On a few occasions in the past, I have commented on President Obama’s speeches by presenting the text above the line and using footnotes for my own text. I did this, for example, back on December 2009 with a comment called “90 Notes” and again on September 2, 2010 with one called “54 Notes.” This method makes the result look a little (a very little, I should stress) like a page of Talmud, with Mishnah above and Gemorrah below. (If you don’t understand that, it doesn’t matter.) In this case, I am annotating the President’s March 28, 2011 speech as a follow-on to a commentary I made on March 22, called “Down the Rabbit Hole: An Introduction to Operation Rapid Serpent.” I may have recourse to refer back to that article so that I (and you, the reader) are spared the burden of unnecessary repetition. As before, too, I will comment on the speechwriting elements of the text as well as on matters of substance; in this case, however, I will try to minimize the former as I often directly address the President in my remarks. So here goes:
* * * *
The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, For Immediate Release, March 28, 2011
Remarks by the President in Address to the Nation on Libya, National Defense University, Washington, D.C., 7:31 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Tonight, I’d like to update the American people on the international effort that we have led in Libya –- what we’ve done, what we plan to do, and why this matters to us.
I want to begin by paying tribute to our men and women in uniform who, once again, have acted with courage, professionalism and patriotism. They have moved with incredible speed and strength. Because of them and our dedicated diplomats, a coalition has been forged and countless lives have been saved.[1]
Meanwhile, as we speak, our troops are supporting our ally Japan, leaving Iraq to its people, stopping the Taliban’s momentum in Afghanistan, and going after al Qaeda all across the globe. As Commander-in-Chief, I’m grateful to our soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines, Coast Guardsmen, and to their families. And I know all Americans share in that sentiment.[2]
For generations, the United States of America has played a unique role as an anchor of global security and as an advocate for human freedom. Mindful of the risks and costs of military action, we are naturally reluctant to use force to solve the world’s many challenges. But when our interests and values are at stake, we have a responsibility to act.[3] That’s what happened in Libya over the course of these last six weeks.
Libya sits directly between Tunisia and Egypt -– two nations that inspired the world when their people rose up to take control of their own destiny.[4] For more than four decades, the Libyan people have been ruled by a tyrant -– Muammar Qaddafi.[5] He has denied his people freedom, exploited their wealth, murdered opponents at home and abroad, and terrorized innocent people around the world –- including Americans who were killed by Libyan agents.
Last month, Qaddafi’s grip of fear appeared to give way to the promise of freedom. In cities and towns across the country, Libyans took to the streets to claim their basic human rights. As one Libyan said, “For the first time we finally have hope that our nightmare of 40 years will soon be over.”[6]
Faced with this opposition, Qaddafi began attacking his people.[7] As President, my immediate concern was the safety of our citizens, so we evacuated our embassy and all Americans who sought our assistance. Then we took a series of swift steps in a matter of days to answer Qaddafi’s aggression. We froze more than $33 billion of Qaddafi’s regime’s assets. Joining with other nations at the United Nations Security Council, we broadened our sanctions, imposed an arms embargo, and enabled Qaddafi and those around him to be held accountable for their crimes. I made it clear that Qaddafi had lost the confidence of his people and the legitimacy to lead, and I said that he needed to step down from power.[8]
In the face of the world’s condemnation, Qaddafi chose to escalate his attacks, launching a military campaign against the Libyan people.[9] Innocent people were targeted for killing. Hospitals and ambulances were attacked. Journalists were arrested, sexually assaulted, and killed. Supplies of food and fuel were choked off. Water for hundreds of thousands of people in Misurata was shut off. Cities and towns were shelled, mosques were destroyed, and apartment buildings reduced to rubble. Military jets and helicopter gunships were unleashed upon people who had no means to defend themselves against assaults from the air.
