March 22, 2011
Denver, Colorado, USA
Have you ever seen the devastation from a BGM-109 Tomahawk cruise missile? It’s beyond description. Standing in the impact area, it’s as if nothing has ever existed there before.
It’s naive to think that something with so much destructive power is unlikely to cause ‘collateral damage.’ I can only imagine the consequences of 159 and counting, the amount of force that has been unleashed in Libya as yet by western governments.
This morning, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates shrugged off any implication that military strikes are responsible for significant civilian casualties in Libya… while at the same time playing down America’s role and the timeline for continued action.
This is insane. You are either at war, or you are not. Warfare requires clearly defined objectives, competent generals, and well-resourced fighting forces… it cannot be waged with half-measures and stammering equivocation.
Yet, here we are again, watching bureaucrats tap dance in front of voters, playing down the long-term ramifications of engagement and outright rejecting the idea of regime change as an intended objective.
They feel 100% justified in their decision to wage a half war without getting their hands dirty, rejecting any consequences to civilians, all under the auspices of protecting civilians… but only Libyan civilians.
Much praise has been heaped on Barack Obama, Nicolas Sarkozy, and the UN Security Council for their ‘political courage,’ taking action in the face of popular backlash to defend Libyans.
“Political courage” is an oxymoron. Everything these people do is for their professional gain, to be reelected, and the fallout of these decisions costs lives and economic misfortune. The cost of the munitions alone so far is over a quarter billion dollars, let alone the human cost.
Barack Obama himself said in 2002, “What I am opposed to is the attempt by political hacks… to distract us from a rise in the uninsured, a rise in the poverty rate, a drop in the median income — to distract us from corporate scandals and a stock market that has just gone through the worst month since the Great Depression. That’s what I’m opposed to. A dumb war. A rash war. A war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics.”
Sounds great. Spoken like a true Nobel Laureate.
The intellectual dishonesty and hypocrisy involved is phenomenal. The UN Security Council resolution (#1973) which ‘authorized’ this invasion, expresses condemnation for Qadaffi’s deleterious actions against his own people…
… nevermind that the exact same thing is happening in Bahrain (which produces only 10% of Libya’s oil) where the US Navy’s 5th Fleet is headquartered with front row seats to the show;
… nevermind that governments have hardly uttered a word about the situation in Bahrain or Saudi Arabia;
… nevermind that the western world has proven itself incompetent at regime change after the occupations of both Iraq and Afghanistan;
… nevermind that 10-years of warfare have worn out the spirit and morale of fighting forces to the point that they are twisted into taking trophy photos of dead civilians like a 16-point buck;
… nevermind that you can’t just step in, bomb some targets, step out, and expect a peaceful, stable, democratic, pro-Western society to materialize out of thin air;
… nevermind that the coalition forces lack the moral authority to cherry pick which countries to invade and which civilian populations to ignore.
When they lack moral authority, they simply create it out of thin air. Politicians and bureaucrats equate morality with legality. If something is legal, it must be just… and if it’s not legal, they’ll pass a law or resolution making it legal… and hence just.
This is the way they operate– using regulatory technicalities to wrap themselves in a blanket of righteousness in order to execute their agenda. As Tacitus said, “the more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws.”
