The illegal war in Libya

[Sea Skimmer]

And I got to say I really love how many people wanted the US to loose in Iraq once the invasion was an established reality. That’s always been a great demonstration of how so many people in the world have no more or often far less caring about the people US military action affects then the US itself does. The idea that 20 million plus people in perpetual chaos is better then the US winning while looking like a fool is sickening and plain stupid. But that’s exactly what many people think is ‘right’, everyone is a pawn against the US. Right and wrong based on thinking like that is worthless. Blame the North Koreans for it all. The US certainly tried to go back to being isolationist after WW2.

[Thanas]

FWIW, I do not doubt that the removal of Ghaddafi is as legitimate as it can be according to international law and in my opinion he has deserved death several times over. My problems with it stem from the fact that this seems to be another president grabbing even more presidential power which the constitution does not, IMO, give him a right to.

[Sea Skimmer]

No I’m sorry, the War Powers Act is bullshit that has always been ignored, and US military action has been taken literally dozens and dozens of times before and after it without explicit Congressional approval, including outright occupations of several nations and US involvement in for example the rather large Korean War. So precedent is overwhelmingly in favor of Obama and precedent has always been a major part of constitutional interpretation.

Commander in chief is not a term one would normally ever interpret as ‘subject to collective veto’, and Obama is not taking any new power at all by doing this. The US congress has some of our better known idiots complaining about it, and that’s it, and a reason exists for that. Also the Republicans hound Obama for everything no matter how legal or trivial, and they’ve been pretty quiet in total, though part of this is because in all reality the budget crisis is far more important to them. Congress will always have the power to block specific military action after the fact by enacting specific spending legislation to block any money from being spent on it, if they can agree a budget! If all military action required congressional approval then this would mean that the US could not even fire ABM missiles at an incoming ICBM attack when we have under 30 minutes time to work with. Sound like a rational policy? I mean hell, during the Cold War the US congress passed laws which enabled WW3 to be launched by personal who were not even members of the government but rather military officers, provided that the government was smoking vapor first. This is not a very good basis to claim congress alone has the power to employ military force. Congress has already claimed it can pass that power on to third parties! If you can get away with calling Korea a police action, well, Libya looks WAY closer to world policemen then fighting a war with a million combatants at any given

Now the complaints about Obama speaking so little on the matter, those are legitimate because its just not presidential or what we reasonably can and should expect, and its that silence and have largely fed the complaints about the lack of congressional approval.

[K. A. Pital]

I guess you missed how Mubarak and Ben Ali didn’t massacre as many people as possible?

I already said that objective evidence and death tolls which are not produced by any of the parties to the Libya conflict are required to make a judgement on "how many" people were actually "massacred". Reliable death tolls will come after the war. And calling deaths of armed rebels civilian casualties is likewise wrong.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties ... _civil_war
From what I see here, the casualties are quite low, considering that it's an actual war. There is also no proof that a significan share of the casualties are civilians, not rebel soldiers, mutineers and armed insurgents. Needless to remind, the civilian casualties of the civil wars in post-Soviet nations were far greater despite the civil wars being quite short.

So pardon me if I don't entirely buy the "massacre" bit and the "black and white war" mantra. I have that tendency after Yugoslavia, you know.

Nor was either of them openly a raving lunatic while and both left relatively quickly. Yeah that looks like a difference to me.

The leader of your own nation before Obama was a raving lunatic, too. How does being a raving lunatic earn you a special place on the World Policemen's "Kill List", anyway? By that logic, you should have already killed Chavez regardless of whether he is good or bad. The current leaders of Russia are not raving lunatics, but they are evil. Now what? Oh yeah, Russia has nuclear weapons, and the leaders are not going anywhere any time soon. Let's forget about it. Overthrowing Kuchma in Ukraine is perfectly well (fogetting for a moment the nationalist, almost neo-nazi lunatic who came in his wake), but let's forget about Russia entirely. Or let's sponsor whatever right wing forces they have, because right wingers everywhere are natural allies of the USA. Because they will, economically, take the US pills for every illness. The ravings don't matter how bad or good a leader is. Krushev was raving, compared to Stalin's calm behavior, after all.

Killing a bunch of US and British citizens is certainly part of it, and reopening relations with Qaddafi was never exactly popular with the US or British population at large either, but as I have said before, rebuffing his offer to abandon chemical weapons would have been just stupid, and the US has been long criticized for long embargoes. I guess being consistent in a policy is bad too hun?

