The Law

Presidential Deception in Foreign Policy

Making: Military Intervention in Libya 2011

STEPHEN R. WEISSMAN

How did a U.S.-led, U.N.- approved military intervention to protect civilians in Libya end up
enabling rebels to overthrow the Qaddafi regime? A variety of evidence shows that the Obama adminis-
tration was dishonest in publicly describing its military purpose as solely humanitarian when it was
largely directed towards regime change. Presidential deception prevented the emergence of alternative poli-
cies that might have avoided Libya’s postwar chaos while obfuscating U.S. responsibility for that conse-
quence. The essence of the deception is set forth below in contrasting statements by President Obama and
former Central Intelligence Agency Director and Secretary of Defense Panetta.

Keywords: president, Obama, Libya, Qaddafi, intervention, Benghazi, Clinton

“Of course, there is no question that Libya—and the world—would 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 change would be a mistake.”
— President Barack Obama, Address to the Nation on Libya, March 28, 2011 (White
House 2011b).

“In Afghanistan. . . I said what everyone in Washington knew but we couldn’t officially
acknowledge: that our goal in Libya was regime change.”
— Former Central Intelligence Agency Director and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta,
recounting a statement he made in early July 2011 (Panetta 2014, 354).

Introduction

In August 2011 a U.S.-led, U.N.-authorized military intervention to “protect civil-

ians . . . under threat of attack” in Libya (U.N. Security Council 2011c, 3) enabled rebels

Stephen R. Weissman is former staff director for the U.S. House of Representatives’ Subcom-
mittee on Africa. He is the author of A Culture of Deference: Congress’s Failure of Leadership in For-
eign Policy. AUTHOR’S NOTE: My thanks to Louis Fisher for his encouragement and valuable
comments.

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Presidential Studies Quarterly DOI: 10.1111/psq.12294
Vol. 46, No. 3, September 2016, 669–690 C 2016 Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress
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670 | WEISSMAN

to overthrow long-time dictator Muammar Qaddafi. Although there was a democratic

parliamentary election in July 2012, the country quickly succumbed to the rule of lawless
militias. These were largely descended from local rebel brigades that benefited from the
intervention. In September an extremist Islamist militia was implicated in the assassina-
tion of four Americans, including Ambassador Christopher Stevens, in the former rebel
capitol of Benghazi. Today Libya is widely characterized as a “failed state.” Rival govern-
ments—in the West and in the East—proclaim their legitimacy. But effective political
and economic power resides in hundreds of competing militias, including newer Islamic
State and tribal formations. In 2014, fighting killed up to 2,500 people (International
Crisis Group 2015, i). In February 2016 the Obama administration debated using mili-
tary force against the Islamic State grouping (Schmitt 2016).
On the international level, the undisciplined outflow of arms, ethnic fighters and
Islamic extremists from postwar Libya precipitated an Islamic extremist takeover of half
the nation of Mali and strengthened jihadists from North and West Africa to the Egyptian
Sinai. The intervention, mainly organized by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO), aggravated relations between the United States and Russia. The latter continues
to denounce alleged Western misuse of the United Nations to force regime change.
Recently the chaos in Libya precipitated a breakdown of coastal migration controls, con-
tributing to a risky mass exodus of African and Middle Eastern refugees toward Europe.
These developments raise important questions about presidential policy making in
Libya (Congress did not play a role). How did an intervention justified by humanitarian
concern become one that overturned a regime and ushered in its chaotic successor? Did
the Obama administration consider alternative policies that might have avoided the
worst consequences of the intervention? Are there any implications for the integrity of
the American democratic process?
On these issues, the postintervention reflections of former and current U.S. officials
are less than satisfying. In a 2015 article in Foreign Affairs, two former members of the
National Security Staff wrote, “The military campaign that the United States designed
and led (even if from behind the scenes) was tightly limited to ending attacks against
civilians and achieving a cease-fire that would pave the way for a political transition. . . As
a result of his intransigence, it was Qaddafi himself and not NATO who turned the inter-
vention from a mission to protect civilians into something that led to regime change”
(Chollet and Fishman 2015, 155). The authors ask their readers to believe that Qaddafi
had the power to force NATO to do “something” that overthrew him. Having endowed
him with the decisive agency, they do not find it necessary to consider whether alternative
U.S. and NATO approaches might have produced a better political transition. Abstract-
ing the postwar situation from what came before, they conclude that it would have been
difficult to improve upon America’s performance given the fledgling new government’s
reluctance to admit international peacekeepers and inability to utilize outside assistance
(Chollet and Fishman 2015, 156–57).
Similarly, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, by all accounts a major force in
the formulation and implementation of the military operation (Cooper and Myers 2011;
Warrick 2011; Mills 2011; Gates 2014, 511) sheds little light on its evolution or alterna-
tive policy options. For instance, during the Democratic Presidential Debate in December
2015 she observed:
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PRESIDENTIAL DECEPTION ON LIBYA | 671

