Type Your Article Here ...Obama's glaring double standard.He decides to intervene in Libya because he believes he can. But in Ivory Coast, Laurent GBagbo proved too strong for Sarkozy and, of course, Obama. He even established a no-fly zone of his own and told France to beat it that's what it did. Obama must have been told by his national security advisers it would be too dangerous (so he, too, backed off). Even Ban Ki Moon was cowed by Gbagbo who failed to get reelected but refused to cede power to the winner of the election, now holed up in a hotel and being consoled by the capable UN secretary general, perhaps! Despite the real atrocities happening in Ivory Coast many times worse than the imagined, speculated ones in Benghazi, President Obama (and perhaps President Sarkozy too) said his administration "Remains committed to finding a peaceful solution" to the crisis.
In his life, or shall we say, since he decided (only God knows when?) he wanted to be president of the United States of America, Barrack Hussein Obama had to overcome many hurdles which he called problems. He overcame his first problem when he was elected senator of Illinos.His next problem was Hillary Clinton. And then, John McCain -- before marchingh triumpantly into the Whitehouse.He created history by becoming the first ever Afircan-American to occupy the highest office of the land and, of course, the world.
He's a brilliant when it comes to overcoming problems, as he'd proved again and again. His strategy was to seek popular support for his cause by working behind the scenes, or behind closed door if you will. During the 2008 Democratic nomination primaries, he lined up as many prominent people as possible to endorse his candidacy. Senator Edmard Kennedy, Senator John Edwards and Governor Bill Richardson of New Mexico were those who helped Obama "overcome his problems." By the time the Clinton camp realized what was happening, and though former president Bill Clinton stepped in to help by personally appealing to Bill Richardson, the then Governor of New Mexico and his former UN representative ( among the few not yet commited to any candidate), it was already too late. The former president's appeal didn't move Richardson.
The same tactic was similarly used to prevail over McCain during the general election...and Col. Muammar Ghaddafy in the Libyan conflict!
Another notable thing about Obama was that he's good at pretending. At the beginning of the uprising in Libya, he said Co. Ghaddafy must go! But he pretended to balk at rushing to get involved in another Muslim country for which Americans have shown fatigue.Though he kept up his rhetorics against the Libyan strongman, such as "Ghaddafy had lost his legitimacy to lead", (he must go) etc. round the clock, he didn't act. A day turned into a week. But he still didn't give the order. Then it became too much for certain parties; they slammed him for dithering and called him names. But he was unfazed, why?,because it was his plan to appear reluctant to commit American forces to a third war, to appear not as a president recklessly rushing to intervene in another Muslim country, but be seen as president going into war due to popular demand. The battle cry to prevent humanitarian disaster, genocide or to prevent the possible slaughter of up to seventy thousands innocent civillians was his own --by Obama. And when Col. Ghaddafy threatened "we won't show mercy, or will search for you house to house, room to rooom," he made the biggest (and probably the last) mistake of his life, for he allowed President Obama to have the justification that he here-to-fore didn't have. Legally yes he had the authority to act as he did as he'd already had authorisation from ten out of 15 UN Security Council members (Russia, China, Germany, India and Brazil abstained), and support of the Arab League (which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton described as crucial) to establish a no-flyzone. But morally he knew the no-fly zone would not and could not stop Ghaddafy or his forces on the ground from massacring tens of thousands if that's really their intent. But he knew all along that Ghaddafy would never do such a thing, as proved by the fact that during the battles to regain lost territories from Ras Lanuf, Brega, Aljadabya up to Benghazi, there was no reports of massacres. None. Although his momentum had been building up steadily with almost the whole world under his belt, with even the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon lashing out at the Col., he was still cautous. But after Ghaddafy said he'd show no mercy, eveyrthing changed. The rest, as they say, is history. But, is that it? No! After a few days into the no-fly zone and 110 Tomahawk missiles later, "Wait a minute," said the enraged Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa, "We didn't sign up for this! .We thought we wanted to only protect civillians." This really rattled the adminstration, although the French president or other official rushed to issue statements to the effect that Amr Moussa said he was misquoted, the seed of doubt was planted in people's mind.
When the prime minister of Turkey also said Turkey also had second thought about the way the enforcement of the no-fly zone was carried out, Obama dispatched his capable secretary of state to meet with Amr Moussa and probably Obama himself called up Turkey' Recep Tayyip Erdogan to call them to retract their statements, which they did. The French official or leaders who was quick to jumpt in and say Amr Moussa was misquoted, probably lied (for obvious reason), but since no word came from Moussa denying what the Frtench said, people took it as the truth. Ironically Amr Moussa continued to stress the Arab League didn't agree with the disproportionate use of force that had happened, and even asked for emergency meeting of the League. After a few days, however, Obama personally announced from the Whitehouse that the problems with the Arab Leaue and Turkey had been overcome.And the next day, Amr Moussa, a possible presidential candidate in the forthcoming Egyptian presidential election, perhaps not wanting to alienate Washington which could be useful for his political ambition, repeated the words (as if they were put in his mouth by the Obama administration): "We repect the UN resolution 1973 and endorse it." And that was that.
