President Obama, having achieved a resolution at the United Nations satisfactory to what appeared to be his preliminary hesitations, finally tip-toed into a limited intervention in Libya, on the basis of ensuring that the country is made a ‘no fly zone.’ Under pressure from much of the Republican leadership to intervene against Colonel Gaddafi in the face of the latter’s pursuit by apparently, ‘all means necessary’ of those rebelling against him, the President tipped over into a decision when it was becoming clear that the Colonel was heading for a full-scale invasion of Benghazi.
The President has tried hard to get maximum support from the members of the Security Council for Resolution 1973, concerned as he obviously has been not to look to the rest of the world as if yet another American president has been ready to go to war in the ex-colonial world that used to be known in Cold War days as the Third World. But of course, as the resolution showed, that Third World has become quite complicated in its ideological orientation. And surprisingly in the original First World coalition of NATO, a certain complexity has been indicated in the abstention of Chancellor Merkel’s coalition in Germany. Clearly the Germans remain hesitant, with memories of Rommel and the Second World War, to give any sense to the international community that they are ready for adventures in the ex-colonial world again.
On the other hand, the President’s main concern in committing the United States to anything, however limited, that looked like military intervention at the same time as he is trying to mop up things and get out of Iraq and, more importantly Afghanistan, has been to secure the support of the Middle Eastern countries and the Arab and Muslim worlds in general. He started off in this endeavour with the diplomatic ace that with uprisings in various countries in the Arab world, commencing, in of all places and to everyone’s surprise, in Tunisia and then Egypt, his allies in the area are quite frightened and would hardly wish to ignore the Americans’ wishes, in case their help was subsequently needed. And fortunately for the US, Turkey, which seems to have been reluctant to sanction the UN resolution is not a member of the Security Council.
But at the same time, the President may well be also looking to ensure that his government does not seem to be propping up autocratic regimes in office once they do not smell of radicalism; as well as seeming to be hoping that the sometime radical Yemeni government which the US has been partially supporting on the grounds that the fight there is against al Qaeda, does not peremptorily collapse leaving the field to America’s arch-enemies.
A disappointment on the President’s part must be that, on the brink of his visit to Brazil, his first to a Latin American state, the new government of that country has not supported UNSCR 1973; and nor have the other countries that have come to be called the BRICS. But he will probably have been relieved that one or other of them did not actually vote against the resolution, but chose to abstain. It will generally be thought in the United States that China, sharing with many countries a political system that the West does not recognize as democratic, will not have surprised anyone by its abstention; though to other minds the Chinese government, as an avid investor in the developing world, and a major energy consumer, has one eye on the future.
The Russian decision is no doubt based not on any particular affection for Gaddafi, but its strong consciousness that its own land is populated and bordered by people of the Muslim faith, and by Muslim-dominated former republics of the Soviet Union. Prime Minister Putin and President Medvedev have had enough trouble in the last decade combating Muslim oppositionists and would hardly wish to fan any more flames. As far as Brazil is concerned, President Rousseff’s successor government to that of former President Lula will hardly have forgotten the United States’ peremptory dismissal of the attempt by Brazil, along with Turkey, to mediate the difficulties between the powers and Iran in respect of its nuclear development efforts. Brazil, with its major industrial machine today, as well as its determination to diversify its commodity and oil exports to a range of countries in the world, including those in the Middle East, would not see itself as alienating others unduly on behalf of American or NATO diplomacy.
In the NATO fold, however, President Obama will be well satisfied by the enthusiastic support of its membership – both in Europe (with the exception of Germany) and Canada. The British and the French – both of whom, along with Italy, have been on a ‘hail fellow well met’ relationship with Libya and its leader, particularly since the release of the Lockerbie prisoner from gaol in Scotland, have made major investments in Libya. Both President Sarkozy and Prime Minister Berlusconi have been accused by Libyan sources of having made sure that their countries reaped fully from the relationship that they established with Gaddafi himself, whom they seemed to be happy to deal with. And the British have not been far behind. There the Conservative Party which, when in opposition, supported the American intervention in Iraq, have further consolidated the position of unanimity that they had with Prime Minister Blair on the necessity for ‘liberal interventionism’ of the kind which NATO eventually committed itself to in the case of Kosovo and the civil and military battles in the ex-Yugoslavia area.
So, so far President Obama will not be dissatisfied with the state of play. His guideline is the UN resolution which mandates the organization “to take all necessary measures to protect civilians and civilian populated areas under the threat of attack – while excluding a foreign occupation force of any form on any part of Libyan territory.” The Secretary of the Arab League has already suggested that perhaps the powers have gone somewhat beyond the mandate. In many parts of the world, even those disgusted with Gaddafi’s behaviour will be anxious to see if the powers can keep in tandem with that resolution – and not be forced to go any further.
