The war of attrition in Libya
Monday, March 7, 2011 at 10:23PM 
Watching the news, if this goes down and Qaddafi survives, we will have so much blood on our hands.
At its most basic: very evil leader, people putting it on the line, and we stand by on a very vulnerable regime. This is a 6-7m population, all along the coast. This isn't Iran - not even close.
Don't care about the framework (NATO, UN, whatever), because, in the end, it'll be us that leads the way.
I'm with Ajami on this one: a "moment of reckoning for the Obama administration." Pledging humanitarian aid won't be enough. Obama will regret this like Clinton regretted Rwanda. Time for Mrs. Clinton to earn her spurs.
We let this go down and we'll be hated anyway, and we hate ourselves for letting it happen. So what is the big difference? There will be no working with the guy after this anyway, so what is the downside? The Saudis hate him, because of the hit he tried on Abdullah.
We recognize the rebels. We supply them. We drone and fly aircraft in order to make it impossible for Qaddafi to win. We tell the Russians and Chinese this presents zero precedent for anything involving them.
We simply do what's right.
I realize it's no easy call for Obama, but at some point you need to move away from what you can't live with and toward something you can stand. Qaddafi, if he wins, will go on killing and torturing for a very long time.
Just about everybody needs outside help in these things. We did.
Reader Comments (15)
Stand-off jamming, B-2 bombers at night, precision munitions, crater some taxiways, destroy parked Migs and helicopters, get in, get out. This would not be Operations Southern Watch.
I appreciate your articulation of the situation because I believe your are exactly right on every point. I am extremely disheartened in the American response. By the time the hand wringing is done the opportunity to dispose of Qaddafy will have passed. This is the 3:00 AM phone call.
SecDef Gates was (to his great credit) made it clear that establishing a presence in Libya was basically an act of war due to the need to disable/destroy the Libyan air defense systems.
1. If we can't get the Europeans to lead on this one, do we form another "coalition of the willing," with all the negative baggage that term and approach brings in?
2. Is the US as a nation ready to take on yet another military endeavor that could turn into more Nation Building?
As I wrote elsewhere in your blog, I believe the Europeans can and should take lead on this, and we should also get contributions from the rest of the Arab world (e.g. Saudi F-15 and Qatari F-16???) But what can the US (Obama, Clinton, et.al.) do to force both Europe and Arab allies to actually get off their butts? Observing the European lack of response in the Balkans before US, frankly, unilateral involvement does not give me great hope for success here.
As much as I want to see Qaddafi gone, I'm not ready for yet another US military commitment. I don't have the strong opposition to 'go it alone' that others do. It's just, as I wrote earlier, "we're kinda busy" and I don't think we can afford it.
Agree that there are a lot of f--k them up things we can do at very low cost and no boots on the ground. Getting arms to them, that we could do through third parties (Saudis? Egyptians?) for a price.
If the rebels are correct and there is some chance of deal with Qaddafi (which I tend to doubt), we may not have to push all that long. We just need to create strategic despair on his side, while avoiding it on the rebels' side.
One thing to crush demonstrations in your country, but this is civil war where half the country has fallen to the opposition and we're on the record as wanting this guy gone--bad.
I just think you have to follow through on that, if you want to play the Leviathan, and deep down, we always will, no matter the fad--or the facts.
No actual occupation, no nation building requirement other than supporting UN effort, which we'd do if he fell, so not additional cost.
Time for action. A few more days of dithering will cause the opposition to become so weakened that the chance for change will be blown away on the winds out of the Sahara.
I had heard a report that the Saudis are already sending arms to the rebels. Given the historic hostility between Egypt and Libya, I'm not sure Egypt is a likely partner. It seems to me that the Aghan/Soviet model is the best one. Arm the rebels to the teeth (Israel via Saudi Arabia as a possible channel for arms shipments). Gaddafi is not the Soviet Union and he won't last long against well-armed rebels. I have to believe that Obama is smart enough to understand the consequences of saying "Gaddafi must go." Once you say that, you really have no alternative but to make it happen.
There are two ways to defeat Libya's air defenses--blow it up or be invisible to it.
