The missile strikes that inaugurated Americas latest attempt at regime change were launched 29 days before the 50th anniversary of another such the Bay of Pigs of April 17 1961. Then the hubris of American planners was proportional to their ignorance of everything relevant from Cuban sentiment to Cubas geography. The fiasco was a singularly feckless investment of American power.
Does practice make perfect? In todays episode America has intervened in a civil war in a tribal society the dynamics of which America does not understand. And America is supporting one faction the nature of which it does not know. We are standing with the people of Libya" says Secretary of State Hillary Clinton evidently confident that the" people are a harmonious unit. Many in the media call Moammar Gaddafis opponents freedom fighters" and perhaps they are but no one calling them that really knows how the insurgents regard one another or understand freedom or if freedom however understood is their priority.
But then knowing is rarely required in the regime-change business. The Weekly Standard a magazine for regime-change enthusiasts serenely says: The Libyan state is a one-man operation. Eliminate that man and the whole edifice may come tumbling down." And then good things must sprout? The late Donald Westlake gave one of his comic novels the mordant title Whats the Worst That Could Happen?" People who do not find that darkly funny should not make foreign policy.
In Libya mission creep began before the mission did. A no-fly zone would not accomplish what Barack Obama calls a well-defined goal" the protection of civilians." So the no-fly zone immediately became protection for aircraft conducting combat operations against Gaddafis ground forces.
Americas war aim is inseparable from indeed obviously is destruction of that regime. So our purpose is to create a political vacuum into which we hope this is the audacity of hope" as foreign policy good things will spontaneously flow. But if Gaddafi cannot be beaten by the rebels are we prepared to supply their military deficiencies? And if the decapitation of his regime produces what the removal of Saddam Hussein did bloody chaos what then are our responsibilities regarding the tribal vendettas we may have unleashed? How long are we prepared to police the partitioning of Libya?
Explaining his decision to wage war Obama said Gaddafi has lost the confidence of his own people and the legitimacy to lead." Such meretricious boilerplate seems designed to anesthetize thought. When did Gaddafi lose his peoples confidence? When did he have legitimacy? American doctrine check the Declaration of Independence is that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. So there are always many illegitimate governments. When is it Americas duty to scrub away these blemishes on the planet? Is there a limiting principle of humanitarian interventionism? If so would Obama take a stab at stating it?
Congresss power to declare war resembles a muscle that has atrophied from long abstention from proper exercise. This power was last exercised on June 5 1942 (against Bulgaria Romania and Hungary) almost 69 years and many wars ago. It thus may seem quaint and certainly is quixotic for Indianas Richard Lugar ranking Republican on and former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to say correctly that Congress should debate and vote on this.
There are those who think that if the United Nations gives the United States permission to wage war the Constitution becomes irrelevant. Let us find out who in Congress supports this proposition which should be resoundingly refuted particularly by Republicans currently insisting that government and especially the executive should be on a short constitutional leash. If all Republican presidential aspirants are supine in the face of unfettered presidential war-making and humanitarian interventionism the Republican field is radically insufficient.
On Dec. 29 1962 in Miamis Orange Bowl President John Kennedy who ordered the Bay of Pigs invasion addressed a rally of survivors and supporters of that exercise in regime change. Presented with the invasion brigades flag Kennedy vowed I can assure you that this flag will be returned to this brigade in a free Havana." Eleven months later on Nov. 2 1963 his administration was complicit in another attempt at violent regime change the coup against and murder of South Vietnams President Ngo Dinh Diem. The Saigon regime was indeed changed so perhaps this episode counts as a success even if Saigon is now Ho Chi Minh City.
georgewill@washpost.com
The missile strikes that inaugurated Americas latest attempt at regime change were launched 29 days before the 50th anniversary of another such the Bay of Pigs of April 17 1961. Then the hubris of American planners was proportional to their ignorance of everything relevant from Cuban sentiment to Cubas geography. The fiasco was a singularly feckless investment of American power.
Does practice make perfect? In todays episode America has intervened in a civil war in a tribal society the dynamics of which America does not understand. And America is supporting one faction the nature of which it does not know. We are standing with the people of Libya" says Secretary of State Hillary Clinton evidently confident that the" people are a harmonious unit. Many in the media call Moammar Gaddafis opponents freedom fighters" and perhaps they are but no one calling them that really knows how the insurgents regard one another or understand freedom or if freedom however understood is their priority.
But then knowing is rarely required in the regime-change business. The Weekly Standard a magazine for regime-change enthusiasts serenely says: The Libyan state is a one-man operation. Eliminate that man and the whole edifice may come tumbling down." And then good things must sprout? The late Donald Westlake gave one of his comic novels the mordant title Whats the Worst That Could Happen?" People who do not find that darkly funny should not make foreign policy.
In Libya mission creep began before the mission did. A no-fly zone would not accomplish what Barack Obama calls a well-defined goal" the protection of civilians." So the no-fly zone immediately became protection for aircraft conducting combat operations against Gaddafis ground forces.
Americas war aim is inseparable from indeed obviously is destruction of that regime. So our purpose is to create a political vacuum into which we hope this is the audacity of hope" as foreign policy good things will spontaneously flow. But if Gaddafi cannot be beaten by the rebels are we prepared to supply their military deficiencies? And if the decapitation of his regime produces what the removal of Saddam Hussein did bloody chaos what then are our responsibilities regarding the tribal vendettas we may have unleashed? How long are we prepared to police the partitioning of Libya?
Explaining his decision to wage war Obama said Gaddafi has lost the confidence of his own people and the legitimacy to lead." Such meretricious boilerplate seems designed to anesthetize thought. When did Gaddafi lose his peoples confidence? When did he have legitimacy? American doctrine check the Declaration of Independence is that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. So there are always many illegitimate governments. When is it Americas duty to scrub away these blemishes on the planet? Is there a limiting principle of humanitarian interventionism? If so would Obama take a stab at stating it?
Congresss power to declare war resembles a muscle that has atrophied from long abstention from proper exercise. This power was last exercised on June 5 1942 (against Bulgaria Romania and Hungary) almost 69 years and many wars ago. It thus may seem quaint and certainly is quixotic for Indianas Richard Lugar ranking Republican on and former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to say correctly that Congress should debate and vote on this.
There are those who think that if the United Nations gives the United States permission to wage war the Constitution becomes irrelevant. Let us find out who in Congress supports this proposition which should be resoundingly refuted particularly by Republicans currently insisting that government and especially the executive should be on a short constitutional leash. If all Republican presidential aspirants are supine in the face of unfettered presidential war-making and humanitarian interventionism the Republican field is radically insufficient.
On Dec. 29 1962 in Miamis Orange Bowl President John Kennedy who ordered the Bay of Pigs invasion addressed a rally of survivors and supporters of that exercise in regime change. Presented with the invasion brigades flag Kennedy vowed I can assure you that this flag will be returned to this brigade in a free Havana." Eleven months later on Nov. 2 1963 his administration was complicit in another attempt at violent regime change the coup against and murder of South Vietnams President Ngo Dinh Diem. The Saigon regime was indeed changed so perhaps this episode counts as a success even if Saigon is now Ho Chi Minh City.
georgewill@washpost.com