The ubiquitous repeated reference to multilateral UN resolution or multilateral coalition to return the favour for Nato's help in Afghanistan, or claiming that "our Arab friends are with us or behind us", suggests that the backing from the Arabs was far from solid, or as solid as the Obama administration had wished. Although they went along with Obama's or Clinton's claim of increasing support from many Arab countries to participate in the enforcement of the no-fly zone, none had stepped forward to contribute planes or pilots, which they had plenty, except for Qatar and UAE which agreed, but so far the bombing are carried out by the Americans, British and French. These Arab states are worried that these rebels couldn't be controlled, judging by some statements from Benghazi that they welcome American help but if it's not coming, never mind. They don't need any outside help. They will fight their own battles. Which means once they'e assumed power it's hard to predict what sort of government they will be, whether secular or Islamic.It 's also not far fetched to imagine an unlikely scenario of the AlQaeda being part of the power if not the dominant power.
This governing council which the French rushed to recognized as the only legitimate government of all Libya, consisted of mee-too youths and not very young like elsewhere in the Middle East, former Justice Mustafa Abdul Jalil as the head of the rebel government, army officers who defected to the anti-Ghaddafy side (their contribution to the cause cannot be forgotten or ignored, though they didn't do much fighting they still wanted their share of oil, if you will); and then what about the AlQaeda? It's an open secret that Ghaddafy was a sworn enemy of AlQaeda, and AlQaeda fighters are among the rebels (not because the col. himself said so but because independent sources said so). If that's the case, it would a tussle between the western powers (the U.S., Britain and France) without whose airstrikes the rebels would have been decimated by Ghaddafy, and Islamic militants. But in all probabilities considered, the West would emerge as the white knight which means the rebel government if it ever comes to life will be at best western puupet government. The AlQaeda will make use of that fact to alienate the Muslims from the rebel government, and they become so weak that they are tottering, Mustafa Abdul Jalil may be replaced by someone friendly to or someone from among the AlQaeda ranks. What's more the rebels have no legimate claim over the oil alone since everyone notes they are lucky even to be alive, let alone to celebrate their victory, if not for the western power using Ghaddafy tanks and armour as targets to test their weapons. Once the dust had settled and Ghaddafy gone, if he lost power, the people would slowly realize these rebels were not real heroes; they cried and begged the western powers to save their hides, according to reports from Richard Angel (the bombs were so powerful that the tanks melted). If anything, their government if Obama allows it to happen will last a very short time. Once the Libyans realize this is a de-fac-to American-led western coalition's intervention to prop up mee-too youths trying to emulate their Tunisian and Egyptian counterparts, they will in turn be toppled. No amount of precision bombing will help them if the Libyan people stage demonstrations and shout: western puppets! Traitors!
Either way the Libyan rebels, unlke the Egyptian protesters who earned their respect by being peaceful from start to finish, would be viewed with liitle respect as they didn't single-handedly cause Ghaddafy to fall; the western coaliton's no-fly zone and subsequent what they call mission-creep, did. Also whether Ghaddafy stays or goes, it makes no difference. Obama's doctrine is doomed because of four words most repeated these days: "Why Libya? Why not Ivory Coast? And if Ghaddafy survives or President Bashar of Syria bucks the trend, which seems likely in view of large pro-Bashar rallies taking place throughout thecountry, it's all over for Obama. Even his foray into Egypt, touted as a showcase harbinger for democracy and universal rights demanded by protesting youths, failed to shine. For instane, during the just concluded referendum. the original\par
brains behind the protests (the youths led by the famous Google executive Wael Ghonim) found themselves out maneuvered by the Muslim Brotherhood. After a marathon bargaining among all stakeholders, it was decided the presidential election would be held in 6 months. The youths who lacked experience asked for more time to get organized, but was not entertained.When the campaign started, the youngsters asked the voters to vote no, but the Muslim Brotherhood capaigned for yes votes. The MB also used preachers in mosques to threaten worshipers to vote yes if they want to go to heaven! The Muslim Brotherhood won. The MB, which had ties with Obama in the past could have lobbied the US president to insist they be included in all discussions and Obama obliged.
Although to be fair the Muslim Brotherhood has as much right as the other parties, namely Mubarak's own party NDP which was the largest and other smaller parties, the old and experienced MB,however, may prevail in Egypt. They may not win enough to form the government by themselves, but enough to be kingmaker. Now that thay are free to openly campain for election, expect them to do even better. Their recent success was just a start. Which was like a spanner thrown into Obama's pro-democracy doctrine. The dilemma for President Obama was how to balance on the rope without falling to the ground. If he chooses the the side of the Cairo protesters, the MB will be furious which Obama in his right mind has no relish for; but if he chooses the reverse, the pro-democracy uprisings will die a natural death for sure.