“The goal of the United Nations-sanctioned military
action in Libya is to protect citizens, not regime
change -- but the goal of U.S. policy is that Moammar
Gadhafi "has to go."
From the above, there is no difference between Obama’s
position at this point, and Bush’s against Saddam
Hussein in 2003.
Sadam had to go, said Bush.
And Gadaffi had to go, said Obama.
Thus, the double standards have been made more obvious.
The only question is why?
If the UN is not for regime change in Libya then why is
Obama, in support of the same UN mandate, seeking to
remove Gaddafi?
I am not seeking to defend Gaddafi. But I am certainly
not throwing away my concern for first principles.
In both Iraq and Libya’s actions, the reasoning
behind the attempts is for geopolitical world
governance, hence the hypocrisy.
I
recall that the UN Security Council was not eager to
support George Bush in Iraq in 2003. Yet the whole
world knew at that time that Saddam was more brutal on
his citizens than any despot of this era, including
Gaddafi.
For Iraq, the UN conveniently forgot that the 2003
conflict was a continuation of the Gulf War of 1991, a
consequence of Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait and his
refusal to destroy or reveal the whereabouts of his
WMDs.
Obama, in his 2008 presidential campaign, based his
opposition to the Iraq war on a bumper sticker slogan,
“Saddam did not attack the US on 9/11.”
Interestingly, Gaddafi didn’t either.
Neither did he conceal his WMDs or took over a
neighboring country, but here we go, the bombs are
already falling on Libya – for humanitarian reasons!
For now, the world may be silent about how much of this
sudden awareness for liberty and human rights across the
Middle East may be due to the fall of Saddam Hussein.
Back then, we were supposed to believe that the Iraq war
was unjust. But now the one in Libya is just because of
the humanitarian threats posed by only Gaddafi and by no
rulers elsewhere.
Darfur, we must assume, is peaceful.
Somalia has
rebounded to normalcy, the noise in Yemen is only an
advert for tourism and Zimbabwe is now Obama’s version
of paradise. Of
course, now paradise is also found in North Korea or Sudan, all
because of Gaddafi's nefarious acts in Libya.
And the Ivory Coast, yes the Ivory Coast, the
once-beloved colony of the French, has already been
pulled back from the brink of civil war, as seen fit by
the French even though the reality is Ivory Coast is
burning and about to explode.
Humanitarian concerns do not apply in all of Africa,
except in Libya.
Just ask the French.
Genocide did not happen in Rwanda either.
The French, a major obstacle to the Bush doctrine in
Iraq, is now leading the EU charge against Libya. Their
planes were first to fly in with the bombing in Libya
and soon to take over the entire bombing campaign was
the US.
The irony is boundless. The US Congress had declared war
against Iraq before Bush carried out that mandate to its
logical conclusion.
But for Obama, the French, and others within the
UN, Bush was dead wrong.
There is not yet support in Congress for the war in
Libya.
But the Obama's administration, eager to enforce
the UN’s wish on Libya, is already at full throttle
against the weaker Gaddafi.
The brave
nations that sat out the war in Iraq are now the
aggressive promoters of the one against Gaddafi,
a far weaker foe than Saddam of Iraq was.
When the stronger Saddam was showering mustard gas on
his people, on a scale vastly horrendous than any act
seen before, the UN/US interventionist humanitarian
class did not work to support Bush.
When first principles are carried on thin wet paper, by
a body such as the UN and its western allies, the world
ends up suffering.
Obama has so far made his move on Libya look
opportunistic.
In opting for a quick withdrawal of US forces
from Iraq in 2009, he betrayed his hurry to rid himself
of a political hot cake.
But Libya is a different story.
He knew that the same audacity for action, as
exhibited by Bush in Iraq, against the weaker Libya can
assure favorable reelection results in 2012.
He has promised a quick act on Libya.
And “The United States will soon hand the
responsibility over to allies who will maintain a no-fly
zone over Libya,” he said gladly as the dominant leader
of the forces against Libya.
Republicans in the US are already asking questions:
“What happens after Qaddafi….Who will be in charge then,
and who pays for this all?” The Wall Street Journal
reported.
Bush broke the pot in Iraq, owned the re-construction
cost to the delight of the opposition. There will be
similar costs in Libya.
The UN and the western allies must be held
accountable for what may happen there.
The French, who have no stomach for lengthy wars, will
presumably take charge of the war effort after Obama
departs from Libya.
Eagerly lusting for lost heroism, they will assert
themselves on the already bludgeoned Libya by the
Americans.
Then can be restored to the French, the lost heroism in
past wars and interventions: WWII, the Suez, Vietnam,
Algiers, and lately Rwanda.
The UN charter that forbids interference in the internal
affairs of a sovereign nation, will be another victim of
an abandoned first principle.
If the UN had supported the forceful removal of Saddam,
it would have established an agreement for concerted
action against despots like Gaddafi. Had that been the
case, Gaddafi could probably have gotten the message
quicker, as he did with the voluntary surrender of his
WMD pile, the minute the bombs started falling on Iraq.
E. Ablorh-Odjidja, Publisher www.ghanadot.com,
Washington, DC, March 23, 2011
Permission to publish:
Please feel free to publish or
reproduce, with credits, unedited.
