Senators including John McCain and John Kerry are calling
for a no-fly zone over Libya (an idea I
endorsed two weeks ago), but the Obama administration has sent
mixed signals, and Defense Secretary Gates is particularly cool to
the idea. Conrad Black
takes on the latter:
Defense Secretary Robert Gates told a congressional committee,
“Let’s call a spade a spade: A no-fly zone means attacking Libya”
(referring to the need to eliminate anti-aircraft batteries). So
what? The United States cheerfully fires drone missiles into the
territory of its glorious Pakistani ally (which supports elements
of the Taliban we are fighting in Afghanistan) every day. Barack
Obama, while his defense chief quails at taking out the
anti-aircraft defenses of the murderous lunatic Gaddafi, unctuously
repeats that the Libyan leader “has lost the legitimacy to lead and
he must leave.” But such people don’t just leave, and certainly not
because such ungalvanizing figures as Mr. Obama tell him to
leave.
I cannot accept that the West has reached the point of
enfeeblement that we sit like worried, helpless sheep while Iran
arms itself with nuclear weapons, and are afraid to assist a clear
majority in Libya get rid of a murderous fruitcake of a despot…
If NATO (the U.S. Sixth Fleet in practice) can’t take out Libyan
air defenses at no or minimal cost, we should all start studying
Arabic and spending an hour a day with our foreheads pressed to the
floor.
Libyan rebels themselves,
including the Vice President of the provisional government that
has arisen in the eastern half of the country, are calling for a
no-fly zone, as Gaddafi’s air
force — and, not incidentally, the ability to fly in
mercenaries from sub-Saharan Africa — is clearly key to his
ability to maintain what for the moment looks like a stalemate. For
those who doubt the US has an interest in a quick end to the Libyan
civil war, Lee Smith makes
a sobering point:
[W]e know what a civil war in the Middle East looks like. We
know how these conflicts drag in their neighbors and destabilize
bordering states. We know the humanitarian cost and the cost to
American interests. We know what happens in the aftermath. American
soldiers are in Afghanistan to prevent that country from becoming a
failed state and terrorist haven. A civil war in Libya promises to
create a dynamic potentially many times worse. Are we really going
to forgo the opportunity to influence the outcome in America’s
favor?
It seems we might do just that, especially given the Obama
administration’s fetish for approval from the United Nations, which
in practice promotes paralysis. The word
from Turtle Bay is that UN diplomats would be open to a no-fly
zone if attacks on civilians from the air (which have of course
already happened) become so widespread that it constitutes a major
humanitarian crisis. In other words, the strategy is to do
something to prevent Gaddafi from commiting widespread crimes
against humanity — but only once it’s too late.
