GADDAFFI IS IN THE ascendency and talk of a no fly zone over parts of Libya has once more reached the top of the political agenda in the West. There are those who believe we should steer clear of any kind of military involvement and let events take their coarse: the most likely outcome being a Gadaffi victory and bloody revenge taken on those who stood out against him. As we know, or should by now know, that the Gaddafi’s of this world never forget or forgive and those who stand against military action must prepare themselves for the slaughter of those unable to flee the country, while at the same time preparing themselves for an influx into Europe of those Libyan’s lucky enough to cross over into Tunisia on their way to Italy and eventually the UK.
The odd thing is that many of those who stood out against the Iraq war are now calling for intervention and those, like myself, who supported the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, are sceptical about any such intervention. Many of those of the Stop the War Coalition who marched imperiously through London demanding George Bush’s head at the time of the Iraq War are now asking for a George Bush solution – a solution, which at the time, such people were describing as a war crime and demanding that the former American president should be hauled before a war crimes tribunal in the Hague.
Is it no wonder that President Obama has shown little appetite for military intervention, and as such must disappoint many of those liberals who believed that America’s first black president would be different to all off his predecessors.
Both Left and Right should be behind a no fly zone; the Left because of their wretched consciences, and the Right because they should know that remaining indifferent to the Libyan people’s fate is no soft option. For to stand aside risks unleashing great movements of population from North Africa to Europe.
An event that would surely cause an already exasperated European people to unleash their dissatisfaction on to the streets of every north European country where levels of immigration are already testing the people’s tolerance.
TO SIT BACK AND DO NOTHING will not leave us untouched by Libya’s fate. And those who wish to seek a military solution had better get their skates on.
If there is one country in the West that would be left untouched by doing nothing, that country would be the USA. Yet I cannot see how a no- fly zone would work successfully without their support. We in Europe do not have the military capacity to dominate and police Libyan air space; so America would have to take the lead in any such project, if only under the NATO banner.
The United Nations as usual will be rendered impotent by, in this instance, Russia and China. So it will be left to NATO to stick its neck out and help get rid of Gadaffi. The Gulf States which have the military capacity, at least to help, will sit on the sidelines and blame the West if it ends in a Suez-like misadventure.
Perhaps among all of the Western allies, the UK government has given the most vociferous backing to the no-fly zone idea, yet has very little to contribute to it.
Cameron and his defence minister, Liam Fox have sought to peal layer upon layer from our defence budget in order to help reduce our deficit. Yet they speak as if they had the authority of a world power – when in fact they are overseeing and adding to our national decline. In a way they are no different to Gadaffi with his own idle boasts.
To stand in front of a camera when you have effectively neutered your country’s defences and demand an action that your country cannot participate in, is contemptuous.
This is what David Cameron and his Foreign Secretary have done. The late Chairman Mao had an expression for such statesmen, ‘paper tigers’ and this indeed is what our current Coalition has reduced a once great nation too.
MY GUESS IS, THAT WHEN IT COMES TO LIBYA and the no-fly zone, our contribution will comprise of a joint one between us and France: their rusted hulks of aircraft carriers, coupled with whatever aircraft we will have left available to us.
The French, like all European nations, have allowed America to carry the burden of Europe’s defence since the Second World War and throughout the Cold War. They have managed to do so while at the same time despising the power of the USA.
We in Britain, on the other hand, have always managed to punch above our weight in terms of our nation’s defence. But now our so-called ‘statesmen’ who put foreign aid before the defence of their country are indeed belittling the people they are supposed to be serving by issuing idle threats of the nature given to Libya by our prime minister and Foreign Secretary.
As a man of the Right, I take a different stance to those who may think like me when it come to the issue of military involvement in Libya. I believe we should, for reasons of self-interest, put an end to Colonel Gadaffi.
I would not however blame president Obama if he washed his hands of the whole business of Libya and left us in Europe to deal with it ourselves. Indeed President Obama would be doing us a great favour if he did indeed stand idly by and just watched developments – developments that cannot impact on the nation he governs.
COLONEL GADAFFI, like Saddam Hussein needs to be removed if his people are to be free and without fear. Gadaffi also be removed for selfish European reasons which has nothing to do with oil, but everything to do with keeping Libyans on their own soil.
Time is running out for the West in Libya. NATO must, if necessary go it alone without the authority of the UN. A no-fly zone must be activated as soon as possible. To leave it until Gadaffi has gained control of his country would be too late. At the moment we in the West still have time to alter the balance of forces in Libya.
We know there is a rebel opposition, but we know little of its make-up. This knowledge has altered movement to a no-fly zone. But it should not do so because, even if a regime hostile to the West were to come to power, at least the Libyan people would stay put knowing that Gadaffi had been overthrown.
We in the West should not concern ourselves with what would come after Gadaffi. If it is, in the worst case scenario, an Islamist regime, then we can assume that this what the people wanted and they should be left to live with it. We in the West need not fear an Islamist Libya. What is more worryingly is the prospect of Gadaffi orchestrating his revenge upon the Libyan people for turning away from him. For this would mean hundreds of thousands of refugees landing on European shores.
We have to take a hand and rid Libya of its despot. I hope this crisis will cause the Coalition to thinks again about defence cuts, but I hope in vain because the Coalition’s list of priorities does not include the ring fencing of defence in favour of foreign aid.
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