Rym: It would be easy! Scott: Yeah, it would be easy!
End of debate.
Yes, because I have a simplistic opinion on the legitimacy of lethal force on varying scales as a means of diplomacy. Clearly, this will be a ten-second show, and at no point will I disagree with Scott's clearly overwhelmingly superior opinion.
Listen, no offense or anything, but you did say that it all could be "easily" done. I've listened to the show for quite a while now, and I really don't have much memory of you ever saying anything might be "daunting" or even "difficult", much less "impossible and we're better off not trying". With you guys, it's always "easy". I stand by my expectation of what the debate will be like. I'd be happy to be proven wrong, but I really expect that the script above is going to be the take-away from that show. There might be a little more bloppity blah but that's going to be the Reader's Digest version.
Listen, no offense or anything, but you did say that it all could be "easily" done.
Air power intervention would be relatively easy, and certainly within our capabilities. The aftermath, cost, and ramifications are another matter entirely.
I've listened to the show for quite a while now, and I really don't have much memory of you ever saying anything might be "daunting" or even "difficult", much less "impossible and we're better off not trying".
What about all the times we talk about teaching old people to use technology and government reform? ;^)
Libya, to the best of my knowledge, has no substantial force-projection capabilities offshore. Overflies of fighters engaging any aircraft within the zone, possibly coupled with the bombing of any SAM sites Libya kept active, would not likely present more immediate risk than our NATO interventions in Serbia. From a logistical standpoint, we could do it.
Almost every concern and reservation I see is not logistical, but economic and political. Bombing AA sites is an act of war against a sovereign nation. Ground force follow-up is a dicey and likely untenable situation. Every other aspect of intervening unilaterally with a no-fly zone is a disaster waiting to happen. Except the immediate logistics of implementing it.
Being at work, I can't exactly spend the day gathering sources, so here's one op-ed.
As no-fly zones go, an operation over Libya could be organized fairly quickly. The United States and its NATO allies already have airplanes, ships and radar in and around the Mediterranean, along with an airbase on Sicily, about 350 miles north of Tripoli.
The article notes all of the concerns you've raised as real, serious, and possibly show-stopping. But the plain logistics of using force in an immediate sense are not one of them.
Yeah, so wikipedia plus most news stories seem to confirm that (unless there is secret intelligence), Libya has no force projection capabilities. I'm unaware of any aircraft carriers or squadrons of advanced fighter jets they possess. This isn't exactly expert knowledge.
Yeah, video games usually make sense. Mass murder AOK! Single murder of a guy who is already mass murdering, not OK. Who the fuck comes up with this shit?
Alright, Scott, Cite an example. Remember, the death of a combatant is not murder, and accidental civilian deaths caused by US troops do not count, as murder requires Malice Aforethought, also sometimes called Premeditation.*
Fine, let them have it their way. Since bombs are ok, but sniper rifles aren't, let's just bomb Ghadafi's house, and noplace else.
Scott, you don't know a goddamn thing about the military, or how it works. To assassinate Gaddafi with a sniper's bullet, you need Intelligence on Gaddafi's movements, enough to reliably predict where he's going to be, you need to use that intelligence to find a spot where he's not heavily protected - Yeah, you can say "Oh, but he's cruising around in a golf cart, you can shoot him there", because that does you no good if they're actually running any competent level of security - and you need to use that intelligence to find a way to get yourself into a position where you can take the shot, which is going to be inside his security cordon, if they have a lick of sense and training. You need to smuggle in a two man team - despite your great and extensive video game experience, snipers very rarely work alone. Nor do they run around jumping in the air constantly and calling people mexican jew lizards with their yet-to-break voices - and all the equipment they need to stake out the position you have selected, possibly for a number of days, as well as equipment to protect themselves, rations, sleeping gear, etc. Weather needs to be agreeable, you need to be able to identify the target, most likely at range - yes, that's right, your highly complex plan of "Hurr durr just shoot the prick with a sniper rifle" can be foiled by a disguise or a body double. You need to have them sit there, and wait for that shot, which might not come up if your intel is bad by the time it's used - unfortunately common, even in this information age, Intel goes off faster than prawns in the hot sun, and fucks you up much worse when it's bad - and then, once that's happened, your team needs to pack up and extract as quickly and quietly as possible, as the Libyan army now has a huge hard-on for the idea of having their bullet-filled corpses strung up in a public square - and that's if the army has failed to do it's job properly, and isn't very hot on the heels of your now highly-unpopular-in-Tripoli sniper team, who need to fuck off at top speed, and get to whatever point it is practical to extract them quietly.
