Did We Give Up on Libya?

[Geee]

National Review:


President Obama has announced that America will stop attacking Col. Moammar Qaddafi’s forces in Libya. He instead hopes that others can force Qaddafi out — or that the dictator will leave because of economic and diplomatic pressure.

It will apparently be up to NATO to finish the war — without direct American combat participation. The relieved Obama administration had never quite explained what the mission was in the first place — or for whom and for what we were fighting. Was the bombing to stop the killing, to help the rebels, to remove Qaddafi, or to aid the British and French, who both have considerable oil interests in Libya?

Were we enforcing just a no-fly zone, establishing a sort-of-no-fly zone with occasional attacks on ground targets, or secretly sending in American operatives on the ground to work with rebels? Did the Obama administration go well beyond the Arab League and United Nations resolutions by trying to target Qaddafi for a while and ensure that the rebels won? If so, did anyone care? Was the administration ever going to ask for congressional approval — at a time when we are running a $1.6 trillion annual budget deficit and have about 150,000 troops committed in Afghanistan and Iraq? Was Libya a greater threat to our national security than Syria or Iran, or a greater humanitarian crisis than Congo or the Ivory Coast? Are our new allies, the rebels, Westernized reformers, Islamists, or both — or neither?

The abrupt abandonment of hostilities after about two weeks has set an American military precedent. True, the United States once lost a big war in Vietnam. It also decided not to finish a war with Islamic terrorists in 1983 after Hezbollah operatives blew up 241 U.S. military personnel in their Beirut barracks. In 1993, a few months after the “Black Hawk Down” mess in Mogadishu, President Clinton quietly withdrew American troops from Somalia.

[Pepper]

Geee

 

 

Obama sets a new Standard on Wars!

 

1. Call it Kinetic Military Action instead of Wars.

2. Only pick on people who you know you can beat.

3. Don't go through Congress, instead rely on the UN and NATO to diminish the role of the US as a defender of Peace through strong military force.

5. Do not define the goal. But if you are forced to do so, then redefine it each day. Send out your sock puppets with conflicting stories. Keep your enemies as well as your friends puzzled.

6. Pull out before the job is done.

7. When the dust is settled, declare it a victory no matter how messy.