Being consistent in policy is good, except the US is never the consistent one. Today it gives chemical weapons to Saddam, the next day they hang him on the lamp post. Today they give Sukharto weapons to conduct the biggest genocide in recent history, the next day they are all sorry-ass about it, but no one gives a flying shit. Today they say "self-determination of nations" is a paramount rule and push through the independence of Kosovo, the next day they say Georgia's territorial integrity is sancrosanct after the latter shells South Ossetian capital with Russian peacekeepers still there. Today they trade with Gaddafi, tomorrow they bomb him. Today they give weapons to Bin Laden to fight the Empire of Evil (TM), the next day they invade Afghanistan to get rid of Bin Laden... or help Afghani drug trade, or something else. Keep embargo of the USSR, open doors to China. Keep embargo of Cuba, but no embargoes for Mubaraks, Pinochets... even Quaddafis, if the latter bark in the right direction. Your state is a hypocritical piece of shit like all Great Powers (TM), and it has lost any and all right to claim any "consistency" in "policy".

As for British and US citizens, oh, I'm gonna cry. We're talking about the same nations who and whose client states opressed the Middle East for decades. Like I said, if the only thing that makes Qaddafi different is the fact he killed Westerners, it's the same personal bullshit which made America go after Saddam.

Yes it does, of course it does so in large part because Qaddafi has been paranoid about radical Islam threatening his regime. But that very fact that Libya is established somewhere is what makes intervention useful. Libya doesn’t need nation building, or civilizing, it just needs Qaddafi gone.

Yeah - his minister of interior, who is one of the leaders of the insurgency, is clearly the good guy here. Suddenly the person who was running Quaddafi's police is a Knight In Shining Armor. Just like some of those Knights in Shining Armor from Mubarak's government who quickly sided with the rebels, hoping to lead the rebellion to a Brave New World (TM) where they'd take Mubarak's place. And this will clearly change Libya for the better. Not the complete and utter eradication of the former government - if it was so bad and corrupt, you should erase all the traces of said corruption to get any positive result, you know.

My main problem with Iran has always been that they have similar irrational characters at the top. Take them away and I think the rest of society would eventually sort itself out, certainly it would have an increased ability to try.

Strange. I thought it doesn't matter if the leaders are "irrational", it is important that they look out for the well-being of their own nation. A rational person who doesn't work in the best interests of his nation is worse. But, considering there's another concept of the world, that which revolves around the interests of the First World nations (for whom it truly matters not how Dark Age the Iranian regime might be, what matters is if it can be reasoned with, because it has oil)... Yeah. I see your point. I just find it as laughable as your claim to any sort of consistency in America's policy.

Saudi is horrible, but if the people are going along with it to the extent that they do, then not much anyone can do about it rationally.

Giving new FN-FALs to people against Saudi theocracy can be a good beginning. Like in Libya. No? *laughs* Giving weapons is good when we're talking about Contras. Or Libyan rebels. Or whoever is good now for American interests. The House of Saud is not Qaddafi. They are horrible, but they are an ally. That's all that matters. America has no morality, none at all.

Now they complain that the US is not taking on three times as many people in a whole array of countries over protests that may or may not call for a government change in one of them… yeah that’s rational all right.

No, they're just exposing the hypocritical double standard that the US has, as always.

Saying the west is wrong no matter what it does is just as meaningless a statement as saying it is always right. In fact we all damn well know that people will bitch no matter what the west does, including doing nothing, and that the people who bitch about this bitch because they want that power for themselves. But it is amusing to see the complaining go on unchecked when everything is UN approved.

Arms shipments to rebels are not approved by the UN resolution, by the way. It is not a cheque blanque on everything, as you imply. But let me note that I didn't say "the West is always wrong". What I said that it's right by pure coincidence, when it's national interests (to stabilize Libya's oil shipments) coincides with the interests of a significant fraction of the people.

Anyway current events still don’t match the questionability of the UN Congo Intervention in 1960, which I might add was carried out almost completely by non western troops and followed on Soviet intervention.

I never said UN interventions were unquestionable. In fact, I have a deep slant against interventions in principle. Be they UN, US, Soviet, or whatever. They rarely end up producing a good end result.

The house of Saudi is far more politically astute, and repressive as it is the opposition simply never gains any traction. Saudi has not had a major internal rebellion since the 1970s and even that was localized as I recall. None of the leaders are raving lunatics. I’d love to see them toppled myself but the opportunity has never arisen.

