Tag Archives: Libya

Britain, Foreign Affairs, Islamic State, Libya, United Nations

MPs blame Cameron for the rise of Islamic State

LIBYA

Intro: British chaotic intervention in Libya left a vacuum that has let jihadis thrive

Members of Parliament on the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee have warned that the ‘ill-conceived’ military intervention in Libya by David Cameron has helped to fuel the growth of Islamic State and left the world a more dangerous place.

In a devastating verdict, MPs have savaged the former prime minister’s judgement in rushing to war in 2011, saying the intervention was based on ‘erroneous assumptions’.

The cross-party committee accuses Mr Cameron of ignoring military chiefs and a lack of reliable intelligence to pursue an “opportunistic policy of regime change” in Libya.

And it says he gave little thought to how Libya would fare following the removal of dictator Colonel Gaddafi setting the scene for the country’s descent into anarchy and chaos.

The committee says that Mr Cameron’s Libyan adventure ‘was not informed by accurate intelligence’, with ministers underestimating the threat that the country could become an Islamist stronghold.

It concludes: ‘By the summer of 2011, the limited intervention to protect civilians had drifted into an opportunistic policy of regime change. That policy was not underpinned by a strategy to support and shape post-Gaddafi Libya.

‘The result was political and economic collapse, inter-militia and inter-tribal warfare, humanitarian and migrant crises, widespread human rights violations, the spread of Gaddafi regime weapons across the region and the growth of Islamic State in North Africa. Through his decision making in the National Security Council, former prime minister David Cameron was ultimately responsible for the failure to develop a coherent Libya strategy.’

The report, dated September 14, 2016, says Mr Cameron’s failings in Libya means Britain now has a “particular responsibility” to assist the war-ravaged country and help deal with the flood of migrants heading from its shores to Europe.

But it says ministers should not deploy troops to the country until it becomes more stable, warning they would become “an accessible Western Target” for IS and other militants. The committee’s chairman, Conservative MP Crispin Blunt, said: ‘The UK’s actions in Libya were part of an ill-conceived intervention, the results of which are still playing out today.’

An international coalition led by Britain and France launched airstrikes against Gaddafi’s forces in March 2011 after the regime threatened to attack the rebel-held city of Benghazi.

Mr Cameron claimed the intervention was necessary to prevent a massacre of civilians, but the new parliamentary report says that, despite appalling human rights abuses over 40 years, Gaddafi had no record of large-scale attacks on Libyan civilians.

It says that the Government ‘selectively took elements of Gaddafi’s rhetoric at face value’ without assessing the real threat.

MPs find that ministers and officials should have realised that the rebels included a “significant Islamist element”. They add: “The possibility that militant extremist groups would attempt to benefit from the rebellion would not have been the preserve of hindsight.”

The report also criticises Mr Cameron for ordering military action despite the reservations of the then Chief of the Defence Staff Lord Richards and MPs are scathing about the lack of post-war planning for the country.

The report cites unpublished research by the House of Commons Library showing Britain spent £320million bombing Libya, but just £25million on reconstruction.

Mr Cameron did not give evidence to the inquiry, saying he was too busy. A Foreign Office spokesman said the decision to intervene in Libya was an international one, called for by the Arab League and authorised by the UN.

18 September, 2016:

When David Cameron’s legacy as prime minister is written into the history books, his decision for Britain to join France in the 2011 military intervention against Libyan dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi is not likely to count in his favour. Insisting he had learnt the lessons and the litany of failures of the Iraq war, Mr Cameron was keen to emphasise that, so far as Libya was concerned, Britain had the full backing of a UN Security Council resolution, and that military intervention was vital if Gaddafi was to be prevented from massacring thousands of anti-government protesters in Benghazi.

But as the damning report by the Foreign Affairs Select Committee on Libya makes clear, Mr Cameron’s attempt to develop a new paradigm for military intervention in rogue states was as flawed as Tony Blair’s arguments for invading Iraq. The report concludes that the decision to intervene was not based on accurate intelligence, the threat to civilians in Benghazi was overstated and the government failed to grasp that among the rebel factions were a significant number of Islamist radical fighters.

As Mr Cameron has already announced his decision to stand down from the House of Commons, he has avoided of being in the position of defending his government’s record in Libya (and also of explaining the role Mr Blair played in encouraging him to act).

Theresa May is yet to make clear her views on how she intends Britain will respond to future global challenges. But with conflicts in places such as Syria continuing to dominate the headlines, it is vital that, if Britain does need to respond militarily, it does not end up repeating the same mistakes Mr Blair and Mr Cameron made.

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Britain, Iraq, Middle East, Military, Society, United States

Iraq and the tinderbox of the Middle East: America weighs up its options…

IRAQ

Intro: Learning the lessons of recent conflicts in the region should provide us with a guide concerning the current situation in Iraq

The paradox of the US and UK cosying up to Iran in light of the chaos in Iraq reconciles well with the age-old adage of ‘my enemy’s enemy is my friend’ – an example that demonstrates in comfortable fashion just what is implied by this historical idiom. And, yet, the crisis in the region leaves the US and UK with little choice.

Over the last ten days images of ISIS fighters massacring Shi’ite captives, brought to us most graphically through the medium of social media, are brutally barbaric and shocking – but, that has been their intention all along; horror is, after all, a weapon of war. It is being used by ISIS in ways that is totally depraved and inhumane of reasoned thinking.

