Most Libyans believed they were lucky when, during the February 17, 2011 revolution, the UN Security Council (UNSC) adopted Resolution No. 1973 under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations, enabling NATO to launch a military air campaign and ultimately securing victory for the rebel forces.
Barack Obama’s United States however withdrew early from the leadership of the campaign lest it should have been described in the media as ‘Obama’s war’, like George W. Bush’s war on Afghanistan and Iraq. So the leadership moved to Nicolas Sarkozy’s France and David Cameron’s Britain.
Most Libyans believed they were lucky when, during the February 17, 2011 revolution, the UN Security Council (UNSC) adopted Resolution No. 1973 under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations, enabling NATO to launch a military air campaign and ultimately securing victory for the rebel forces.
Barack Obama’s United States however withdrew early from the leadership of the campaign lest it should have been described in the media as ‘Obama’s war’, like George W. Bush’s war on Afghanistan and Iraq. So the leadership moved to Nicolas Sarkozy’s France and David Cameron’s Britain.
After the rebels captured Gaddafi, who was hiding in a cesspool, and killed him on the same day, the Europeans stopped their air operation without finishing their more important political role on the ground, leaving the Libyans drowning in their own political chaos.
Logically, the Europeans were right to withdraw because it was a Libyan problem on Libyan land. But because of their interference using their juggernaut military power, albeit from the air, to protect the Libyan people and bring them democracy, the Europeans became an integral part of the issue: a problem and a solution.
When the Europeans withdrew and Gaddafi’s fragile institutions fell apart, the country turned into a bloody scene for armed militias fighting for power for different political, ideological, regional and tribal goals. Then, IS emerged and managed to establish its first emirate in North Africa in Sirte, the point that separates western from eastern Libya.
And after the horse was stolen, the West – the Americans and Europeans – just like the police that always come late in movies, marched in to save the labyrinthine situation.
British Prime Minister David Cameron, along with former French President Nicolas Sarkozy, took the brunt of Obama’s criticism for their failure to play their political role and participate in the building of a new Gaddafi-post Libyan state.
“When I go back and I ask myself what went wrong, there is room for criticism because I had more faith in the Europeans given Libya’s proximity, being invested in the follow-up,” said Obama in a recent interview with The Atlantic. “Cameron became distracted by a range of other things after the operation.”
He noted that Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, lost his job the following year and he used France’s interference for electoral purposes. “Sarkozy wanted to trumpet the flights he was taking in the air campaign, despite the fact that we had wiped out all the air defenses and essentially set up the entire infrastructure,” explained Obama. This sort of bragging was fine because it allowed the U.S. to “purchase France’s involvement in a way that made it less expensive for us and less risky for us.”
In other words, giving France extra credit in exchange for less risk and cost to the United States was a useful trade-off except that “from the perspective of a lot of the folks in the foreign-policy establishment, well, that was terrible. If we are going to do something, obviously we have got to be up front, and nobody else is sharing in the spotlight,” said Obama.
Obama also blamed internal Libyan dynamics. “The degree of tribal division in Libya was greater than our analysts had expected. And our ability to have any kind of structure there that we could interact with and start training and start providing resources broke down very quickly.”
Libya proved to him that the Middle East was best avoided. “There is no way we should commit to governing the Middle East and North Africa,” said Obama at a time when his term is about to end and when Libya is sinking in its own chaos.
The chaos is only a heading for a critical political void, a doomed economic situation and an aggravated security situation that IS has been using to grow stronger and expand. The Libyan Political Agreement (LPA) – signed in Skhirat, Morocco – has become the only possible way out of Libyans’ political, economic and security predicament and also for the West to correct its mistake of not continuing its political role following the air operation.
UNSC Resolution No. 2259 endorsed the LPA and welcomed it and the establishment of the Presidency Council (PC) of the Government of National Accord (GNA). Thus, the PC has gained an international trust and is therefore in no need to earn the token vote of confidence of the ragged Council of Deputies (CoD) in Tobruk, especially since over 100 deputies from outside the CoD headquarters – after blocking the voting session – signed a statement of confidence of the GNA.
This caused the PC to issue a decisive statement calling upon all Libyan sovereign institutions and public bodies, mainly formal financial institutions, to start communicating promptly with the GNA to develop the measures necessary for transfer of power. The problem with the statement however is that it was issued from the capital of another state, Tunis.
In order for the GNA to be able to receive the sovereign institutions and public bodies, it has to carry out its work in Tripoli or in any Libyan land even if a remote village. Many European officials, especially from France and Italy, say they are ready to protect the GNA, but without elaborating how.
Head of the United Nations Support Mission in Libya Martin Kobler said 95 percent of Libyans support a unified government. Nonetheless, Libyans’ deteriorating situation clearly shows that ignoring the GNA as a solution, despite all its defected structure and people, will lead the country and people to more and more chaos and destruction.