Judging people by epatage is the worst thing to do. Himmler was hardly keen on epatage, as I recall. He was also smart, rational, etc. *laughs* That aside, the opposition doesn't get any traction because the West gives them no support. If it started openly giving them weapons and millions of dollars, they might get traction. Then again, perhaps someone else should give them money and weapons. The West is, after all, too busy with existing and possible future interventions all over the world.

[Sea Skimmer]

I already said that objective evidence and death tolls which are not produced by any of the parties to the Libya conflict are required to make a judgement on "how many" people were actually "massacred". Reliable death tolls will come after the war. And calling deaths of armed rebels civilian casualties is likewise wrong.

The mass defection of the regular army alone is a pretty good testament to the body count being significant. Its also just not that big a country, relative to population even 100 dead in Libya is a much higher ratio of death then the US suffered in the World Trade Center attack for example.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties ... _civil_war
From what I see here, the casualties are quite low, considering that it's an actual war.

Low compared to what? Egypt had about 300 people killed in 18 days, not all from government forces and with shitty hospitals, while that list indicates at least that many people died in three days in Benghazi in a nation with only about 15% as many people. The death toll would be far higher if they didn’t have good hospitals too. Thousands of wounded exist too, most of whom we can assume would have died in a place like Ivory Coast. But people tend to ignore the wounded in conflicts of all kinds anyway.

There is also no proof that a significan share of the casualties are civilians, not rebel soldiers, mutineers and armed insurgents. Needless to remind, the civilian casualties of the civil wars in post-Soviet nations were far greater despite the civil wars being quite short.

The Soviet Union also had 300 million people, I’d expect quite a few more to die if a war did break out. Also it’s a simple fact that short wars are short wars, what do you want the world to about them? The fact that they were for the most part short, and a in era in which information collection and distribution was so much more difficult isn’t very favorable to an intervention anyway.

So pardon me if I don't entirely buy the "massacre" bit and the "black and white war" mantra. I have that tendency after Yugoslavia, you know.

Life is rarely black and white, but like I said, it was bad enough for nearly the entire regular military including air force and navy units to either openly defect to the rebels or abandon the service. That isn’t normal for civil disturbances. If that had not happened all the protesting would have been put down in a few days before anyone could react.

The leader of your own nation before Obama was a raving lunatic, too. How does being a raving lunatic earn you a special place on the World Policemen's "Kill List", anyway? By that logic, you should have already killed Chavez regardless of whether he is good or bad.

We did try to overthrow Chavez. Didn’t work but the guy was also elected in real elections and a non violent way still exists by which he might be realistically removed. But apparently armed attack is the only option the US is allowed. If we wanted Qaddafi dead we would have at least blown up his entire Tripoli compound by now, instead of just one random building.

Being consistent in policy is good, except the US is never the consistent one. Today it gives chemical weapons to Saddam, the next day they hang him on the lamp post.

The US never supplied a single actual weapon to Saddam unless you count certain disease samples.

Today they give Sukharto weapons to conduct the biggest genocide in recent history, the next day they are all sorry-ass about it, but no one gives a flying shit.

Yeah that was not a shinning moment but the US likes stability precisely so we don’t have to get involved ourselves as everyone hates us for doing.

Today they say "self-determination of nations" is a paramount rule and push through the independence of Kosovo, the next day they say Georgia's territorial integrity is sancrosanct after the latter shells South Ossetian capital with Russian peacekeepers still there.

And that’s why the US has extensive armed Georgia with tank, artillery and jet fighters to take another crack at it right?

Today they trade with Gaddafi, tomorrow they bomb him. Today they give weapons to Bin Laden to fight the Empire of Evil (TM), the next day they invade Afghanistan to get rid of Bin Laden...

The next day, if you mean 12 years and a terrorist campaign that didn’t exist until afterwards, then sure. Of course the US also gave money and arms to another hundred thousand other people in the country who didn’t go out an become international terrorists.

or help Afghani drug trade, or something else. Keep embargo of the USSR, open doors to China. Keep embargo of Cuba, but no embargoes for Mubaraks, Pinochets... even Quaddafis, if the latter bark in the right direction. Your state is a hypocritical piece of shit like all Great Powers (TM), and it has lost any and all right to claim any "consistency" in "policy".

The US was plenty consistent in the Cold War, beat the USSR at all costs. We won, and your nation fell into a pit of technological inferiority and bankruptcy largely of its own making. Too bad, I certainly think the world would be better if a remotely functional USSR had persisted. But yeah, we never will be very consistent because unlike say, modern Russia under Tsar Putin the First, the US actually manages to have real transitions of democratic power and the people will and do demand contradictory things.

