This isn't the Coalition of the Willing that went into Iraq in 2003 that was driven by the US with other most other parties bribed or cajoled into it but an active coalition where we actually are one of the more reluctant participants. I agree this isn't a very well defined mission and it doesn't make me easy that we are sending advisers in but I would still take this over one where we are determined to go in there and occupy the country. If anything what you see as Obama's indecisiveness I see it as justifiable caution in regard to a very complex situation. How long though are we going to continue to support unpopular undemocratic regimes in the Middle East? One of the main things that Al Qaeda has cited for why they attack the US is because of the US support for regimes like the House of Saud and Mubarak. I totally agree that there is a very possible danger that these countries elect theocratic parties that are not friendly to the West but I don't see how we can indefinitely support hardline regimes. As we have seen that just ratchets up anti-American feelings among the populace and becomes fodder for groups like Al Qaeda to conflate hatred of the regime with hatred to the US. The people of the region need to evolve to the point where they can take responsibility for their governance. If you look at Iran where there is widespread resentment for the regime and opposition figures and moderates like Khatami have expressed friendly attitudes towards the US I don't think a downfall of pro-western regimes will inevitably lead to anti-western theocratic states. We may have that but it is also possible that theocracy's themselves may not survive democratic aspirations if the people of the Middle East get a taste for democracy.
They have been changing the "mission objective" every day. The initial drum roll to gather support was for a simple 'no fly zone'. That's when the Arab countries jumped onto the bandwagon. BUT, once the bombings started, "strategic targets" were added to the mission. (....many Arab countries dropped their unequivocal support, but nobody is reporting this). It's obvious that this has become about regime change, leaving Gudaffi in power is probably now a national security risk to America & others, he has a history of getting involved with terrorism, can't see how he can be left in power. I read somewhere where they titled this conflict as "Humanitarian Imperialism"....fits the bill of both the liberal and conservatives in America.
Liberals are called out and destroyed. <iframe title="YouTube video player" width="640" height="510" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/t28ZR8eC1-w?hd=1" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Well yeah. I'm not a big fan of that war, but it actually did remove Saddam Hussein and (after a long time) got Iraq back to building a (fragile, corrupt) democracy. The sanctions went on for years putting a hardship on Iraqis and degrading their infrastructure, economy, and civil society wihout doing anything to take out Saddam, so that when we did remove him the reconstruction was that much harder. Given that we ultimately did invade and occupy Iraq, it'd have been better to do it from the get-go instead of starting with a slow-attrition through sanctions. The difference here is that Libya has a semi-credible rebel army. I'm not sure how they got that impression. People started talking about a no-fly zone that included destruction of ground assets for a couple of weeks before the thing passed. And, when the UN decision was announced, it was made pretty clear (at least to me, and I didn't attend the meetings) that it wasn't just a no-fly zone, that all military assets were targets. I have a hard time believing that the Arab countries were operating with less information than I had.
This has been a total cluster****. We establish NFZ too late to do any good, then pull out after rebels show they will lose without ground support. When it is all over both sides will unite in their hate for us.
