Libya Needs Cancer of Gaddafi Removed, But U.S.

More Slasher Than Surgeon

By Ian Williams, March 18, 2011

The Security Council voted late Thursday by 10 votes to zero, but with five abst
entions, for a resolution that authorized military action to protect civilians.
The resolution included many understandable reservations and cautions, bearing i
n mind the US record. Not least it precluded foreign occupation.
We can accept that a patient with a brain tumour might desperately need surgery,
but there is still cause for alarm if Jack the Ripper offers to operate. Both m
ethod and motive are open to question.
So while no person with a conscience wants Gaddafi to win his sanguinary battle
of repression against his own people, there are more than enough doubts that the
US is the appropriate specialist to call. However, like Jack the Ripper - they
do have the knives. We should avoid the reflexive binary positions both of thos
e who support any intervention in an Arab country and those who equally obdurate
ly oppose any intervention by any Western power, anywhere.
In fact, ever since the 2005 General Assembly when Kofi Annan steered the UN Gen
eral Assembly into accepting that that the Security Council’s remit over threats t
o peace and security extended to what was happening inside sovereign nations, th
ere is legal grounds for Security Council intervention.
There is clearly present need, unless the world is prepared to stand by and watc
h massacres of disloyal Libyans. And of course, one of the problems with the US
as a self-appointed instrument in this case is that Washington seems neutral abo
ut not dissimilar events in Bahrain, Yemen or even in Gaza, preferring to arm th
e perpetrators and provide some measure of diplomatic protection. The sudden US
rediscovery of Libyan tyranny is also somewhat problematic, as indeed are its pr
evious military attacks on Libya.
Susan Rice, the US Ambassador to the UN spoke eloquently, and from her previous
record, probably sincerely, about the need for intervention. However, a few week
s before she had with deep insincerity cast a veto expressing her own and Americ
an opinion on Israel’s repression and breaches of international law in the West Ba
nk!
Even accepting the motive, method is a problem. Consistently in Iraq, Afghanista
n and elsewhere, the US has shown a predilection for high technology ariel warfa
re and shown a propensity to risk civilian life rather put its own military at r
isk. Even in Kosovo, which most of the locals consider gratefully to have been
a “good” war, President Clinton’s refusal to countenance ground forces or risk America
n casualties by bombing from below 15,000 feet incurred unnecessary casualties
and eroded international support, while not frightening Serb leader Milosevic in
the slightest.
In Libya, it might be different. Clearly identifiable columns of government forc
es trailing along the few passable roads along the coast would make an easily id
entifiable targets. But US over-caution, in wanting to take out Libya’s negligible
air defences before acting could easily involve serious mistakes and casualties
. No one who saw the WikiLeaks video of the helicopter gunning down journalists
in Baghdad is going take the sensitivity of the US military for granted. We do n
ot want Benghazi destroyed to save it.
On the positive side, decisive intervention would send a clear message to Gaddaf
i’s forces, largely one might presume motivated by fear of reprisals from the regi
me that there were speedier and worse consequences than that, or indeed an event
ual trip to International Criminal Court in The Hague.
As to motive, one of the reasons that Russia has been reluctant to consider a mi
litary option, apart from its own bugbears like Chechnya, has been Foreign Minis
ter Sergei Lavrov’s personal experience of American arrogance in times past. Mosco
w supported intervention against Iraq after the invasion of Kuwait, and then as
UN Ambassador he was consistently snubbed and humiliated by the US and UK as the
y pursued the resolutions, the sanctions, the air strikes and the rest, far beyo
nd the intention of the resolutions or the will of the majority of the Security
Council.
So, immediate surgery is needed. It would be best to find a more trusted surgeon
, but if Jack the Ripper has the only scalpels, what do you do?
Just before the vote I suggested that there are two elements that should be cons
idered in any such UN resolution, both to get Russian and maybe even Chinese sup
port, and to reassure many others around the world.
The first is to ensure a sunset clause. Any mandate for military action should h
ave precise limitations both about the nature of operations and a time limit. It
should return to the Council within days or weeks for a renewal of authority. S
econdly, there is a need to ensure that there is some element of shared control
over operations. After the Rwanda and Srebrenica debacles no one, including the
UN Secretariat itself, would or should entrust this task to international civil
servants. But a subcommittee of the Security Council, or even a revival of the
long somnolent UN Military Staff Committee, of representatives of the Permanent
Five members should provide some reassurance against irrational exuberance on th
e part of the Pentagon. The machinery is there just waiting reactivation. Indee
d the Pentagon has a Military Staff Committee whose purpose is to liaise with th
e UN body.
It is possible that these might have averted some of the abstentions, but certai
nly the language of the resolution, invoking constant reporting to and monitorin
g by the Security Council and the Secretary General, averted the otherwise inevi
table vetoes. Ban Ki Moon’s principled stands on the region’s regimes over the last
few months, for which he has had insufficient credit, suggests he will certainly
take the job seriously.
Those who are opposed to intervention on principle will of course continue to do
so. But the Libyan opposition, who have asked for help, are the ones who will p
ay the price for others’ high-mindedness. Pragmatic mandates could help.