They won't retain power (and probably won't retain their lives) if Ghaddafi loses.  Not to mention that most of them are handpicked True Believers.

I'm just glad Obama isn't very good at this kind of thing.  Unlike Bush's, Obama's sham coalition is falling apart already.

I was so relieved by your link -- apparently this is the first bombing campaign in history to incur zero civilian casualties, according to Mike Mullen's crystal ball.  Amazing!

Let's go with your assumption that the real objective is regime change.  What to do then, if the Libyan military actually does go with a cease fire,  and retreats into the center of the towns they currently firmly hold?

It's relatively easy (as was demonstrated today) to destroy convoys crossing a desert.  What's the plan, then, when the only convoys out in the open are rebels, and the only way for the US/UK/France to directly go after Qaddafi's troops is to violate the cease fire ourselves, and start unprovoked bombing of downtown areas?

The whole "plan", if you can call it that, depended on the idea that a bit of air cover would be enough for the rebels to win easily.  There's still some hope that's the case,  but hope is not a plan.  At the very least, I believe our involvement (to accomplish regime change) would at least require supplying the rebels with heavy weaponry so they can do their own slaughtering; but past experience shows that heavy weapons usually come with various "advisors" and "trainers" who tend to end up involved in combat.

The adult response is that there exists at least one Republican who theoretically could have been worse, therefore, STFU.

The best in the thread. Every word rings true.

The justification offered for the Kissinger era was that something huge was a stake - the possibility of Soviet domination of the entire globe, effectively eliminating democracy from the earth.  Even then it was overstated, but at least it was plausible.  None of our current enemies pose an existential threat,  and there's no reason to act like they do.

On your first line: I think there is a chance of Libya turning into a quagmire.  Not of Iraq/Afghanistan proportions,  but very possibly in the Somalia/Beirut category.

Hank, you don't think this is an intervention for reasons of oil, do you? If you wanted a reliable source of oil you'd just let Gaddafi win. Oil is fungible... as long as it's getting into the market, it's affecting the price lower. By prolonging the conflict, we're prolonging the uncertainty.

You have to cast your cynicism aside for a minute and recognize that sometimes we do intervene for idealistic reasons. That's what Somalia was. That's what this is. Samantha Power is not Exxon's puppet; she's an idealistic woman who cares about human rights and self-determination. Is she wrong? Is she misguided in this case. Maybe. But you have to argue the facts, not cast aspersions on the motivations of a class of people and leave it at that.

The "foreign policy establishment" didn't make the decision to push the button on a 100-plus cruise missiles exploding on foreign soil. Barack Obama did that, without even the barest of a nod to Congress. You should at least be honest with yourself and acknowledge where the buck stops. The president you voted for did this, breaking a pledge in the process.

.

what more do you need?  Remember this?

[quote]“I’m convinced that the collapse of the Communist house almost
everywhere has even, in certain cases, had the unexpected side effect
of wiping out the traces of its crimes, the visible signs of its
failure, allowing certain people to start dreaming once again of an
unsullied Communism, uncompromised and happy.”

If this is not precisely true, even of those nostalgic for “Fidel,” apologetic about Hugo Chávez, credulous about how “secular” the Baath Party was, or prone to sympathize with Vladimir Putin
concerning the “encircling” of his country by aggressive titans like
Estonia and Kosovo and Georgia, still it does contain a truth.[/quote]

This is [url=http://www.bernard-henri-levy.com/what-can-we-do-for-the-young-libyan-revolution-the-huffington-post-20110306-16620.html]Levy on Libya.[/url]  No doubt he will be all over the airwaves soon.

[quote]3. Failing that, again, they request the destruction or in any case
the long-distance jamming of transmission systems that alone, as in all
modern warfare, make it possible for the Libyan military to operate,
even if it’s falling to pieces. “What?” Abdeljalil Mohamed Mayuf,
director of the Arab Gulf Oil Company, said to me, at the hotel where
we dined, watching the members of the international press corps try to
make their PCs, portables, and other Turayas work. “Do you mean to tell
me that Mohamed Gadhafi, the dictator’s eldest son, is capable, through
the pathetic ‘General Communications Authority’ he heads, of paralysing
your computers and preventing me from phoning my family members in
Tripoli? And that the American fleet, stationed in the Gulf of Sirte,
would not have the means to put the Father’s instruments out of
commission and ground the planes? What a joke!”

4. All of them ask as well for a concerted action on the part of the
African regimes (but also, the Serbian and Ukranian ones) who tolerate
the shameful traffic that allows these regiments of mercenaries that
make up, I repeat, the mass of the official army, the leftovers of
which I have seen at the Egyptian border attempting to melt into the
throngs of Bangladeshi refugees fleeing the chaos, to be dumped on
Libyan soil. This demand is addressed in particular to France. It is
addressed to Great Britain, whose influence in Kenya one can presume.
But it is addressed even more to France, the country that carries
considerable weight in other African countries that supply these
professionals of death and that remains, moreover, the homeland of
human rights for all of the Libyans I met. “I don’t very well
understand,» Abdulatif Gebril, professor of French in a country where
the teaching of language, in particular French, has long been outlawed,
his voice trembling with emotion, “how an advisor of your president”
(Henri Guaino) “accompanied by an ambassador of France” (whom I cannot,
on the other hand, identify) could still “pass last Christmas” in
Tripoli. “But it’s never too late to make up for it! Use your
French-speaking world to convince your friends in Lomé and N’Djamena
that they are the accomplices of a new slave trade—and you will be
absolved.”[/quote]

....to be a good day. :^)

in Libya. Basically, as go the tribes, so goes the country, and no stable governing coalition is going to function without the support of the small but powerful Gaddafi tribe and its larger allies including the Magarha.

One implication is that "decapitating" the regime is unlikely to remove current & former regime supporters from political power & relevance. There can be no equivalent of de-Baathification in Libya, and either the country will split, or some compromise with what's left of the regime will be worked out.

I see why you like the site, especially the comments.

As far as the five questions, actually anyone paying attention has been asking them.

...because in Kissinger's day explosives were delivered by free-falling bombs. And the Soviets did not generally use cruise missiles in Afghanistan.

So in terms of tons of TNT delivered to the target, Obama is a safe third, or at least second, and will be for some time.

IMO, the real reason is what I said at the end:  Low hanging fruit.   It looked easy,  and allies were putting pressure on us.

I agree with your  point that we don't have to be consistent - there is no obligation to address every human rights violation that is equal to or worse than Libya, just because we went into Libya.  

But for the same reason,  there was no obligation to go into Libya, and some of us don't believe in starting wars (or entering existing ones) unless there is something obligating us to do so.

Isn't that abundantly clear?