We should be in no doubt. There will be more such images as the insurgents intensify their activities. And with that will come increasing calls for the UK to accept its responsibility for Iraq’s grim predicament and to help to do something to alleviate it.

We should not be misunderstood, either, when it is asserted that the UK is, in some measure, culpable in bringing about the grisly events that are being played out in Iraq. That can hardly be denied. There are, of course, other factors which have played their part, most notably the wave of sectarian conflict that has swept across the Middle East as part of the Arab Spring and revolution. Ultimately, though, in supporting the 2003 military invasion, Britain helped to light the fuse.

Pressure for the UK to re-engage militarily in Iraq must, however, be firmly resisted. There is no public or political appetite for an intervention again at this level on this occasion. Two things have emerged that should be crystal clear, and learning the lessons of recent conflicts in the region should provide us with a guide concerning the current situation in Iraq.

The first is that, like all modern warfare, aerial superiority is the key to victory. This was demonstrated through the use of UK/US air support in the overthrow of Colonel Gaddafi in Libya, and, as it happens, in the way the absence of this support for rebels in Syria has allowed president Bashar al-Assad to continue his onslaught and by surviving as the country’s brutal dictator.

But the second is that air supremacy on its own cannot conclusively defeat an insurgency. Boots on the ground are required – although, crucially, those boots do not need to be US or UK boots. Arguably, those boots can be Iraqi boots. Once the Baghdad military forces regroup following the recent embarrassing defections that ceded so much ground and territory to ISIS, Iraq’s own security personnel should be in a position to claim back much of the lost ground.

For the Iraqi government to regain control, it does look as if US air support will be needed. But such assistance carries significant risks.

With Sunni-Shia tensions already high in the region, how would others in close proximity to events in Iraq react to the US effectively becoming an instrument of Shia might and strength? Middle East conflagrations do have a habit of converging, no more so than in the tinderbox that is Lebanon. US air strikes in Iraq would not auger well for those neighbouring countries that have allegiances with each other.

President Barack Obama continues to weigh up his options. Mr Obama has already approved 300 extra troops to secure the US embassy and Baghdad airport, and calls are mounting in America – notably in Republican quarters – for a more strategic military deployment to help repel the rebels and by restoring order.

In all likelihood the US President will win domestic support for drone strikes. Given what has gone in recent conflicts an air of caution seems certain to be placed over the use of direct air strikes. The use of drones carries risks, too, as innocents caught up in the crossfire, for example, will always consider defecting to the other side for protection. On a calculation of minimising collateral damage to achieve its objectives the use of aerial drones is an option America has at its disposal.

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Economic, Europe, Government, History, NATO, Politics, Russia, Society, United States

America has a role in supporting Europe. It isn’t about to turn its back…

AMERICA & EUROPE IN COUNTERING THE THREAT FROM RUSSIA

A European crisis has, once again, brought the ambitions of a second-term American president into the sharp light of day. Mr Obama could never have wished that he would land in Europe with the sole task of rallying some of his country’s oldest allies against the expansionist threats posed by Vladimir Putin of Russia. And yet, this is precisely the situation Barack Obama finds himself in.

Mr Obama arrived in The Hague and described Europe’s idiosyncratic collection of comatose economies as the ‘cornerstone of America’s engagement with the world’. His presence was enough to underline the realities of a new and emerging Cold War message: one to which America remains the ultimate guarantor of European security.

Whatever the intrinsic American wishes are, America cannot abdicate from that role. While history may reflect back the words of Franklin Roosevelt who pledged that America would never send US troops to fight in Europe, or even during Mr Obama’s own reign in office when he pronounced America’s ‘pivot’ and orientation towards Asia, Putin’s provocative stance and actions in Crimea has made such a profound difference to how the US reflects upon Europe. The United States accepts that the threats posed by Russia are serious and interconnected, and is turning away from the Pacific to behave in a way that every president from Truman to Reagan would have recognised.

Predicting what Putin will do next to enhance and strengthen his Russian Federation is difficult to determine. As a former KGB officer, he knows the high value placed on keeping his intentions as mysterious and covert as possible.

Psychology is also at play. The flint-eyed incumbent of the Kremlin strongly believes that Mr Obama is a president motivated far more by what is happening in the Pacific. To Mr Putin’s eye Barack Obama is a leader that is fundamentally uninterested in Europe and viscerally reluctant to use force of any kind. The Russian leader observed how Mr Obama steered clear of intervening in Libya by allowing Britain and France to claim the credit for toppling the Gaddafi regime. America’s role in that campaign was leadership from the back, rather than the front dynamism many would otherwise have expected.

And no-doubt the Kremlin hardliner would have taken special note when Bashar al-Assad made a mockery over Mr Obama’s ‘red lines’ and gassed hundreds of innocent Syrian civilians without paying a military price.

Mr Putin may even have thought this was an American president who could be pushed around. The disarmament treaty with Moscow, signed in 2010, for example, imposed far greater cuts on the US arsenal than was made to the Russian inventory.

Russia has remained committed in driving a wedge between Europe and America. Along with its actions in Ukraine, Russia has demonstrated the compelling necessity of NATO and the Atlantic Alliance. Such miscalculations may even impel Europe to realise the mistakes of continuously running down its defences.

America and Europe seem certain to respond with skill and resolve. Such a partnership can only make the world a safer place.

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