PrintFebruary 24, 2011
Obama's Libya Silence
I give US President Obama credit: he does not bomb his own citizens. For reasons only he and his advisers know for sure, Obama remains muted on the current genocide in Tripoli, Libya in which Libyan Dictator Muammar al-Gaddafi has unleashed a violent crackdown on his citizens. In 1986, Libya was bombed by Ronald Reagan because the then US President correctly deemed the Maghreb country's dictator as a rogue, and a terrorist. This current US President remains reticent to respond, after a week of bloodshed in Tripoli streets. This is the 3AM "wake up call" Secretary of State Hillary Clinton chided him about 3 years ago.
As Washington Post's Charles Krauthammer accurately said of Obama's silence on Tuesday's Bret Baier's Fox News Program:
"This is a President who went around the world in the first year in office saying he would he was raising the moral standard of the United States in the world after the travesties as he saw it or the Bush Administration. Here he is, he has nothing on what's happening in Libya which is a case of brutality and mere genocide to use the word of one of Gaddafi's own diplomats. The shooting of demonstrators from helicopter gunships, the strafing of demonstrators from bombers is astonishing."
Yes, it is astonishing that the leader of the Free World can prove so weak in the face of this carnage.
No it is not surprising to see this kind of behavior from an unpredictable despot who has been openly anti-American and violently oppressive for decades.
Obama was quick to abandon his ally, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak two weeks ago, as the "political winds" blew toward the protesters at Tahrir Square in Cairo. Now, Obama refuses to castigate Gaddaffi, a dangerous man who remains unchallenged in his 42 years of dictatorship. The man who led a bloodless Nasserist-style coup in 1969 is currently basking in the savaging of his own country -- all by his own doing. We are bearing witness to a genocide. Gaddafi refuses to relinquish power, and this week, simultaneously ordered strategic bombing of his own citizens, who he and his son, deem as "dogs." This is something Saddam Hussein once ordered against the Kurds. Some of Ghaddafi's bombardiers heroically refused to execute their orders and fled to Malta.
The rest of the world community also is turning a blind eye to this soon-to-be- all-out civil war. The self-congratulatory United Nations, laughably had appointed Gaddafi as a member of the Human Rights Council and has merely given lip service. There are news clips of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's sharing smiles with Gaddafi. I believe these images will haunt the Italian Premier's legacy long after the controversy over his sexual liaisons subsides. He is a complicit partner to a madman who seeks "total war," even against his citizens Berlusconi ‘s country had been the colonizer of this North African country, and like other European countries, their attitude toward the Middle East remains one of collective guilt, deceiving themselves into believing they can now rationalize with evil despots. It is both a farce and shameful that the West refuses, and with impunity forget their values.
Do the United States and the Europeans stay reticent today because they fear an oil-rich country, like Libya, will not provide vital resources in the future?
If the answer is "yes," it' is both inexcusable and unconscionable. The West should remember its roots, built on democracy, liberty and inalienable rights, to stand up for justice and equality. The Obama Administration is afraid of stepping on the toes of an evil tyrant who remains hell-bent on spitting on these hallowed principles.
If there is something to be learned it is that Arab politics remains a convoluted game of strong man politics, antithetical to everything the West is supposed to espouse; Arab politics has always been, and will always be an anarchic and violent system. Hello World! We are all bearing witness to its naked ugliness.
As a leader of the Free World, Obama's reticence toward this rogue regime is sickening, and his silence remains deafening.