Confronted by this brutal repression and a looming humanitarian crisis, I ordered warships into the Mediterranean.[10] European allies declared their willingness to commit resources to stop the killing.[11] The Libyan opposition and the Arab League appealed to the world to save lives in Libya. And so at my direction, America led an effort with our allies at the United Nations Security Council to pass a historic resolution that authorized a no-fly zone to stop the regime’s attacks from the air, and further authorized all necessary measures to protect the Libyan people.
Ten days ago, having tried to end the violence without using force, the international community offered Qaddafi a final chance to stop his campaign of killing, or face the consequences. Rather than stand down, his forces continued their advance, bearing down on the city of Benghazi, home to nearly 700,000 men, women and children who sought their freedom from fear.[12]
At this point, the United States and the world faced a choice. Qaddafi declared he would show “no mercy” to his own people. He compared them to rats, and threatened to go door to door to inflict punishment. In the past, we have seen him hang civilians in the streets, and kill over a thousand people in a single day.[13] Now we saw regime forces on the outskirts of the city. We knew that if we wanted -- if we waited one more day, Benghazi, a city nearly the size of Charlotte, could[14] suffer a massacre that would have reverberated across the region and stained the conscience of the world.
It was not in our national interest to let that happen. I refused to let that happen.[15] And so nine days ago, after consulting the bipartisan leadership of Congress, I authorized military action to stop the killing and enforce U.N. Security Council Resolution 1973.[16]
We struck regime forces approaching Benghazi to save that city and the people within it. We hit Qaddafi’s troops in neighboring Ajdabiya, allowing the opposition to drive them out. We hit Qaddafi’s air defenses, which paved the way for a no-fly zone. We targeted tanks and military assets that had been choking off towns and cities, and we cut off much of their source of supply. And tonight, I can report that we have stopped Qaddafi’s deadly advance.[17]
In this effort, the United States has not acted alone. Instead, we have been joined by a strong and growing coalition. This includes our closest allies -– nations like the United Kingdom, France, Canada, Denmark, Norway, Italy, Spain, Greece, and Turkey –- all of whom have fought by our sides for decades. And it includes Arab partners like Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, who have chosen to meet their responsibilities to defend the Libyan people.[18]
To summarize, then: In just one month, the United States has worked with our international partners to mobilize a broad coalition, secure an international mandate to protect civilians, stop an advancing army, prevent a massacre, and establish a no-fly zone with our allies and partners. To lend some perspective on how rapidly this military and diplomatic response came together, when people were being brutalized in Bosnia in the 1990s, it took the international community more than a year to intervene with air power to protect civilians. It took us 31 days.[19]
Moreover, we’ve accomplished these objectives consistent with the pledge that I made to the American people at the outset of our military operations. I said that America’s role would be limited; that we would not put ground troops into Libya; that we would focus our unique capabilities on the front end of the operation and that we would transfer responsibility to our allies and partners. Tonight, we are fulfilling that pledge.[20]
Our most effective alliance, NATO, has taken command of the enforcement of the arms embargo and the no-fly zone. Last night, NATO decided to take on the additional responsibility of protecting Libyan civilians. This transfer from the United States to NATO will take place on Wednesday.[21] Going forward, the lead in enforcing the no-fly zone and protecting civilians on the ground will transition to our allies and partners, and I am fully confident that our coalition will keep the pressure on Qaddafi’s remaining forces.
