I haven't had anything to say about Libya since the 'fall' of Tripoli - I almost, in a state of dispirited disbelief, was moved to drag from noxious bile an opinion after reading some absurdity from EJ Dionne at the Washington Post - EJ is in love with Obama - I mean literally in love I think - Dionne is of that ilk of uber lefties who, on first hearing Obama speak, fell trembling before him like Moses before the burning bush - a mere day after the rebels rabbled their way into Tripoli Dionne was writing how this was a brilliant victory, that the Obama doctrine had now been completely and utterly vindicated and that since Obama's genius had now been irrefutably demonstrated only a heretical ignorance of a most vile, pernicious and cancerous aspect could possibly explain those still refusing to believe in the truth before them - or words to that effect. I was so galled by this astoundingly obtuse hagiography that I did feel an instinctive urge to spit something up - but didn't.
I didn't because it seemed irrelevant - I had said all along that getting rid of Qaddafi was meaningless vis a vis the larger questions - Qaddafi was weak, he had deliberately kept his military weak so as to forestall coup attempts - a Marine Expeditionary Force could have finished him off in a fraction of the time it took a NATO sans America to do it [and if your real concern was humanitarian that is what should have logically been done cause god knows how many have died in the six months it's taken France and England to get it done] - Saddam's army was much, much more powerful - if Dionne is gonna praise Obama for this victory he should tenfold be praising Bush for his against Saddam - but of course he can't because of the disaster that befell Iraq after Saddam was gone - which is why praising Obama a mere day after rebels took Tripoli bespeaks of an idiocy of such astounding heft it takes ones breath away. Getting rid of Qaddafi was not the issue per se defining this idiotic war [and wasn't even part of the UN resolution if anyone cares to remember - but of course Obama gets to wage an illegal war because... well, no one can explain that one, although I can make a pretty good guess] - the troubling aftermath of the inevitable dethroning was the issue; the disaster of a civil war almost surely now to come was the issue; the now revealed utter weakness of a NATO sans America and how an 'America alone' scenario, which we now have, that will destabilize long term security arrangements was the issue [if you've always believed in an 'America alone scenario this isn't huge - if, like Obama, you believe America isn't the essential country when it comes to security, well then, you've just been proven grossly wrong]; the extremely dangerous and confusing precedent set for a war raised upon a very shaky, vague and highly selective humanitarian pretext was the issue, the emergence of an Islamist state possibly linked to Iran, a newly belligerent Turkey and then to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and all lined up against Israel was the issue - the mere fact of getting rid of Qaddafi [and he still isn't quite gone remember] pales in significance when compared to the highly, highly toxic detritus trailing in his departing wake - and we set all this in motion to defend what vital interest of the US? None that I can think of.
And so I didn't comment on Libya - until now - and I'm doing so now because the one tentative exception I made to my generally complete repudiation of Obama's Libyan adventure was that I might support something if it served a long term interest viz China's influence in the region - if one could factor in China then suddenly Libya does start to move into 'vital American interest' territory - and so word coming out this week that possibly China all through this war has been trying to supply arms to Qaddafi, that gets my attention - I have no comment other than that at the moment - I still think this war was utterly idiotic, misguided, ill conceived - but if some damage spills over onto China's reputation in the region, well... that's something. Not sure what. Could indeed set some troubling dynamics in motion, ie if China feels embarrassed or marginalized by perfidious or otherwise disreputable behavior they may be motivated to compensate in ways not comforting to the general weal.