Yes, Quietly - because you'd have to do all of this, without actually being caught or found out, because not only is Assassination of Foriegn heads of state against US policy, Since Gaddafi does not fall under the definition of a combatant, and since both the US and Libiya are signatories to the Geneva convention and thus it applies even in times of peace between those nations, that would be murdering a non-combatant, which is grave breach of the Geneva convention, and would therefore essentially be a war crime. Ditto that for dropping a bunker buster on his bungalow.
And that's just the immediate. Long term effects are not my forte. But, I do know that a failed or foiled attempt would result in galvanising his forces, and making it even harder to get them to surrender, defect or otherwise give up.
Yeah, so wikipedia plus most news stories seem to confirm that (unless there is secret intelligence), Libya has no force projection capabilities. I'm unaware of any aircraft carriers or squadrons of advanced fighter jets they possess. This isn't exactly expert knowledge.
You do realize that the term "Force Projection" is pretty much only about how capable you are of fighting a war abroad and away from your established bases, which doesn't apply in this case, as the war in question is a civil war, being fought exclusively on Libyan soil, from their own bases? It's not all about Aircraft Carriers or Advanced fighter jets, Rym. A single sniper team can cause the rout of an entire platoon, when employed correctly.
*- Not a lawyer, judge, or even the shoeshine of a Lawyer's secretary. Correct me on this if I'm wrong please, lawyers.
Yeah, so wikipedia plus most news stories seem to confirm that (unless there is secret intelligence), Libya has no force projection capabilities. I'm unaware of any aircraft carriers or squadrons of advanced fighter jets they possess. This isn't exactly expert knowledge.
You do realize that the term "Force Projection" is pretty much only about how capable you are of fighting a war abroad and away from your established bases, which doesn't apply in this case, as the war in question is a civil war, being fought exclusively on Libyan soil, from their own bases?
They cannot even project substantial force into their territorial waters by most accounts. It means that we can strike from a position of surprising safety with no fear of reprisal. We don't have to risk any substantial assets to strike. Our range is greater than their range. That's all I'm saying. So long as we don't commit ground forces, it costs us only money and manpower.
I'm not agreeing with Scott. Don't get me wrong. His views of this conflict border on crazy. ;^)
They cannot even project substantial force into their territorial waters by most accounts. It means that we can strike from a position of surprising safety with no fear of reprisal. We don't have to risk any substantial assets to strike. Our range is greater than their range. That's all I'm saying. So long as we don't commit ground forces, it costs us only money and manpower.
That's a very fair assessment. I'm sorry I mistook what you were trying to say somewhat.
I'm not agreeing with Scott. Don't get me wrong. His views of this conflict border on crazy. ;^)
I wouldn't say bordering crazy, He's just rather misinformed on how a military force actually goes about things. I can see the logic chain, it's just that he doesn't have the knowledge to back it up, or to be able to tell that his logical chain isn't really practical(or in some cases possible).
Short of mental illness, isn't the majority of what we'd call "crazy" just varying levels of misinformation as well? I think most religious people are just misinformed rather than mentally ill, for one thing.
Short of mental illness, isn't the majority of what we'd call "crazy" just varying levels of misinformation as well? I think most religious people are just misinformed rather than mentally ill, for one thing.
Crazy is coming to a wildly different conclusion based on the same information that doesn't quite follow.
those tools are just another kind of information, no?
Ah, but all things are causal manifestations of other phenomena, all matter information, and so forth. Don't be so quick to zoom an argument too far in, nor too far out, lest you make it irrelevant.
Well, people are irrational, and that irrationality can cause them to conclusions that are wildly wrong. I guess that's what we'd call "crazy". If you don't know how to think rationally, then that too is simply not having the information you need. Nonetheless, I will grant that people who do understand how to think rationally still quite often come to the wrong conclusion, and in that case the issue is not lack of information.
It's not abnormal brain chemistry that's the issue, it's normal brain chemistry.
We're talking about Scott here.
Well, perhaps in Scott's case it's different, but the main discussion was on a broader scale. I think the issue with most people is that they simply do not understand how to think rationally, and they do not understand just how unreliable their own brains are. I'd say that most people could be taught to think rationally, but they aren't, and so they don't. Hence the larger issue is indeed people lacking the information they need.
