According to President Obama, the decision to bomb Libya was because Colonel Muammar Ghadafi’s regime threatened “our interests and our values,” as well as “our common humanity and our common security.” But is that really the reason? And is it a good reason? It’s an important question to ponder because regardless of whether someone endorses or opposes war, no one can deny the importance of understanding “Why war?”
Although President Obama (and President Bush before him) talked about freedom and freeing people from tyrannical rule, the unspoken truth is that going to war is more about the freedom to do as one wishes without interference from others, to control one’s actions, and the actions of others. But that is a truth that no president would dare utter.
Imagine if President Obama made the argument for bombing Libya by saying, “We must bomb Libya and Muammar Ghadafi must go so we can install a pro-U.S. government whose actions and decisions we can control” (or if President Bush had made a similar argument for invading Iraq). Instead, presidents and pundits like to conjure up threats. In the case of Libya, Obama had previously claimed that Ghadafi constituted “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.” But the fact that it has been relatively easy to ground Libya’s air force (just as it was relatively easy for U.S. military forces to prevail over Iraqi forces) is tacit proof that Libya does and did not pose a threat to U.S. national security (a fact that Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has publically acknowledged).
Libya is simply the latest evidence of the problem that the use of American military force in the post-Cold War era has been largely unrelated to real threats to U.S. security. Since the end of the Cold War, the United States has employed significant military force on 11 occasions:
the 1989 invasion of Panama
Operation Desert Storm in 1991
Subsequent enforcement of no fly zones in Iraq from 1991 to the 2003 invasion
the ill-fated Somalia “Blackhawk Down” mission in 1992–93
Haiti in 1994
air strikes in Bosnia in 1995
missile attacks against Sudan and Afghanistan in 1998
air strikes in Kosovo in 1999
Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan
Operation Iraqi Freedom
Operation Odyssey Dawn
However, only one of these—Operation Enduring Freedom—was in response to a direct threat to the United States. And we missed the mark, with Osama bin Laden and other senior al-Qaeda leadership now ensconced in Pakistan.
Professional soldiers must think about it in terms of how to fight and win war from a military perspective. That is their duty and obligation, for which they should not be faulted. But the rest of us—and especially our president and other policymakers—need to remember that the use of military force is simply a means to an end. So “why war?” should always lead to two more questions:
Is the end justified? (i.e., Is the security of the United States at stake?) Is war the appropriate and best means to achieve the end? (i.e., Will larger strategic goals and objectives result from military success?)
If the answer to both is not “yes,” then not only is war unnecessary but just as likely to make America less safe and secure (because the use of military force means killing people—even if only targeted against those in uniform, many are forced to serve against their will in dictatorial regimes such as Ghadafi’s—and those who lose fathers, brothers, and sons are likely to breed the resentment and hatred that is the basis for recruitment to the ranks of terrorists). Such is the case with Libya.
Charles V. Peña is Senior Fellow at the Independent Institute as well as a senior fellow with the Coalition for a Realistic Foreign Policy, and an adviser on the Straus Military Reform Project. Mr. Peña has been senior fellow with the George Washington University Homeland Security Policy Institute and Foreign Policy Advisor for the 2008 Ron Paul Presidential Campaign.
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Bombing Libya is unrelated to any threat to the US
Posted on April 4, 2011 by Charles V. Pena
According to President Obama, the decision to bomb Libya was because Colonel Muammar Ghadafi’s regime threatened “our interests and our values,” as well as “our common humanity and our common security.” But is that really the reason? And is it a good reason? It’s an important question to ponder because regardless of whether someone endorses or opposes war, no one can deny the importance of understanding “Why war?”
Although President Obama (and President Bush before him) talked about freedom and freeing people from tyrannical rule, the unspoken truth is that going to war is more about the freedom to do as one wishes without interference from others, to control one’s actions, and the actions of others. But that is a truth that no president would dare utter.
Imagine if President Obama made the argument for bombing Libya by saying, “We must bomb Libya and Muammar Ghadafi must go so we can install a pro-U.S. government whose actions and decisions we can control” (or if President Bush had made a similar argument for invading Iraq). Instead, presidents and pundits like to conjure up threats. In the case of Libya, Obama had previously claimed that Ghadafi constituted “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.” But the fact that it has been relatively easy to ground Libya’s air force (just as it was relatively easy for U.S. military forces to prevail over Iraqi forces) is tacit proof that Libya does and did not pose a threat to U.S. national security (a fact that Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has publically acknowledged).
Libya is simply the latest evidence of the problem that the use of American military force in the post-Cold War era has been largely unrelated to real threats to U.S. security. Since the end of the Cold War, the United States has employed significant military force on 11 occasions:
However, only one of these—Operation Enduring Freedom—was in response to a direct threat to the United States. And we missed the mark, with Osama bin Laden and other senior al-Qaeda leadership now ensconced in Pakistan.
Professional soldiers must think about it in terms of how to fight and win war from a military perspective. That is their duty and obligation, for which they should not be faulted. But the rest of us—and especially our president and other policymakers—need to remember that the use of military force is simply a means to an end. So “why war?” should always lead to two more questions:
Is the end justified? (i.e., Is the security of the United States at stake?) Is war the appropriate and best means to achieve the end? (i.e., Will larger strategic goals and objectives result from military success?)
If the answer to both is not “yes,” then not only is war unnecessary but just as likely to make America less safe and secure (because the use of military force means killing people—even if only targeted against those in uniform, many are forced to serve against their will in dictatorial regimes such as Ghadafi’s—and those who lose fathers, brothers, and sons are likely to breed the resentment and hatred that is the basis for recruitment to the ranks of terrorists). Such is the case with Libya.
Charles V. Peña is Senior Fellow at the Independent Institute as well as a senior fellow with the Coalition for a Realistic Foreign Policy, and an adviser on the Straus Military Reform Project. Mr. Peña has been senior fellow with the George Washington University Homeland Security Policy Institute and Foreign Policy Advisor for the 2008 Ron Paul Presidential Campaign.