As for British and US citizens, oh, I'm gonna cry. We're talking about the same nations who and whose client states opressed the Middle East for decades. Like I said, if the only thing that makes Qaddafi different is the fact he killed Westerners, it's the same personal bullshit which made America go after Saddam.

You can call it what you want, I really couldn’t care less. I know you support the right of people to murder whoever they want in there own sovereign territory. That’s a fine system to live under and the way life was before the UN… and I am no UN supporter. However at the same time life before the UN also was one in which it was perfectly justifiable to start a war over a single murder or even a mere diplomatic insult. So at that point finding an excuse for a war becomes almost trivial. Remember those NBC reporters Qaddafi secretly arrested? A hundred years ago that’d easily be a war on its own.

Yeah - his minister of interior, who is one of the leaders of the insurgency, is clearly the good guy here. Suddenly the person who was running Quaddafi's police is a Knight In Shining Armor. Just like some of those Knights in Shining Armor from Mubarak's government who quickly sided with the rebels, hoping to lead the rebellion to a Brave New World (TM) where they'd take Mubarak's place. And this will clearly change Libya for the better. Not the complete and utter eradication of the former government - if it was so bad and corrupt, you should erase all the traces of said corruption to get any positive result, you know.

Ideally all traces would be removed, but nothing is going to happen one way or another until elections take place and a government exists. The people may vote regime figures back in, if they want that then so be it. The point is they get the choice. That might not happen, but the very fear of ‘what could happen’ is why the US was so willing to support dictators it could work with because things could always get worse. Now in Libya we are totally rejecting that thinking, is this a bad thing or a roadmap to what the future should be?

Strange. I thought it doesn't matter if the leaders are "irrational", it is important that they look out for the well-being of their own nation.

That’d be rational thinking, so I am not sure what you are trying to say? Qaddafi might never have faced this rebellion if he’d spent his fortune on the nation while being repressive as ever. Instead it seems like he basically has not spent a huge portion of the nation’s wealth on anything, not even himself.

A rational person who doesn't work in the best interests of his nation is worse. But, considering there's another concept of the world, that which revolves around the interests of the First World nations (for whom it truly matters not how Dark Age the Iranian regime might be, what matters is if it can be reasoned with, because it has oil)... Yeah. I see your point. I just find it as laughable as your claim to any sort of consistency in America's policy.

Its as consistent as democracy will allow it to be. If people want more consistency in life then they should be fully supporting the US backing every dictatorship around.

Giving new FN-FALs to people against Saudi theocracy can be a good beginning. Like in Libya. No? *laughs* Giving weapons is good when we're talking about Contras. Or Libyan rebels. Or whoever is good now for American interests. The House of Saud is not Qaddafi. They are horrible, but they are an ally. That's all that matters. America has no morality, none at all.

Give them to who? Seriously. Like I was just saying the last time big armed resistance existed in the Kingdom was the 1970s before the US was anything like so deeply involved in the Middle East. Al Qaeda had a spurt of action in the early 2000s but that was pretty comprehensively crushed, and simply never on a large enough scale to do anything but pointless terrorist attacks which were mostly directed at westerners anyway.

I’m all for arming rebellions against dictatorships, but it’s pointless to arm people when they don’t have a hope of winning.

No, they're just exposing the hypocritical double standard that the US has, as always.

Whatever. People want to claim one size fits all when it’s blatantly not going to work. Funny how they call us all ignorant of the world at the same time.

Arms shipments to rebels are not approved by the UN resolution, by the way. It is not a cheque blanque on everything, as you imply.

All necessary measures short of invasion. That’s as close to a blank check as you can get.

But let me note that I didn't say "the West is always wrong". What I said that it's right by pure coincidence, when it's national interests (to stabilize Libya's oil shipments) coincides with the interests of a significant fraction of the people.

How has UN action stabilized Libyan oil shipments? We’ve pushed into an indecisive war which has 75% of Libya’s oil export capacity embargoed as it is under pro Qaddafi control and the other 25% just got shutdown by pro Qaddafi blowing up a pumping station. We’ve turned Qaddafi certainly winning into complete uncertainty.

I never said UN interventions were unquestionable. In fact, I have a deep slant against interventions in principle. Be they UN, US, Soviet, or whatever. They rarely end up producing a good end result.

Very often because they are not intended to be decisive in the first place, which is bad; or lack local support which is far worse. That is the number one knock against Libya too, we have not committed to ensuring an end to the war. But beyond that, the alternative was Qaddafi wins. The only reason I see that favored letting Qaddafi in was in fact it would restore oil flow the quickest. It’s not like the west didn’t already have major investments in Libyan oilfields so in terms of financial gain, I don’t see how this can turn into a western advantage.