I figured I would post this after getting into an argument about Libya with my dad.
Top ten ways that Libya 2011 is not Iraq 2003 1. The action in Libya was authorized by the United Nations Security Council. That in Iraq was not. By the UN Charter, military action after 1945 should either come as self-defense or with UNSC authorization. Most countries in the world are signatories to the charter and bound by its provisions.
2. The Libyan people had risen up and thrown off the Qaddafi regime, with some 80-90 percent of the country having gone out of his hands before he started having tank commanders fire shells into peaceful crowds. It was this vast majority of the Libyan people that demanded the UN no-fly zone. In 2002-3 there was no similar popular movement against Saddam Hussein.
3. There was an ongoing massacre of civilians, and the threat of more such massacres in Benghazi, by the Qaddafi regime, which precipitated the UNSC resolution. Although the Saddam Hussein regime had massacred people in the 1980s and early 1990s, nothing was going on in 2002-2003 that would have required international intervention.
4. The Arab League urged the UNSC to take action against the Qaddafi regime, and in many ways precipitated Resolution 1973. The Arab League met in 2002 and expressed opposition to a war on Iraq. (Reports of Arab League backtracking on Sunday were incorrect, based on a remark of outgoing Secretary-General Amr Moussa that criticized the taking out of anti-aircraft batteries. The Arab League reaffirmed Sunday and Moussa agreed Monday that the No-Fly Zone is what it wants).
5. None of the United Nations allies envisages landing troops on the ground, nor does the UNSC authorize it. Iraq was invaded by land forces.
6. No false allegations were made against the Qaddafi regime, of being in league with al-Qaeda or of having a nuclear weapons program. The charge is massacre of peaceful civilian demonstrators and an actual promise to commit more such massacres.
7. The United States did not take the lead role in urging a no-fly zone, and was dragged into this action by its Arab and European allies. President Obama pledges that the US role, mainly disabling anti-aircraft batteries and bombing runways, will last “days, not months†before being turned over to other United Nations allies.
8. There is no sectarian or ethnic dimension to the Libyan conflict, whereas the US Pentagon conspired with Shiite and Kurdish parties to overthrow the Sunni-dominated Baathist regime in Iraq, setting the stage for a prolonged and bitter civil war.
9. The US has not rewarded countries such as Norway for entering the conflict as UN allies, but rather a genuine sense of outrage at the brutal crimes against humanity being committed by Qaddafi and his forces impelled the formation of this coalition. The Bush administration’s ‘coalition of the willing’ in contrast was often brought on board by what were essentially bribes.
10. Iraq in 2002-3 no longer posed a credible threat to its neighbors. A resurgent Qaddafi in Libya with petroleum billions at his disposal would likely attempt to undermine the democratic experiments in Tunisia and Egypt, blighting the lives of millions.
This sounds a little like "Ten reasons I won't wreck the car again if you let me drive it to the prom this year". They're all pretty reasonable, they all sound pretty well thought out, and they're all based in pretty solid fact. However, I'm still a little cautious about letting you drive the car again since you wrecked it so bad last time.
However, I'm still a little cautious about letting you drive the car again since you wrecked it so bad last time.
Well, there are different people driving now.
Yes, and I'm still paying for repairs necessitated by the wreck you caused the last time you went out. And look at you - you've only now been able to walk upright again without crutches for the last week and a half and you'll have that steel plate in your skull for the rest of your life. It would seem to me that you'd want to stay away from those kids who convinced you that it was a good idea to drive around simultaneously drunk, stoned, and hallucinating.
Why do you always have to judge me for what my older brother did! I'm an adult to! You never treat me like I am my own separate person. Did I lie like he did? You've always loved him more! *runs out the room throwing a tantrum*
Comments
1) You say it after you kill him, not before.
2) Hokuto Shinken is a two thousand year old art of assassination. They use that word in the show!
People present those ideas on the internets.
Epic lulz ensue.
Almost every concern and reservation I see is not logistical, but economic and political. Bombing AA sites is an act of war against a sovereign nation. Ground force follow-up is a dicey and likely untenable situation. Every other aspect of intervening unilaterally with a no-fly zone is a disaster waiting to happen. Except the immediate logistics of implementing it.
Being at work, I can't exactly spend the day gathering sources, so here's one op-ed. The article notes all of the concerns you've raised as real, serious, and possibly show-stopping. But the plain logistics of using force in an immediate sense are not one of them.
