NO FLIES - ON US

As this is being written, US and British warships have launched over 100 missiles at Libyan anti-aircraft
systems and French fighter jets have been airborne creating a No-Fly Zone over Libyan air space – all this
in enforcement of a UN Security Council resolution to stop Colonel Moammar Qaddafi’s butchering of
his own people. But before the rockets fired, questions were already landing fast and furious about the
mission, dubbed by the Defense Department “Operation Odyssey Dawn.”

First, who is responsible here? Only hours after the assault began, the Obama Administration raced like
Olympic sprinters to deny any instigation by the United States. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made it
clear to the Washington Post that the US did not lead the operations or take any unilateral actions in any
way. The Post further reported that the US would turn over operations to its partners after the first
salvos. This is, after all, the same administration headed by a President who has been stung in recent
weeks for his seemingly endless rounds of golf, his intense concentration over his NCAA Tournament
brackets, his diligent attendance at big-money fundraising dinners, and – this weekend – a relaxing jaunt
to Rio. One would guess that he need not worry about being accused of leadership.

At any rate, we appear to have been dragged by our ankles, sobbing all the way, into defending Libyan
rebels with air strikes – which would have been a useful idea some three weeks ago before Col. Qaddafi
had erased hundreds of them off the face of the earth. Now the missiles screaming into the night from
US ships in the Mediterranean are more of a cruel irony than a defense. Coming so late to the cause, we
must ask: what if the rebels lose anyway? With the mighty western military riding to the rescue, would a
rebel defeat even be permitted? The United States has already denied that Qaddafi is being personally
targeted and President Obama has been scrupulous to avoid the term “regime change,” but would it be
possible for these operations to end with Qaddafi and his cohorts STILL in power? At that point, would
the United States have ANY standing left among the international community?

To avoid any or all of those questions, the Libyan rebels must succeed – but what will that mean? It has
been apparent for weeks that popular uprisings are occurring all over the Mideast, but there has been
lean comment about what is initiating them. Many of the uprisings are laced or even directed with
supporters of the kind of Sharia law favored in Iran. In the case of the Libyan rebels, many of them were
the same personnel who rushed into Iraq as insurgents to fight the United States some years ago. It is
not immediately clear that they are huddled masses yearning for freedom and democracy, but, more
likely, radical jihadists seeking to topple leaders they consider insufficiently fascist. Aside from that
minor complication, the kind of regime change needed in Libya is unlikely to arrive with a few well-
placed Tomahawk missiles. It will require the acquisition and holding of territory – and that will require
infantry. Without that, we are launching air strikes to effectively generate a power vacuum within a
country that has been on the State Department’s terrorism sponsorship list for more than thirty years.

These are impossible questions to answer – which is probably why jetting down to Rio is sounding better
all the time.