by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
NRO’s\u00a0The Corner<\/em><\/p>\n President Obama just gave a weird speech. Part George W. Bush, part trademark Obama \u2014 filled with his characteristic split-the-difference, straw-man (\u201csome say, others say\u201d), false-choice tropes.<\/p>\n His support for those \u201cyearning for freedom all around the world\u201d was the sort of interventionist foreign policy that a Senator Obama \u2014 if his past reaction to the removal of Saddam Hussein is any indication \u2014 would have objected to, especially in the case of sending bombers over an Arab Muslim oil-exporting country. Since Saddam was a far greater monster (gassing thousands is far worse than turning off the water to neighborhoods) than the monsters that Obama now wishes to slay, I think he has confused rather than enlightened his audience.<\/p>\n There was no mention of the Congress. Is he going to ever ask its approval? And if not, why the repeated emphasis on asking others such as the Arab League or the UN for their approval \u2014 given that their representatives, unlike ours, are largely not elected?<\/p>\n In a speech dedicated to clarifying our policy, it left it even more murky. What was our objective, and what is it now? Obama asserted that \u201cWe have stopped his deadly advance.\u201d But is that the aim \u2014 the status quo, and a sort of permanent\u00a0safe<\/a>\u00a0zone for rebels in accordance with UN directives? Or are we going beyond that to eliminate Qaddafi, who is the source of the problem? The president now says he won\u2019t overthrow Qaddafi by force, but that is what he hopes, in fact, will happen as a result of our military presence:<\/p>\n Of course, there is no question that Libya \u2014 and the world \u2014 will be better off with Qaddafi out of power. I, along with many other world leaders, have embraced that goal, and will actively pursue it through non-military means. But broadening our military mission to include regime\u00a0change<\/a>\u00a0would be a mistake.<\/p>\n This is reminiscent of George H.W. Bush\u2019s declaration that he wanted Saddam gone, had used our military to save Kuwait, but not to remove Saddam, urged others to remove him \u2014 and then ended up solving one problem while creating another more violent and unending.<\/p>\n Constant reference was made to UN sanctions, in contrast both to the costs incurred in Bush\u2019s Iraq, and the dithering by Clinton in the Balkans. He talked of allies, of joint operations, and a diminished American role to come. But again, to fulfill the UN mandate of saving the Libyans, he is going to have to violate \u2014 or at least go beyond \u2014 it by going after Qaddafi, a task he now seems to have outsourced to the Europeans, after ceasing the Tomahawk attacks on key Libyan ground installations. Why brag that \u201cwe targeted tanks and military assets that had been choking off towns and cities and we cut off much of their source of supply\u201d when we are not going to do it anymore, in admission that to do so would be going well beyond a UN-sanctioned no-fly-zone?<\/p>\n Translation: It now seems good to have removed Saddam, but too costly. It was good to remove Milosevic, but it took too long. So I will remove Qaddafi much more quickly and at far less cost, but I won\u2019t do it by targeting Qaddafi, but by preventing his aircraft from flying and hoping Qaddafi goes away. Qaddafi deserves our special intervention because he is worse than other dictators, such as an Assad who is a \u201creformer\u201d or Ahmadinejad whom we won\u2019t \u201cmeddle\u201d against. We successfully sought a UN resolution to protect the people, and will stick by it, but hope somehow someone will go beyond it and remove Qaddafi. We are an\u00a0exceptional<\/a>\u00a0nation that has always acted out of humanitarian concerns in a way not true of other countries (\u201cTo brush aside America\u2019s responsibility as a leader and \u2014 more profoundly \u2014 our responsibilities to our fellow human beings under such circumstances would have been a betrayal of who we are. Some nations may be able to turn a blind eye to atrocities in other countries. The United States of America is different.\u201d), but unfortunately in this case.<\/p>\n