Maybe I should ask him what vital US interest in the region justifies any sort of intervention in Libya.
It's well within my personal capabilities to punch my co-worker in the face without even standing up. That doesn't mean it's well-advised to do so.
Yes, Quietly - because you'd have to do all of this, without actually being caught or found out, because not only is Assassination of Foriegn heads of state against US policy, Since Gaddafi does not fall under the definition of a combatant, and since both the US and Libiya are signatories to the Geneva convention and thus it applies even in times of peace between those nations, that would be murdering a non-combatant, which is grave breach of the Geneva convention, and would therefore essentially be a war crime.
Ditto that for dropping a bunker buster on his bungalow.
And that's just the immediate. Long term effects are not my forte. But, I do know that a failed or foiled attempt would result in galvanising his forces, and making it even harder to get them to surrender, defect or otherwise give up. You do realize that the term "Force Projection" is pretty much only about how capable you are of fighting a war abroad and away from your established bases, which doesn't apply in this case, as the war in question is a civil war, being fought exclusively on Libyan soil, from their own bases?
It's not all about Aircraft Carriers or Advanced fighter jets, Rym. A single sniper team can cause the rout of an entire platoon, when employed correctly.
*- Not a lawyer, judge, or even the shoeshine of a Lawyer's secretary. Correct me on this if I'm wrong please, lawyers.
I'm not agreeing with Scott. Don't get me wrong. His views of this conflict border on crazy. ;^)
I think most religious people are just misinformed rather than mentally ill, for one thing.
I think the issue with most people is that they simply do not understand how to think rationally, and they do not understand just how unreliable their own brains are. I'd say that most people could be taught to think rationally, but they aren't, and so they don't.
Hence the larger issue is indeed people lacking the information they need.
Top ten ways that Libya 2011 is not Iraq 2003
1. The action in Libya was authorized by the United Nations Security Council. That in Iraq was not. By the UN Charter, military action after 1945 should either come as self-defense or with UNSC authorization. Most countries in the world are signatories to the charter and bound by its provisions.
2. The Libyan people had risen up and thrown off the Qaddafi regime, with some 80-90 percent of the country having gone out of his hands before he started having tank commanders fire shells into peaceful crowds. It was this vast majority of the Libyan people that demanded the UN no-fly zone. In 2002-3 there was no similar popular movement against Saddam Hussein.
3. There was an ongoing massacre of civilians, and the threat of more such massacres in Benghazi, by the Qaddafi regime, which precipitated the UNSC resolution. Although the Saddam Hussein regime had massacred people in the 1980s and early 1990s, nothing was going on in 2002-2003 that would have required international intervention.
4. The Arab League urged the UNSC to take action against the Qaddafi regime, and in many ways precipitated Resolution 1973. The Arab League met in 2002 and expressed opposition to a war on Iraq. (Reports of Arab League backtracking on Sunday were incorrect, based on a remark of outgoing Secretary-General Amr Moussa that criticized the taking out of anti-aircraft batteries. The Arab League reaffirmed Sunday and Moussa agreed Monday that the No-Fly Zone is what it wants).
5. None of the United Nations allies envisages landing troops on the ground, nor does the UNSC authorize it. Iraq was invaded by land forces.
6. No false allegations were made against the Qaddafi regime, of being in league with al-Qaeda or of having a nuclear weapons program. The charge is massacre of peaceful civilian demonstrators and an actual promise to commit more such massacres.
7. The United States did not take the lead role in urging a no-fly zone, and was dragged into this action by its Arab and European allies. President Obama pledges that the US role, mainly disabling anti-aircraft batteries and bombing runways, will last “days, not months†before being turned over to other United Nations allies.
8. There is no sectarian or ethnic dimension to the Libyan conflict, whereas the US Pentagon conspired with Shiite and Kurdish parties to overthrow the Sunni-dominated Baathist regime in Iraq, setting the stage for a prolonged and bitter civil war.
9. The US has not rewarded countries such as Norway for entering the conflict as UN allies, but rather a genuine sense of outrage at the brutal crimes against humanity being committed by Qaddafi and his forces impelled the formation of this coalition. The Bush administration’s ‘coalition of the willing’ in contrast was often brought on board by what were essentially bribes.
10. Iraq in 2002-3 no longer posed a credible threat to its neighbors. A resurgent Qaddafi in Libya with petroleum billions at his disposal would likely attempt to undermine the democratic experiments in Tunisia and Egypt, blighting the lives of millions.