Category: Foreign Policy

Last night I wrote about the measures that the Obama Administration is finally enacting to deal with the problems in Libya. among them was a no-fly zone to protect anti-government forces. But Russia put the kibosh on that plan since they’re on the Security Council and any action by the UN would require unanimous consent from that useless body.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov described the idea of imposing limits on Libyan air space as “superfluous” and said world powers must instead focus on fully using the sanctions that the U.N. Security Council approved over the weekend.

Of course, we all know that this administration won’t act unilaterally. They’d rather drain our own resources on useless sanctions and blockades while floating a small city off the coast of Libya than assert themselves on the world stage. So much for that new respect among nations we were promised in the 2008 presidential campaign.

And while we’re on the subject, the foreign press is beginning to notice how the US is a foreign policy eunuch. In The Telegraph, Nile Gardiner writes;

The fact that it took ten days and at least a thousand dead on the streets of Libya’s cities before President Obama finally mustered the courage to call for Muammar “mad dog” Gaddafi to step down is highly embarrassing for the world’s only superpower, and emblematic of a deer-in-the-headlights approach to world leadership. Washington seems incapable of decisive decision-making on foreign policy at the moment, a far cry from the days when it swept entire regimes from power, and defeated America’s enemies with deep-seated conviction and an unshakeable drive for victory.

Actually, it more than ten days because Gaddafi was trying to distract the world’s attention from his problems with the Gaza bloody shirt more than 14 days ago. Why not? It has worked to stir up the Palestinians in the past…for more than forty years.

The only thing missing that would mirror the Jimmy Carter way of dealing with these situations is to offer refuge to Gaddafi similar to what Carter did for Iran’s shah and Nicaragua’s Somoza so that Libyans can hate us for not turning over the despots.

Thanks to Old Trooper for one of those links.

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and the US have had a spotty relationship for decades. During the Cold War, when the US was at the bayonet point of Western Democracy in Berlin, Gaddafi, Libya’s East Berlin Embassy planned, financed and executed and a bombing at the LaBelle Disco in Berlin on April 5th, 1986. They succeeded in killing two American Army sergeants, a Turkish woman and injuring scores more, some permanently.

Ten days later, on April 15th, 1986, an American air strike attacked barracks, palaces and airfields in Libya with F-111F fighters, killing at least 60 Libyans. Two American pilots were killed over the Gulf of Sidra, one of whom, CPT Paul F. Lorence, has never been returned to the US.

In response, Libya then participated in the bombing of Pan AM flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. 259 passengers and crew were killed. 189 were Americans.

After watching the US easily topple the Hussein regime in Iraq, Qaddafi decided that this war on terror was hitting a little close to home, so he volunteered to dismantle his weapons of mass destruction programs. After turning all of his weapons over to the UN, he discovered that it was still cool to oppose the US and endeared himself to the US left by attacking George Bush at every opportunity.

Now Gaddafi’s ass is in an industrial strength sling with his own people. According to some sources, he’s sponsored the murder of 200 – 1000 protesters. His family is squabbling over his assets, Time rumors that he plans on torching gas and oil pipelines. And Gaddafi is defiant;

“I am not going to leave this land. I will die here as a martyr … I shall remain here defiant,” Gaddafi said in a speech on state television.

“Muammar Gaddafi is the leader of the revolution, I am not a president to step down … This is my country. Muammar is not a president to leave his post, Muammar is leader of the revolution until the end of time.”

So what’s our policy now? Other than a few feeble statements from Hillary Clinton, there’s nothing. Gaddafi is in a position that we’ve been hoping for decades to find him in, and now that we have the opportunity to actually influence the outcome while Gaddafi teeters on the precipice, the Obama Administration is virtually mute.

Another opportunity, like scores of other opportunities, about to be squandered.

The Daily Mail reports that amid burning government buildings and 233-400 dead protesters, Libya’s leader Colonel has left the capitol;

The Libyan justice minister has now resigned in protest at the ‘excessive use of violence’ against the protesters, according to the Quryna newspaper.

As Europe and the U.S. condemned the regime’s handling of the unrest, Gaddafi’s son Saif said his family would ‘fight until the last bullet’.

More than 300 victims were massacred – many by foreign mercenaries – during the government crackdown in Libya’s second city, Benghazi.

Qaddafi’s time has long ago passed. He’s lucky he survived the Reagan years. Of course, on The Obama’s watch, it’s hard to tell where the US support will land.

Thanks to Old Trooper for the link.