Judging people by epatage is the worst thing to do. Himmler was hardly keen on epatage, as I recall. He was also smart, rational, etc. *laughs*

And Hitler was voted into power in a sort of legal manner… not a lot to do about that is before the fact is there?

What do you want the US to do, invade countries just to see if public support will come out to rally against the leaders afterwards?

That aside, the opposition doesn't get any traction because the West gives them no support.

Just like it was extensive western support that caused the uprisings in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt, Yemen and Syria? I don’t think so. It was mass public dissatisfaction from the base of society, and if the US could buy that, well, I think the world and certain conflicts like Iraq and Vietnam would have gone a lot differently. As it is the Saudi government is still able to buy peace. That may not work forever, it didn’t for Egypt, but that remains to be seen.

If it started openly giving them weapons and millions of dollars, they might get traction. Then again, perhaps someone else should give them money and weapons. The West is, after all, too busy with existing and possible future interventions all over the world.

I’d fucking love it if other people in the world would step up and do more while the US and China settled down into a routine of deterrence. To some extent they are but not nearly quickly enough, and nowhere near in step with the rise of economic power outside the US boarders. The fact that the world does not do so gives us precious little reason to listen to them.

[Thanas]

Commander in chief is not a term one would normally ever interpret as ‘subject to collective veto’, and Obama is not taking any new power at all by doing this. The US congress has some of our better known idiots complaining about it, and that’s it, and a reason exists for that. Also the Republicans hound Obama for everything no matter how legal or trivial, and they’ve been pretty quiet in total, though part of this is because in all reality the budget crisis is far more important to them. Congress will always have the power to block specific military action after the fact by enacting specific spending legislation to block any money from being spent on it, if they can agree a budget! If all military action required congressional approval then this would mean that the US could not even fire ABM missiles at an incoming ICBM attack when we have under 30 minutes time to work with. Sound like a rational policy?

I'd argue that "incoming ICBM" is a whole different situation from "pre-planned attack", considering one always enables the right to self-defence and carries a risk to the whole nation, the other doesn't.

[Sea Skimmer]

I'd argue that "incoming ICBM" is a whole different situation from "pre-planned attack", considering one always enables the right to self-defence and carries a risk to the whole nation, the other doesn't.

Legally it’s no different, both require spending money and committing to military action. Either it is the case that only the US congress can approve military action before it happens, or it is the case that the US congress does not always have that sole power.

In fact the War Powers Act does have specific provisions for emergency situations like that; including action on foreign soil, and it is precisely the existence of provisions like that which made the act meaningless the moment it became law, overriding a presidential veto to do so BTW. It was clearly unworkable as a concept even in the eyes of the people who wrote it! It was just a feel good 'law' passed as Vietnam was winding down. As it is the way the constitution is written, congress has specific powers, and all other powers are explicitly in the hands of the president as commander in chief. The Congress did not help its own case when it approved budgets for over a century of president ordered military expeditions and approved the UN treaty which basically outlawed declaring war.

[Thanas]

I'd argue that "incoming ICBM" is a whole different situation from "pre-planned attack", considering one always enables the right to self-defence and carries a risk to the whole nation, the other doesn't.

Legally it’s no different, both require spending money and committing to military action. Either it is the case that only the US congress can approve military action before it happens, or it is the case that the US congress does not always have that sole power.

The one does not follow the latter. A policeman has the right to shoot back when he is shot at, that does not give him the right to kill people.

In fact the War Powers Act does have specific provisions for emergency situations like that; including action on foreign soil, and it is precisely the existence of provisions like that which made the act meaningless the moment it became law, overriding a presidential veto to do so BTW.

How so?

[Serafina]

Legally it’s no different, both require spending money and committing to military action. Either it is the case that only the US congress can approve military action before it happens, or it is the case that the US congress does not always have that sole power.

There is a MASSIVE legal difference between the two. Several nations, including Germany and Japan, explicitly forbid any pre-planned attack yet allow self-defence. International law also differentiates between the two.
Just because the USA do not differentiate between the two does not mean that it is impossible to do so.

[Sea Skimmer]

[
The one does not follow the latter. A policeman has the right to shoot back when he is shot at, that does not give him the right to kill people.

A solider does not have that right Thanas. A solider must follow orders and in the US military that is still under penalty of death. A solider can be ordered to hold fire, no matter what is coming at him. Of course this rarely happens because its usually a stupid move, but it is very much legal. This is one of those reasons why a military is a military, while a policeman is still considered a civilian.