If you ask others to take the lead on this it complicates the operational-level problem enough to make the option unattractive because they don't have low-observable aircraft. LO aircraft and precision weapons are a game changer here--they allow you to side-step a massive sustained attack that looks a lot like "going to war with Libya." And you can do it with negligible risk of losses.
With LO, you simply show up, deny Qaddifi the ability to employ his airpower by taking out taxiways and aircraft on the ground in a low-risk way, and then leave it to the rebellion to do the heavy lifting in a reasonably fair fight.
If he's foolish enough to repair the runways and launch aircraft the morning after the initial attack, then either crater the runways while his aircraft are airborne or turn Libya into an air-to-air training range for the F-22. It would all be over quickly and with finality--it would not be long and drawn out as an operational matter.
By creating ambiguity about US intentions, I suspect it would also accelerate events at the strategic level as well. He knows what we did in 1986 and he knows our aim is much better now.
I don't know what Qaddafi's WMD capabilities are, but that would change the calculus (if airstrikes provoked their use on citizens, the US could be accused as precipitating it).
Oh where is that legendary CIA of the 1950's? Think of all the governments we brought down...some even legitimate ones. Can't we just go into the archives and pull out one of the old op files? Guess not.
So...it comes down to us again. Not a single Arab nation willing (or able) to step in. No African country able (or inclined) to help. The Brits and the French, who messed up that part of the world, dither and talk. The Chinese scared to death, the Russians too busy stealing from each other, and India...just sits there.
The Saudis perhaps have studied the American revolution. They may have noted that the French King was so delighted to assist the American colonists against his English enemies that he failed to understand that the Americans were doing away with the monarchy...not just the English. Doing away with the monarchy turned out to be a very popular idea that spread to France a few short years later. Most of Europe followed and the Russians, although slow to catch up, finally murdered their royal family in a cellar.
Most of those Saudi princes have their own planes. It's not just a luxury in that part of the world.
Interesting piece from Victor Davis Hanson on the risks associated with US (and others) taking fairly absolute/aggressive positions on jerks like Qaddafi, but not backing those words: http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/261502/unacceptable-victor-davis-hanson
If I understand things correctly, the backbone of Qadaffi's forces at the moment are mercenaries. Would offering them a large enough payday for swapping sides or at least going home be a cheaper solution than killing them?
How much does it cost in legal risk (lawfare) and actual flight and munitions cost to kill one african mercenary? How much does it cost to pay him to go home?
I'm not so sure the most cost effective option of getting the job done is military in this case.
Interesting side note: The first known combat employment of an airplane took place over Libya during the Italo-Turkish war of 1911...
Personally, I don't think Obama is capable of making any of the decisions advocated here. I'm not even sure he's capable of processing them as decisions he ought to be making. He, like the Euros, will dither until it's too late (as he did with Egypt) and his "decisions" (more statements than decisions, really) are OBE.
This is what we get when we put a legislator with no leadership experience in an executive office.
I really have a hard time believing we would be able to tell the difference between friend and foe. Other than Qaddafi and his sons do we have any idea who is a loyalist and who is a rebel? Taking out air defenses will also mean taking out anti-aircraft batteries in the hands of rebels, surely resulting in unintended deaths. It won't be pretty, not in the least bit.
We are not not only facing the question, whether America and the other NATO states should engage, but whether they are able to actively take part in the Lybian-conflict from a financially point of view.
Secretary Gates recently said, that America cannot afford to wage another war, simply because the US lacks the financial resources.
Mr. Barnett is a great strategic thinker and to a great extent I also support his visions on removing hostile regimes and building democracies in the Non-Integrating gap.
Only the question, how that should financially be affordable, still remains unanswered.
Libya was doing more and more business with the outside world and though they had a dictator things were improving there. If Qaddafi wins this country will be a complete gap country with no path (for a long time) to the core.
Russian and China will veto this at the security council level so we need to just act on the no fly zone and supplying / advising the rebels.
Ironically, I believe Libya was doing a large amount of business with Russia.
In short I think I agree with everything you said.
Thanks,
Brian