In that effort, the United States will play a supporting role -- including intelligence, logistical support, search and rescue assistance, and capabilities to jam regime communications.[22] Because of this transition to a broader, NATO-based coalition, the risk and cost of this operation -- to our military and to American taxpayers -- will be reduced significantly.[23]
So for those who doubted our capacity to carry out this operation, I want to be clear: The United States of America has done what we said we would do.[24]
That’s not to say that our work is complete. In addition to our NATO responsibilities, we will work with the international community to provide assistance to the people of Libya, who need food for the hungry and medical care for the wounded. We will safeguard the more than $33 billion that was frozen from the Qaddafi regime so that it’s available to rebuild Libya. After all, the money doesn’t belong to Qaddafi or to us -- it belongs to the Libyan people. And we’ll make sure they receive it.[25]
Tomorrow, Secretary Clinton will go to London, where she will meet with the Libyan opposition and consult with more than 30 nations. These discussions will focus on what kind of political effort is necessary to pressure Qaddafi, while also supporting a transition to the future that the Libyan people deserve -- because while our military mission is narrowly focused on saving lives, we continue to pursue the broader goal of a Libya that belongs not to a dictator, but to its people.[26]
Now, despite the success of our efforts over the past week, I know that some Americans continue to have questions about our efforts in Libya.[27] Qaddafi has not yet stepped down from power, and until he does, Libya will remain dangerous.[28] Moreover, even after Qaddafi does leave power, 40 years of tyranny has left Libya fractured and without strong civil institutions. The transition to a legitimate government that is responsive to the Libyan people will be a difficult task.[29] And while the United States will do our part to help, it will be a task for the international community and –- more importantly –- a task for the Libyan people themselves.
In fact, much of the debate in Washington has put forward a false choice when it comes to Libya. On the one hand, some question why America should intervene at all -– even in limited ways –- in this distant land. They argue that there are many places in the world where innocent civilians face brutal violence at the hands of their government, and America should not be expected to police the world, particularly when we have so many pressing needs here at home.[30]
It’s true that America cannot use our military wherever repression occurs. And given the costs and risks of intervention, we must always measure our interests against the need for action. But that cannot be an argument for never acting on behalf of what’s right. In this particular country -– Libya -- at this particular moment, we were faced with the prospect of violence on a horrific scale.[31] We had a unique ability to stop that violence: an international mandate for action, a broad coalition prepared to join us, the support of Arab countries, and a plea for help from the Libyan people themselves. We also had the ability to stop Qaddafi’s forces in their tracks without putting American troops on the ground.
To brush aside America’s responsibility as a leader and -– more profoundly -– our responsibilities to our fellow human beings under such circumstances would have been a betrayal of who we are. Some nations may be able to turn a blind eye to atrocities in other countries. The United States of America is different. And as President, I refused to wait for the images of slaughter and mass graves before taking action.
Moreover, America has an important strategic interest in preventing Qaddafi from overrunning those who oppose him. A massacre would have driven thousands of additional refugees across Libya’s borders, putting enormous strains on the peaceful –- yet fragile -– transitions in Egypt and Tunisia. The democratic impulses that are dawning across the region would be eclipsed by the darkest form of dictatorship, as repressive leaders concluded that violence is the best strategy to cling to power.[32] The writ of the United Nations Security Council would have been shown to be little more than empty words, crippling that institution’s future credibility to uphold global peace and security.[33] So while I will never minimize the costs involved in military action, I am convinced that a failure to act in Libya would have carried a far greater price for America.
Now, just as there are those who have argued against intervention in Libya, there are others who have suggested that we broaden our military mission beyond the task of protecting the Libyan people, and do whatever it takes to bring down Qaddafi and usher in a new government.
Of course, there is no question that Libya -– and the world –- would be better off with Qaddafi out of power. I, along with many other world leaders, have embraced that goal, and will actively pursue it through non-military means.[34] But broadening our military mission to include regime change would be a mistake.
The task that I assigned our forces -– to protect the Libyan people from immediate danger, and to establish a no-fly zone -– carries with it a U.N. mandate and international support. It’s also what the Libyan opposition asked us to do. If we tried to overthrow Qaddafi by force, our coalition would splinter.[35] We would likely have to put U.S. troops on the ground to accomplish that mission, or risk killing many civilians from the air. The dangers faced by our men and women in uniform would be far greater. So would the costs and our share of the responsibility for what comes next.[36]
To be blunt, we went down that road in Iraq. Thanks to the extraordinary sacrifices of our troops and the determination of our diplomats, we are hopeful about Iraq’s future. But regime change there took eight years, thousands of American and Iraqi lives, and nearly a trillion dollars. That is not something we can afford to repeat in Libya.