How so?

It says the president can use forces as long as he notifies congress within 48 hours, and that he can continue using forces for as long as 90 days without any specific authorization, after which he would be required to withdrawal them. Doesn’t sound like strict control to me.

But every president has asserted successfully that the last bit is a unconstitutional provision. Indeed in several cases congress has pulled funding from a military operation, and only then invoked the war powers act to order a withdrawal after the subject is irrelevant.

The bill also says that Congress can authorize military action in a form other then declaring war… which is really not helping congresses case! In fact by doing so congress is openly saying we aren’t bound by the constitution, which explicitly gives congress the right to declare war, raise and equip forces and pass a budget, and that all other powers are reserved for the President as Commander in Chief! That would include the ability to create new kinds of conflicts like a ‘police action’. The end result is the War Powers Act does nothing Congress could not already do by controlling the detail text of the military budget, and creates multiple constitutional issues one of which actually supports the president. End result is worthless, and that’s why it gets ignored.

[Sea Skimmer]

There is a MASSIVE legal difference between the two. Several nations, including Germany and Japan, explicitly forbid any pre-planned attack yet allow self-defence. International law also differentiates between the two.
Just because the USA do not differentiate between the two does not mean that it is impossible to do so.

Thank you for that totally irrelevant comment. It doesn't fucking matter what other nations with different legal systems and different constitutions do. Yeah they have different laws, amazing. You can't own a 90mm anti tank gun in Japan either, this means jack fuckall in America. What is possible is also irrelevant. What is relevant is what is on paper right now in United States Law and if Obama broke it or not.

[K. A. Pital]

The mass defection of the regular army alone is a pretty good testament to the body count being significant. Its also just not that big a country, relative to population even 100 dead in Libya is a much higher ratio of death then the US suffered in the World Trade Center attack for example.

Rebels are also people, you know. They're somebody's father, brother, etc. Soldiers may defect in this case as well. Like I said, there should be evidence. If there are houses blown to smithereens, there should be photos. And after the war they should make a list of missing: civilians, combatants, etc. That is, if the rebels win.

Low compared to what? Egypt had about 300 people killed in 18 days, not all from government forces and with shitty hospitals, while that list indicates at least that many people died in three days in Benghazi in a nation with only about 15% as many people. The death toll would be far higher if they didn’t have good hospitals too. Thousands of wounded exist too, most of whom we can assume would have died in a place like Ivory Coast. But people tend to ignore the wounded in conflicts of all kinds anyway.

Egypt's protestors also didn't massively use firearms, neither did the Army. In Libya, the situation is a civil war.

Also it’s a simple fact that short wars are short wars, what do you want the world to about them? The fact that they were for the most part short, and a in era in which information collection and distribution was so much more difficult isn’t very favorable to an intervention anyway.

The Libyan civil war isn't exactly long either, you know.

Life is rarely black and white, but like I said, it was bad enough for nearly the entire regular military including air force and navy units to either openly defect to the rebels or abandon the service. That isn’t normal for civil disturbances. If that had not happened all the protesting would have been put down in a few days before anyone could react.

It is normal for conscript armies. As far as I gather, Libya has one. Conscript armies are people often drafted from the same regions, same cities and villages that the protestors whom they're supposed to "put down" come from. It is hard to use a conscript army against your own people. Regardless of whether they protest with arms, without arms, etc.

If we wanted Qaddafi dead we would have at least blown up his entire Tripoli compound by now, instead of just one random building.

You could, but that would look like a complete hit. Not like "intervention to help".

The US never supplied a single actual weapon to Saddam unless you count certain disease samples.

Hmm...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Sta ... al_exports
What are the "toxigenic" shipments mentioned by the USBC?

Yeah that was not a shinning moment but the US likes stability precisely so we don’t have to get involved ourselves as everyone hates us for doing.

Yeah, the guy was much worse than Qaddafi, he was a little Hitler who started a war of blatant agression against a nation and then killed loads of people in the nation he invaded, but the US "likes stability". Or, in other words, the US are total hypocrites and their behavior changes with national interest, their one and only driving force, which has been my point all along.

And that’s why the US has extensive armed Georgia with tank, artillery and jet fighters to take another crack at it right?

Nop. But it also refuses to recognize Ossetia and Abkhazia, at the same time singing how Russia should recognize Kosovo. Just another instance of hypocrisy.

The next day, if you mean 12 years and a terrorist campaign that didn’t exist until afterwards, then sure. Of course the US also gave money and arms to another hundred thousand other people in the country who didn’t go out an become international terrorists.

