The President’s Call
Last evening President Obama outlined why he order American assets used in military strikes on Libya. The morning after the news media is assessing how effective his speech was.
We all know President Obama is a sports fan. In most sports, there are referees or umpires. Someone to judge whether the play or action that had just taken place was within the rules.
“You’re out” (!), screams the first base umpire raising his arm with his thumb extended. “Charge on number 3” (!), yells the referee rotating his waist forward and the pointing at number 3.
When these plays are clear cut, no one takes notice. When they are close, it is all about how these officials sell the call. In a way President Obama was trying last evening to sell his call on attacking Libya.
With no attack on Americans or American interests, and no imminent threat posed towards America, the decision to attack fits the definition of a bad call. Of course most of us would also want America to stand against the slaughter of innocent civilians.
So does this make it a close call? The problem is that attacks on civilians happens almost every day someplace in the world. How does one draw the line?
The President elaborated other contributing reasons.
- No unilateral action. The President sought first a consensus of involved countries. He tied these together with a UN resolution.
- Chance for cease fire. Before any attacks were made, the coalition sought a cease fire agreement with Kadafi and the Libyan government. Had the Kadafi accepted a cease fire, no armed intervention was to take place. (This requires belief since events went down another road,)
- No US troops on the ground. The President promised that the US leadership role would be temporary and would involve no use of American ground military units. No occupation by the US.
As usual it was Defense Secretary Robert Gates who said it like it is on Sunday. Gates responded when asked is Libya a vital interest of the US, “no, it is not vital but we do have interests in Libya and we do have vital interests in Middle East and Libya is part of the Middle East… “
The President’s speech seems to indicate that he may have learned from the foolish and wasteful invasion and occupation of Iraq. The next few days and weeks will reveal whether President Obama’s nuanced move on another Middle East country was the right call or not.
For now, and considering the additional turmoil in Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Bahrain, and Yemen, I think the President made the right call in a very close play.
This entry was posted on March 29, 2011 at 10:14 am and is filed under Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Iraq War, Politics, Republican Party. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments.
Tags: congress, gaddafi, kadafi, libya, Middle East, Robert Gates
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March 29, 2011 at 10:26 am
“For now, and considering the additional turmoil in Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Bahrain, and Yemen, I think the President made the right call in a very close play.” Are you now calling for the President to send out troops into all those other countries? and if not, what makes Libya different?
Libya posed no threat to us and has not attacked US interests in decades. This is clearly a case of Obama using the American military to enforce foreign interests. We are now more of a UN military branch than ever before.
March 29, 2011 at 10:34 am
mcoville, I completely disagree. Qaddafi forced the issue, we had no choice but to respond. My question remains: What was the alternative?
March 29, 2011 at 11:19 am
Kurt, I can understand your opinion, I just do not think this is as simple as Qaddafi used force… He has used force and worse for many years, why now?
March 29, 2011 at 11:26 am
Mcoville, thanks for commenting… the Middle East is experiencing a lot of popular dissent against long standing autocratic regimes… Despite this, the people are ill equipped to take on democracy. But civil war or falling under greater influence from Iran could disrupt the flow of oil and that would in turn bring the world’s economy to a halt (for a while)…
In bad situations, it is sometimes wise to take the less “bad” options… slowing the pace of change without shutting it off may be Obama’s strategy…