As the bulk of our military effort ratchets down, what we can do -- and will do -- is support the aspirations of the Libyan people. We have intervened to stop a massacre, and we will work with our allies and partners to maintain the safety of civilians. We will deny the regime arms, cut off its supplies of cash, assist the opposition, and work with other nations to hasten the day when Qaddafi leaves power. It may not happen overnight, as a badly weakened Qaddafi tries desperately to hang on to power. But it should be clear to those around Qaddafi, and to every Libyan, that history is not on Qaddafi’s side. With the time and space that we have provided for the Libyan people, they will be able to determine their own destiny, and that is how it should be.[37]
Let me close by addressing what this action says about the use of America’s military power, and America’s broader leadership in the world, under my presidency.
As Commander-in-Chief, I have no greater responsibility than keeping this country safe. And no decision weighs on me more than when to deploy our men and women in uniform. I’ve made it clear that I will never hesitate to use our military swiftly, decisively, and unilaterally when necessary to defend our people, our homeland, our allies and our core interests. That's why we’re going after al Qaeda wherever they seek a foothold. That is why we continue to fight in Afghanistan, even as we have ended our combat mission in Iraq and removed more than 100,000 troops from that country.
There will be times, though, when our safety is not directly threatened, but our interests and our values are. Sometimes, the course of history poses challenges that threaten our common humanity and our common security -– responding to natural disasters, for example; or preventing genocide and keeping the peace; ensuring regional security, and maintaining the flow of commerce. These may not be America’s problems alone, but they are important to us. They’re problems worth solving. And in these circumstances, we know that the United States, as the world’s most powerful nation, will often be called upon to help.
In such cases, we should not be afraid to act -– but the burden of action should not be America’s alone. As we have in Libya, our task is instead to mobilize the international community for collective action. Because contrary to the claims of some, American leadership is not simply a matter of going it alone and bearing all of the burden ourselves. Real leadership creates the conditions and coalitions for others to step up as well; to work with allies and partners so that they bear their share of the burden and pay their share of the costs; and to see that the principles of justice and human dignity are upheld by all.[38]
That’s the kind of leadership we’ve shown in Libya. Of course, even when we act as part of a coalition, the risks of any military action will be high. Those risks were realized when one of our planes malfunctioned over Libya. Yet when one of our airmen parachuted to the ground, in a country whose leader has so often demonized the United States –- in a region that has such a difficult history with our country –- this American did not find enemies. Instead, he was met by people who embraced him. One young Libyan who came to his aid said, “We are your friends. We are so grateful to those men who are protecting the skies.”
This voice is just one of many in a region where a new generation is refusing to be denied their rights and opportunities any longer.
Yes, this change will make the world more complicated for a time.[39] Progress will be uneven, and change will come differently to different countries. There are places, like Egypt, where this change will inspire us and raise our hopes. And then there will be places, like Iran, where change is fiercely suppressed. The dark forces of civil conflict and sectarian war will have to be averted, and difficult political and economic concerns will have to be addressed.
The United States will not be able to dictate the pace and scope of this change. Only the people of the region can do that. But we can make a difference.
I believe that this movement of change cannot be turned back, and that we must stand alongside those who believe in the same core principles that have guided us through many storms: our opposition to violence directed at one’s own people; our support for a set of universal rights, including the freedom for people to express themselves and choose their leaders; our support for governments that are ultimately responsive to the aspirations of the people.[40]
Born, as we are, out of a revolution by those who longed to be free, we welcome the fact that history is on the move in the Middle East and North Africa, and that young people are leading the way. Because wherever people long to be free, they will find a friend in the United States. Ultimately, it is that faith -- those ideals -- that are the true measure of American leadership.[41]
My fellow Americans, I know that at a time of upheaval overseas -- when the news is filled with conflict and change -- it can be tempting to turn away from the world.[42] And as I’ve said before, our strength abroad is anchored in our strength here at home. That must always be our North Star -- the ability of our people to reach their potential, to make wise choices with our resources, to enlarge the prosperity that serves as a wellspring for our power, and to live the values that we hold so dear.