Yeah, the US can give money to islamists, secularists, or anyone. It doesn't matter, so as long as their interests coincide with those of the US.

The US was plenty consistent in the Cold War, beat the USSR at all costs. We won, and your nation fell into a pit of technological inferiority and bankruptcy largely of its own making. Too bad, I certainly think the world would be better if a remotely functional USSR had persisted. But yeah, we never will be very consistent because unlike say, modern Russia under Tsar Putin the First, the US actually manages to have real transitions of democratic power and the people will and do demand contradictory things.

"Real transitions of power", my ass. You have the incumbent party and the raving lunatic party, which also turns into incumbent party when they get elected. Obama was anti-Bush when he was elected, he became Bush II in office. Your congress is a bunch of ever-incumbent moneybags who don't give a flying fuck about anyone or anything that doesn't have the ability to hurt their pockets or incumbency (as you realize, a great many things, and people, fall in this category). Russia is just an oligarchic dictatorship. America is a disfunctional oligarchic democracy. Big deal. I hate them both. In fact, my hatred is universal. I hate all these regimes, from hypocritical First World ones to the corrupt Third World ones.

You can call it what you want, I really couldn’t care less. I know you support the right of people to murder whoever they want in there own sovereign territory. That’s a fine system to live under and the way life was before the UN… and I am no UN supporter. However at the same time life before the UN also was one in which it was perfectly justifiable to start a war over a single murder or even a mere diplomatic insult. So at that point finding an excuse for a war becomes almost trivial. Remember those NBC reporters Qaddafi secretly arrested? A hundred years ago that’d easily be a war on its own.

Certainly. I also support the right of rebels to hang Gaddafi on a lamp post. And if they could do it, well, all the better. I feel foreign influence in this conflict undermines the concept of popular legitimacy through Civil War. Example: the Bolsheviks hanged their enemies on lamp posts using their own forces. There was no NATO which came in to bomb the losing party in the Civil War. Winning a civil war grants legitimacy. Foreign intervention in a civil war takes that legitimacy away and injures it for years. All Eastern European socialist nations were suffering from a crisis of legitimacy because it wasn't popular uprising that brought their governments to power or elections or anything, but Red Army bayonets. It manifested as a huge problem later on. American puppet regimes also suffered huge crises of legitimacy, the Philippines and Latin America are good examples.

That's my position, a bit long, but I hope I made myself clear.

Ideally all traces would be removed, but nothing is going to happen one way or another until elections take place and a government exists. The people may vote regime figures back in, if they want that then so be it. The point is they get the choice. That might not happen, but the very fear of ‘what could happen’ is why the US was so willing to support dictators it could work with because things could always get worse. Now in Libya we are totally rejecting that thinking, is this a bad thing or a roadmap to what the future should be?

See above. It could be both, but I'm almost certain the US will screw it up. For some reason the US screws everything up lately.

That’d be rational thinking, so I am not sure what you are trying to say? Qaddafi might never have faced this rebellion if he’d spent his fortune on the nation while being repressive as ever. Instead it seems like he basically has not spent a huge portion of the nation’s wealth on anything, not even himself.

I think Qaddafi's nation had good hospitals, lots of engineers, one of the largest water engineering projects in the world, a Tokamak (not sure if they built it on their own), universal employment and was in a sort of African G-7 (seven nations with the highest life standard in Africa). I'm not sure how this is "nothing", compared to other African dictatorships, Gaddafi was certainly far from being the worst. Now, Saudi Arabia and UAE, who recently abolished slavery and uses rightless migrant labour to build their sandcastles... Yeah. They are buying the peace of their own citizens, using migrants as underclass. Gaddafi should have learned from their playbook, sure. Dumb old colonel.

Its as consistent as democracy will allow it to be. If people want more consistency in life then they should be fully supporting the US backing every dictatorship around.

I don't think anyone wants consistency. Consistency over time could've easily translated into us still having slaves, after all. I just laughed at your mentioning of consistency as something good.

Give them to who? Seriously. Like I was just saying the last time big armed resistance existed in the Kingdom was the 1970s before the US was anything like so deeply involved in the Middle East. Al Qaeda had a spurt of action in the early 2000s but that was pretty comprehensively crushed, and simply never on a large enough scale to do anything but pointless terrorist attacks which were mostly directed at westerners anyway. I’m all for arming rebellions against dictatorships, but it’s pointless to arm people when they don’t have a hope of winning.

