My prayers for the world. Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi dead. Question for America now what? Greed is a bitch. Take care of America first before you go seeking property of others.
World Love and Peace
US involvement in Libya saves lives
Originally Published: 03/29/11 8:04pm |Modified: 03/29/11 8:05pm | 8 comments
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The American involvement in the international intervention in Libya is drawing a lot of negative attention. A Gallup Poll conducted last monday found only 47 percent of Americans approve of the military role the U.S. is playing in the campaign; 37 percent flat out disapprove.
This is the lowest approval rating Gallup has reported for any American military action in the last 30 years, going back to President Ronald Reagan’s jaunt into Grenada in 1983. In contrast, the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq had 90 percent and 76 percent approval ratings, respectively.
More Americans should approve of the military action against Libya. The intervention is the closest thing to a “humanitarian war” the U.S. has participated in for almost its entire history. Here we have a clear-cut case of a maniacal dictator carrying out a violent, systematic military campaign against his own people.
I understand there are material (read: oil) concerns for the nations taking part in the intervention — more so the European nations than the U.S. However, the existence of material concerns for the intervention, even as primary or secondary motivators, should not make us ignore the positive effects of the bombing campaign.
Muammar Gaddafi’s forces, which had been busying themselves lobbing shells indiscriminately into rebel-held towns — killing at least 8,000 people according to the transitional government in Benghazi — have been stopped.
The airstrikes and missile attacks have helped negate Gaddafi’s technological and equipment advantages over the rebels, paving the way for a successful drive west by the rebels.
As of Sunday morning, there was news the rebels had retaken the key cities of al-Brega and Ras Lanuf — providing observable evidence of just what the United Nations, or U.N./NATO intervention is enabling.
As it stands now, the intervention appears to be working. We can look to a previous intervention (and lack thereof) for guidance about what to do in Libya.
In the 1990s, as Yugoslavia was falling apart and the Balkans degenerated into a bedlam of ethnic cleansing and massacres, NATO and the U.N. stood by hemming and hawing at the corpses piling up on their doorstep.
The four-year siege of Sarajevo tragically represents the length and magnitude of the region’s suffering. The conflict in the former Yugoslavia was extended unnecessarily by the international community’s inaction; the mass graves and scorched villages remain as silent monuments to this fact.
When powerful nations finally got involved in 1995 with an extensive bombing campaign against Bosnian Serb forces, the military capability of the Serb forces was reduced significantly and the conflict came to a conclusion soon after.
Although the agreements and divisions following the intervention are deserving of criticism, the events in Yugoslavia have shown us decisive military action against genocidal and repressive forces can be successful, at least in the short term.
There is such a thing as the right side in a war. That side is the human side — that which protects innocent people and fights for liberty and justice. Even if these ends are side effects of a materially motivated act, they still are good. It is the obligation of powerful nations to protect the people who are being repressed and murdered by their leaders.
What the intervening countries need to concern themselves with is keeping up the campaign, lessening or widening the scope of the intervention as needed and allowing what happens in Libya to remain natural and endogenous.
Last Saturday, I attended a discussion on the events in Egypt and the Middle East. Eventually, the discussion turned to the Libyan intervention. Juan Cole, a professor of history from the University of Michigan, was one of the speakers.
Although he was referring specifically to hesitance about the intervention in the minds of leftists, I think one thing he said can be applied more broadly. He said we must not let our aversion to imperialism — and seeing all Western military action as such — blind us to the humanitarian potential of the intervention in Libya.
I hope my fellow Americans will not ignore the positive potential in the Libyan intervention if it is carried out properly.
Matt Korovesis is a State News guest columnist and a political science and Russian senior. Reach him at koroves1@msu.edu.
My question is Libya's new government better for the people and what is the future of Libya's interaction with the United States? I want to know. . .
How are we the United States of America able to mandate, maintain guidance over foreign countries when America is in dire straits. Poverty, Racism, Unemployment and will the rallies enlightened the politicians to change government that currently exist.
Lepadah
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