But let us also remember that for generations, we have done the hard work of protecting our own people, as well as millions around the globe. We have done so because we know that our own future is safer, our own future is brighter, if more of mankind can live with the bright light of freedom and dignity.
Tonight, let us give thanks for the Americans who are serving through these trying times, and the coalition that is carrying our effort forward. And let us look to the future with confidence and hope not only for our own country, but for all those yearning for freedom around the world.[43]
Thank you. God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America. (Applause.) Thank you.
END 7:58 P.M. EDT
[1] The contention that “countless lives have been saved” goes to the heart of the President’s case for the Libya intervention, since the purpose of the intervention is not to effect regime change but is rather for humanitarian purposes. Unbelievable as it sounds, that’s what the man is saying. But as many have pointed out, this contention is based on a counterfactual: If we had not started a war, would the regime have massacred the residents of Benghazi? Maybe, maybe not. Guys like Qaddafi say lots of things they don't mean. It made tactical sense to make such threats to try to disarm the opposition and make a regime victory less costly; whether a massacre would have actually occurred no one can possibly know. Presumably, the armed opposition currently doing pretty well would have resisted, and in the city center, where air power is not so useful, who can say what that fight might have looked like or what the outcome would have been? Who knows if regime forces would even have entered the city; regime spokesmen at the time claimed they wouldn’t, but of course these are guys one shouldn’t believe even if they claim that spinach is a vegetable. Moreover, what U.S. and allied airpower have done is to create a more level playing field for the civil war now going on. How can the President know in the longer run whether that level playing field will not prolong the war and end up getting vastly more people killed than might (or, again, might not) have died in Benghazi? He cannot possibly know.
[2] There is otherwise really nothing to comment on in this opening section; this is standard presidential-speech boilerplate, or what speechwriters call grace notes of a sort. The real question is whether the American soldiers, sailors and marines he has sent into harm’s way really feel that the President has their back if they get into trouble. I suspect they’re a little tentative about that, to put it generously.
[3] I fear that this phrase is a code word for “the responsibility to protect”, one of the most irresponsible UN gestures of recent years, one designed to legitimate “humanitarian interventions” at the same time that the UN system as a whole tries to ban the use of force for the protection of sovereign national interests.
[4] They have not yet done so in Egypt, as the President has got to know. Great line for a speech, if you don’t look too hard at the reality it purports to describe.
[5] Qaddafi has been a tyrant, to be sure, but he has not ruled alone. As noted in my March 22 essay, Libya is a tribal society, and Qaddafi has wide support in the western part of the country based on kinship ties and vast patronage networks fueled by oil money. Anyone who thinks he is a pushover, an isolated madman without any political clout in the country, does not understand Libyan society or politics.
[6] This, again, is great for an applause line in a speech, but it assumes that every opposition protest is ipso facto part of a democracy movement, and there is simply no evidence that this is on balance the case in Libya, or anywhere else in the Arab world right now. For what reality looks like in Egypt right now, see Samuel Tadros’s latest brilliant comment on the TAI blog, called “Egypt, for Real.” In Libya, quite aside from the tribal dimension—which gives the conflict the flavor of a very traditional “rule or suffer” episode that Ibn Khaldun can educate you about, if you like, from the Muqaddimah—there is the matter of AQIM. AQIM stands for al-Qaeda in the Maghreb; it is an offshoot of one side (the worse of the two bad sides) of the Algerian civil war of just a few years past. It is dangerous and growing more so. We have testimony from a Libyan opposition leader named Abdel-Hakim al-Hasidi that al-Qaeda has been active in the Libyan fight on the opposition’s side. We have an AFP report from March 26 that al-Qaeda has stolen Libyan surface-to-air missiles and spirited them into Chad. We do not know very much about the Libyan opposition fighting Qaddafi, but the more we learn about it the less like a democracy movement it looks. The President’s remarks on this point are really stunning.
[7] No, not exactly. The opposition began shooting first. But that’s just a detail isn’t it?
