As is often noted, we all have a tendency to fight the previous war. Just as the ‘quagmire’ of Vietnam led to reluctance to intervene in Bosnia (at the cost of hundreds of thousands of lives), so too the successes of Kosovo led to the peremptory and ill planned interventionism of Iraq.
But Libya is not Iraq. As jubilant crowds fill Green Square, the fall of Tripoli to the rebels is a victory on many counts
It’s a fair point. As the sound of anti-craft fire combined with the distant crumps of explosions disturb the Libyan night, it’s a fair point: are we celebrating death? Are we cheering on exactly the same kind of indiscriminate slaughter which was unleashed in Vietnam and Cambodia, and more recently in Iraq? Democracy, founded on debate and dissent, should never try to silence those questions. It should ask them. Ask them of ourselves, and those in Government, or the Armed Forces, who seek to represent and defend us.
But for once, this isn’t about us. The uprisings in the Maghreb and Mashriq, the revolutions in the Arab World from Morocco to Yemen, Tunisia to Syria, have not been led by us. It’s a spring awakening, as important as 1968 or 1848.
Transcript from The Journeying Progressive’s speech today (downtown Kansas City, MO):
“Good afternoon. It is dark right now in the nation of Libya. For the past month, the world has watched a selfish dictator brutally suppress the protests of a people in crisis. Today, the United States and her allies have said “Enough.”
Though I understand the reservations about military action in any field, I felt a deep sense of relief when the UN Security Council voted through resolution 1973 last night UK time.
Why? Because in all the mess of the wars of choice in Iraq and Afghanistan, I always feared one of the casualties of those debacles would be the careful constructed Responsibility to Protect principle established after the genocide in Rwanda, and near genocide in Bosnia and Kosovo.
To me this isn’t about the right to wage war, but the responsibility to prevent it
We’ve seen calls for a no-fly zone from several fronts ~ both at home and abroad. It seems to be the favored form of intervention of British PM Cameron, US Senators McCain, Lieberman, and Kerry as well as any number of twitterers. We have seen calls for a no-fly zone in Libya, too, to be sure. On the flip side, Gaddafi has vowed to use whatever military he has to fight a no-fly zone.
Me? I don’t mind the idea (those three years I spent as a Data Processing Technician in the Navy made me a military expert) as long as the US does not take the lead. I firmly believe, as SoS Clinton has said recently, the UN and/or NATO and/or the Arab League should take the lead.
What I find intriguing are the thoughts of SecDef Gates who, as you know, is a holdover from the Bush Administration and former CIA deputy director for intelligence during the Reagan years.