So people in Bahrain have no hope of winning and that's why they can be crushed. But... Libyan rebels had no hope of winning before NATO strikes.

How has UN action stabilized Libyan oil shipments? We’ve pushed into an indecisive war which has 75% of Libya’s oil export capacity embargoed as it is under pro Qaddafi control and the other 25% just got shutdown by pro Qaddafi blowing up a pumping station. We’ve turned Qaddafi certainly winning into complete uncertainty.

Perhaps right now the outcome is uncertain. The operation will continue and logically end with a Western-friendly, but impoverished regime. You don't see how this could be beneficial? If Libya was Cote D'Ivore, a useless nation in the middle of nowhere, I doubt anyone would care. I mean, nobody cared about Darfur or Rwanda, despite both being far greater outrages than Qaddafi's actions during the civil war.

Very often because they are not intended to be decisive in the first place, which is bad; or lack local support which is far worse. That is the number one knock against Libya too, we have not committed to ensuring an end to the war. But beyond that, the alternative was Qaddafi wins. The only reason I see that favored letting Qaddafi in was in fact it would restore oil flow the quickest. It’s not like the west didn’t already have major investments in Libyan oilfields so in terms of financial gain, I don’t see how this can turn into a western advantage.

See above.

What do you want the US to do, invade countries just to see if public support will come out to rally against the leaders afterwards?

See above.

As it is the Saudi government is still able to buy peace. That may not work forever, it didn’t for Egypt, but that remains to be seen.

Yeah. But hey, look at what you did to Cuba. You fucking ruined them, impoverished their nation. Hey, maybe you could to that to the House of Saud? Clearly they're fucking worse than ole' Castro? But no. Castro has no oil. Saudite bastards have oil. So of course, they can buy their populace off... with U.S. dollars. Embargo Saudis! Heh. I know, that's unimaginable.

The fact that the world does not do so gives us precious little reason to listen to them.

Why should they? Europe and China are perfectly well with U.S. imperialism, or U.S. hegemony. They are willing beneficiaries of that policy. Some minor collisions on the way do not change the big picture. And small nations? They matter not. They're just pawns, anyway.

[Thanas]

[
The one does not follow the latter. A policeman has the right to shoot back when he is shot at, that does not give him the right to kill people.

A solider does not have that right Thanas. A solider must follow orders and in the US military that is still under penalty of death. A solider can be ordered to hold fire, no matter what is coming at him. Of course this rarely happens because its usually a stupid move, but it is very much legal. This is one of those reasons why a military is a military, while a policeman is still considered a civilian.

Yes. I do not think my point comes across as well as I intended it to, namely that there is difference between a defensive action and an offensive action. Legitimacy for one does not legitimize the other.

It says the president can use forces as long as he notifies congress within 48 hours, and that he can continue using forces for as long as 90 days without any specific authorization, after which he would be required to withdrawal them. Doesn’t sound like strict control to me.

No, it does not.

But every president has asserted successfully that the last bit is a unconstitutional provision. Indeed in several cases congress has pulled funding from a military operation, and only then invoked the war powers act to order a withdrawal after the subject is irrelevant.

I would rank this more like "majority party decides to do what it wants". Where there is no victim demanding his rights, there is no judge...

[HarrionGreyjoy]

I've been peering at the relevant bits of the UN Charter and the War Powers Resolution to figure out if they're mutually incompatible, because if they are, Congressional action has in the past overridden prior treaties; actually, the "newest law takes precedence" thing is pretty standard on any subject between two laws of otherwise equivalent force.

My conclusion on the compatibility is... maybe? The WPR is a little fuzzy on pre-existing treaties, which the Charter is, by thirty years. Here are the important WPR excerpts I've found.

(a) Authority to introduce United States Armed Forces into hostilities or into situations wherein involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances shall not be inferred--
...
(2) from any treaty heretofore or hereafter ratified unless such treaty is implemented by legislation specifically authorizing the introduction of United States Armed Forces into hostilities or into such situations and stating that it is intended to constitute specific statutory authorization within the meaning of this joint resolution.

Which looks pretty clear, right? No action on treaties heretofore ratified is permitted unless Congress says it is. ...Except,

(d) Nothing in this joint resolution--

(1) is intended to alter the constitutional authority of the Congress or of the President, or the provision of existing treaties;

A little schizophrenic. If I had to guess, part 8a2 probably wins, but this is less "Obama has absolutely no room to argue this is legal and is an evil dictator" and more "Obama's argument that this is legal is a bit flimsy", even if we assume from the get-go that the WPR is constitutional.