[8] It is amazing to me that the President would so casually repeat an earlier mistake. When he said a few weeks ago that Qaddafi had lost the legitimacy to rule, he implied that he once had it. But by democratic standards he never did, unless by legitimacy he means in the Libyan context that tribal might makes for tribal right. You can’t lose something you never had. Qaddafi seized power on September 1, 1969, overthrowing the Sanussi monarchy of King Idris that did have legitimacy, though not of a strictly democratic a sort. Why repeat an error? Curious.
[9] The President speaks as though the opposition was not armed or organized in the slightest, that all the regime’s attacks were against pure innocent bystanders. This beggars belief.
[10] The USS Kearsarge was already there, sir, on normal patrol, as were most of the other ships operating from the Med now. The Boxer, Green Bay and Comstock--amphibious strike force I--was also headed out in that general direction already, on a normal patrol deployment. I was on the ship when it left San Diego on February 22 for Pearl Harbor and points beyond. So, please…..
[11] You make it sound like we acted first and then the European allies came around, when you know perfectly well it was the other way around. How short do you think people’s memories are? Wait, don’t answer that question……you might be right.
[12] This last phrase, “who sought their freedom from fear”, is way over the top—bad speechwriting. Possibly the speechwriter, probably Ben Rhodes, reassigned to the starting rotation in a pinch, was trying to be Rooseveltian here. It doesn’t work.
[13] The President seems to be referring to the Busalim prison massacre of 1996. Some 1, 270 prisoners were murdered, all but a few of them Islamists. Killing prisoners, however, after a prison revolt, isn't the same as what Hafiz al-Asad did in Hama in 1982, or what Qaddafi might or might not have done in Benghazi. Not that it's pretty, of course; but it’s not the same sort of event.
[14] Yes, “could”, not necessarily would. To base a war on a counterfactual is a form of pre-emption, it is not? I thought you were against that.
[15] Grandstanding persiflage. You, Mr. President, were entirely ready to let it happen before your Secretary of State flipped on you and you had the international cover you thought you could use to avoid taking the lion’s share of responsibility for the consequences of starting a war.
[16] Nowhere in this speech does the President use the word “war.” Just like he seems not to know what a “civilian” is—see my March 22 article—he seems not to know what a “war” is either. Where is George Orwell when you need him? When you fire over 300 cruise missiles at someone’s capital city, and drop 500-pound bombs on his forces, and bomb a country’s airfields with B-2 bombers flying from Missouri, you have started a war. There is simply no other word for it.
[17] You have stopped it temporarily, but as your own Pentagon says, stop the air operations and the whole situation could and probably would flip right around again. You have now got yourself in a position where we cannot stop the military action without jeopardizing what it has accomplished. That is why, in my March 22 essay, I characterized this operation as essentially open-ended, and not just for that reason. Yet Mr. President, you say virtually nothing about outcomes in your speech. You talk of processes, with the UN and so on, as if that is enough to justify the use of force. It’s the outcome that matters, and your reluctance to address the connection between the use of U.S. military power and that outcome is distressing. This is a point I will return to in a moment.
[18] This is totally disingenuous. The Arabs and other allies in this coalition are far more “window dressing” that the allies the Bush Administration assembled for the Iraq War, which you derided as such at the time when you were in the Senate. The U.S. military has undertaken by far the vast majority of the sorties flown, and the bombs dropped, over Libya, and there is little likelihood that our allies can assume the brunt of what we have been doing just because we say we’ve “handed it off” to NATO.
[19] It would have taken fewer days if you had not wisely resisted the siren call of the French and British. The Bosnia operation was also a mistake, in my view; we settled nothing there, really. We just froze the conflict, and it will unfreeze one day when we least wish it to. Ah, but that’s another story.
[20] But for how long? As I and others have pointed out, having started this war, we cannot leave Qaddafi standing when the shooting stops. He will be extraordinarily dangerous, far more so, in my view, than he would have been to us and our allies had we not fired hundreds of millions of dollars of ordnance at him. As I said in my March 22 essay, someone needs to go get him. If the opposition can’t, and I doubt they can take Tripoli, and if the French and British either don’t try or try and fail, who do you suppose is going to have to do this, sooner or later, one way or another? Really, sir.
