I've been skeptical about the US/NATO effort in Libya - not because I think there's some grand conspiracy on the part of the MIC to install a puppet government, but because I'm always skeptical about military intervention, and because I think it's realistic to assume that when great powers intervene in the politics of a smaller country, the powers must have some mercenary rationale.
That's why I think it's important that folks read Juan Cole's latest post at Informed Comment: "Top Ten Myths About the Libyan War." In this post, Cole respectfully challenges left-leaning critics of NATO's role in the revolution.
A few choice excerpts after the jump.
Here are a few of the standard lines on Libya that I have heard (and half-believed), but which Cole rebuts:
4. There was a long stalemate in the fighting between the revolutionaries and the Qaddafi military. There was not. This idea was fostered by the vantage point of many Western observers, in Benghazi. It is true that there was a long stalemate at Brega, which ended yesterday when the pro-Qaddafi troops there surrendered. But the two most active fronts in the war were Misrata and its environs, and the Western Mountain region.
5. The Libyan Revolution was a civil war. It was not, if by that is meant a fight between two big groups within the body politic. There was nothing like the vicious sectarian civilian-on-civilian fighting in Baghdad in 2006.
6. Libya is not a real country and could have been partitioned between east and west . . . I don’t understand the propensity of Western analysts to keep pronouncing nations in the global south “artificial” and on the verge of splitting up. It is a kind of Orientalism.
8. The United States led the charge to war. There is no evidence for this allegation whatsoever.
10. This was a war for Libya’s oil. That is daft. Libya was already integrated into the international oil markets, and had done billions of deals with BP, ENI, etc., etc.
Whether or not you agree with Cole, I think his arguments deserve attention. I also feel that understanding whether NATO's efforts in Libya can be called successful - and what conditions and policies contributed to that success - is essential as we evaluate our response to the Arab Spring in other countries, especially Syria.
Obligatory Rec List Thanks: Wow, after seven years of regular DK visits, I'm on the Rec List. Thanks, everyone - but thanks especially to Professor Cole.