Contributors

Saturday, September 22, 2012

Two Wars, Two Different Outcomes


Obama's "lead from behind" strategy during the Libyan revolution was criticized by Republicans as being weak and ineffectual. But if we compare the outcomes of Bush's tactics in Iraq and Obama's tactics in Libya from a cost standpoint in both dollars and lives, the results Obama obtained are an amazing deal.


One concrete result is the attitude of the people. Last night, nearly a year after Qaddafi was deposed, three Libyans died when they stormed the compound of Ansar al-Sharia, the extremist militia that they thought was responsible for the attack on the US consulate in Benghazi. They are sick of these right-wing Al Qaeda linked groups messing with their country, and are doing something about it. And no Americans were involved or pushed them to do it.

A year after our invasion of Iraq every Iraqi despised us and L. Paul Bremer, the American proconsul of Iraq who ruled by decree. The tide only turned when Bush did a 180 years later and stopped persecuting former Baathists, who then turned against Al Qaeda and helped stabilize the country.

Many Libyans consider Americans to be their friends, and were angered when terrorists killed the American ambassador and three others: they liked our guy in Benghazi. The United States had helped them oust Qaddafi from power; not by sending in hundreds of thousands of troops as we did in Iraq, turning Americans into an occupying army, but by providing coordinated air support to rebels fighting to overthrow a tyrant. These Libyans might be conservative Muslims, but they don't want Al Qaeda and Sharia law imposed on them by right-wing militias.

Bush's war in Iraq will ultimately cost more than a trillion dollars in direct outlays and medical care for wounded veterans, and we still have a significant number of "advisers" stationed there. Our assistance to Libya cost one or two billion dollars, and there are no boots on the ground.

And the political outcomes? Similar in some respects, but not all:

Bush eliminated a dictator in Iraq. Obama helped Libyans eliminate a dictator in Libya. Check.

Iraq is still plagued by internal divisions and suicide bombers. Libya has a weak government plagued by militias who flout the law. Check.

Iraq is best buddies with Iran. Libyans are attacking the compound of the militia that killed our ambassador. Uh, no check mark there. And that's the most important result in the long haul.

And the crazy thing? Mitt Romney, John McCain and the gang of neocons advising them still think they were right about Iraq, and want to do the same thing to every other country in the Middle East that looks at Israel cross-eyed.

Yes, we have to put our interests first in the Middle East. But often as not that means letting these countries deal with their own problems, instead of jumping into the middle, wasting trillions of dollars and making everyone hate us.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

"we still have a significant number of "advisers" stationed there."

Fucking Bush! He is STILL calling the shots in Iraq. Cheney too!

Blackwater!

Anonymous said...

Want proof?

National Counter-Terrorism Center Director Matt Olsen said on Wednesday, "I would say yes, [these Americans] were killed in the course of a terrorist attack on our embassy." Beyond that, they think the ringleaders "had connections to al-Qa'ida." In fact, a prime suspect is Sufyan Ben Qumu, who was transferred from Gitmo to a Libyan prison in 2007.

2007?
Who was POTUS in 2007?

I BLAME BUSH!