[21] Yes, but it won’t change the balance of the burden. Just calling it a NATO operation won’t change the U.S. need to lead the fight, because no one else can do it.
[22] This is also disingenuous. We have in fact been doing more in recent days, not less. In recent days we have introduced A-10 Warthogs and AC-130 Gunships into the fight. And we are not using these and other platforms to “protect civilians”—we are using them to attack and destroy the Libyan military. When we attack Tripoli and Sirte (Qaddafi’s hometown), there are no civilians at risk in those places because they are on Qaddafi’s side. That is why the Arab League (and the oh, so predictable Russians, in the person of that human reptile Sergei Lavrov) are now criticizing you for going way beyond the UN mandate, and that is because you are, and that is because the mandate was ridiculous and unimplementable from the start.
[23] Not bloody likely. This open-ended commitment—and it will turn out that way no matter what you think now, sir—is not nearly over or hardly predictable. Let’s reckon the costs when it is over, and we’ll see who was right, OK?
[24] This really gets to the nub of the matter. We said we would prevent a humanitarian outrage, but we will not know the body count, and whose bodies will be counted, until this is over—and, as already noted, this is not yet near to being over. The President seems to be trying to avoid responsibility for the outcome by artificially and prematurely claiming “mission accomplished.” Does this remind you of anything, or of some other President, perhaps?
[25] Who are we going to turn this money over to? The next formally recognized Libya government, right? What if there isn’t one for a long time? What if it turns out to be de facto an Islamist government, or possibly in the process of becoming one? We still going to give them $33 billion? Better not to have mentioned this, seems to me, or to have made any promises.
[26] OK, here is where the President and his Administration go even further down the rabbit hole. What this speech as a whole says is that we will use American military power for humanitarian ends, but we will pursue regime change only with others and only by political and diplomatic means. This is a complete inversion of common sense and millennia of statecraft practice. Political and diplomatic means are typically brought to bear in humanitarian crises and, short of literal genocide (a word way too loosely thrown around lately), that is how it should be. That’s why no U.S. or other external force has been used in Congo, for example, or in Ivory Coast, where there are good guys and bad guys no less clearly on view than is the case in Libya. If we take the President at his word, we should then expect force to be used in Congo and Ivory Coast (and maybe Syria, Bahrain, Yemen, etc., etc.) any day now, if there is UN sanction for it, because the situations are not different in kind from that in Libya. In all these cases tenured but non-democratic regimes are using deadly force against their political opponents. But if we need to overthrow an extremely dangerous regime that threatens the United States and its allies, as Qaddafi’s will be if he survives the present fight, we have to rely on political and diplomatic means to do that? Are you kidding? (This reminds me a little of the Democrats’ argument before the 1991 Gulf War that sanctions would change the Iraqi regime without war, when even a victorious war failed to achieve that end.) This is madness. It is down the rabbit hole all the way to Shanghai.
[27] You think?
[28] You think? Thanks for admitting it. Libya can remain dangerous even after he is gone, too, as my March 22 essay describes.
[29] Yes, it will. Who will police it? Who will pay for it? Who will get UN authorization for it? You are not volunteering American power and money for this, I see; indeed, your diplomatic body language points in rather the other direction. So who, then? The Mad Hatter and his friends?
[30] That is really disingenuous. Most of those opposed to this intervention from the get-go, including your own Defense Secretary and National Security Advisor, are asking you to justify it in national security terms, and to connect military means to political ends. You’re trying to make all those who question the wisdom of this intervention look like isolationists. That is so foul, sir.
[31] Again, conjecture, but not wholly unreasonable conjecture, granted.
[32] It does not follow that whatever happens in Libya will affect what happens in other Arab countries. The regime in Bahrain, for example, is fighting for its life in a zero-sum sectarian conflict. It has to act as though existential stakes are at risk, because in fact they are. The idea that the Al-Khalifa might act differently if Qaddafi loses power in Libya is a fantasy. Rather the same goes for what’s happening in Yemen, Syria and the rest of the region.
[33] This is really rich. This argument, almost verbatim, is what the Bush Administration said about Iraq. At the time Senator Obama ridiculed this claim. Now he makes it, pertaining to a case in which a much lesser threat to American interests is involved—a least so it seemed before the WMD fear was proven to be mostly unfounded.
[34] A joke, right, sir? If a military operation fails to get rid of him, you think UN talkfests will? Why don’t I feel like laughing?
[35] It already has since we’ve already obviously crept (I use the word advisedly) way beyond the “protect civilians” phase. See note 22 above, about the Arab League and the Russians. Love that re-set, don't we now?
[36] We will not escape these costs; having started this war, we will have no choice but to end it if someone else can’t.
[37] Yes, that is how it should be. But what if it doesn’t turn out that way? Where’s your Phase IV planning, sir? Where’s anything but your best-case analysis?
[38] This, from the Niebuhrian Nobel Peace Prize speech, is right. Several articles in the forthcoming issue of The American Interest (by Jim Thomas, Kori Schake and others) make this argument. But as used here, this is a neon red herring. You talk like other Administrations wished to act alone when they did not need to. That’s simply false.
[39] Now the President is essentially quoting Condoleezza Rice’s “birth pangs of a new era” remark. So it’s not enough that his policy is one that qualifies as Paul Wolfowitz-lite; the language has to mimic Condoleezza Rice? Somebody pinch me, please; this is all a little hard to take.
[40] Again, it remains to be seen what the Arab street really wants, and can get. I have an open mind about the young people twittering themselves into a revolutionary fervor these days—God bless them. Obviously, things have changed in the Arab world. The word democracy was unintelligible to most Arabs just a decade or so ago; a loan word in Arabic, it meant “good governance” very generally and vaguely. It meant not the thugs and thieves we have now. It had no meaning in the Western procedural sense. Maybe now it does. That’s good, and certainly the United States must never betray or abandon true democrats. But it is not a foregone conclusion that they represent anything like a majority in any Arab country, even Egypt or Tunisia, or that they can prevail over the forces of non-democratic continuity in those places and others. The Middle Eastern country arguably closest to an understanding and yearning for true democracy along the lines that we understand it is Iran—not an Arab country and obviously in a difficult and very different situation.
[41] It is as unwise to use the word “faith” here as it was for George W. Bush once to use the word “crusade.” When this speech is translated into Arabic and traditional folk read it, they will read “faith” out of Obama’s mouth as Christianity. That will not be good.
[42] Again with the red herring. This is a Trotskyite rhetorical tactic—to associate those who disagree with you to the far outer fringe of some position they do not in fact hold. The idea that anyone who disagrees on prudential grounds with this military intervention is an isolationist is really beyond the pale. It is downright insulting.
[43] All I can say after listening to and reading this strategically incoherent statement is that I hope that you, Mr. President, are an effectual and necessary hypocrite, that you are once again, as you admitted doing before during the Egyptian crisis, speaking out of both sides of your mouth. You care about coalition maintenance, and about appearing virtual and noble (or Nobel--spell it however you like). Well, fine; that’s politics, I guess. As my friend, Kenyon professor Fred Baumann, brilliantly put it, you are expert at practicing “diplomacy as vanity,” seeming to care more about how things look than about how they really are. Still, I cannot bring myself to believe that you would really trust diplomacy and sanctions alone to oust Qaddafi if he looks to survive the present phase of this war. That would be roughly as irresponsible as having started the war in the first place. I am obviously not privy to what you have been saying to Admiral Mullen and General Ham at Africom. I just hope that the ceaseless beating the Libyans are taking from the air, even in places where no “civilians” are or have ever been at risk from regime forces, is on your order. And I hope we get lucky and it turns the trick. But if it doesn’t, you, sir, are not going to be redeemed by this or any other speech.