And I think it’s—fair to say that—of all of the Arab leaders Qaddafi probably had more
blood on his hands of Americans than anybody else. And when he moved on his own people
threatening—a massacre, genocide—the Europeans and the Arabs, our allies and partners—
did ask for American help. And we provided it. And we didn’t put a single boot on the
ground. And—Gaddafi was deposed.
The Libyans turned out for one of the most successful Arab elections that any Arab country
has had. They elected moderate leaders. Now there has been a lot of turmoil and trouble as
they have tried to deal with these radical elements, which you find in this arc of instability
from North Africa to Afghanistan. And it is imperative that we do more. . . to try to deal
with this arc of instability which does have a lot of impact on what happens in a country like
Libya (CBS News 2015).

Secretary Clinton fails to explain exactly how help in preventing a “massacre, gen-
ocide” produced Qaddafi’s overthrow. Even the phrase “Qaddafi was deposed” lacks a sub-
ject; it does not identify who or what deposed him. Clinton too views the postwar scene
in isolation from the preceding U.S. policy and is at a loss to come up witb specific pre-
ventive measures.
President Obama’s postintervention remarks are somewhat more enlightening—
but also quite confusing. During his October 2012 presidential debate with Governor
Mitt Romney, Obama commented:

But you know, going back to Libya—because this is an example of how we make choices.
You know, when we went into Libya and we were able to immediately stop the massacre
there because of the unique circumstances and the coalition that we had helped to organize,
we also had to make sure Muammar Qaddafi didn’t stay there. . . Imagine if we had pulled
out at that point. That—Muammar Qaddafi had more American blood on his hands than
any individual other than Osama bin Laden. And so we were going to make sure that we fin-
ished the job. (Commission on Presidential Debates 2012)

Obama acknowledges U.S. agency in Qaddafi’s downfall, but does not indicate
when his decision to go beyond stopping the massacre to pursue regime change was
made. As for why, he offers a curious rationale by noting that Qaddafi had “American
blood on his hands.” This is a clear reference to a Libyan agent’s involvement in the 1988
destruction of a Pan Am plane over Lockerbie Scotland. But the United States and United
Nations had already addressed this problem by imposing economic sanctions on Libya
and demanding that Qaddafi hand over the suspected terrorists, which he finally did in
1999. By 2003, Qaddafi had also agreed to pay compensation to the victims’ families—
and the world moved on (Vandewalle 2006, 140, 152, 170, 179–84). Indeed, by the time
of the Arab Spring, Libya’s overall relationship with the United States was fairly good:
Qaddafi had given up his weapons of mass destruction programs and was cooperating
closely with U.S. anti-terrorist programs.
Obama has not discussed the contradiction between his admission and statements
by him and his administration during the intervention that disclaimed regime change. In
an August 2014 interview with journalist Thomas Friedman, the president spoke of “a
lesson I had to learn” from Libya:
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672 | WEISSMAN

Then it’s the day after Qaddafi is gone. . . At that moment, there has to be a much more
aggressive effort to rebuild societies that didn’t have any civic traditions. (New York Times
2014)

Like others, however, the president focused only on the postwar experience and did
not provide any preventative policy recommendations.
This article attempts to answer the important questions about policy transforma-
tion and its consequences that U.S. policy makers have mostly avoided. It concludes that,
from the early days of the intervention, the Obama administration deceived both Ameri-
cans and the international community about its policy of military-assisted regime change
in Libya. This dishonesty may well have prevented the emergence of alternative policies
that would have better served the interests of Americans, Libyans, and the international
community. It has also made it difficult to hold the administration accountable for the
ongoing crisis in postwar Libya.

How the Intervention Developed

On February 15, 2011 the sudden wave of popular uprisings against longtime Mid-
dle Eastern dictators called “the Arab Spring,” swept into Benghazi, Libya’s second larg-
est city. It quickly conquered the historically disaffected, Cyrenaica province in the East
and erupted in several Western cities in Tripolitania. Facing a powerful challenge to his
42 years of personal rule, Muammar Qaddafi used disproportionate force against demon-
strators who rapidly turned to violent attacks on regime institutions—provoking an even
more brutal response. With the body count mounting into the hundreds, on February 26
U.N. Security Council Resolution 1970 unanimously called for “an immediate end to the
violence” and “steps to fulfill the legitimate demands of the population.” It backed up
these demands by imposing an arms embargo, travel bans, and asset freezes on Qaddafi,
his family, and key security officials and referring the situation to the International Crim-
inal Court (U.N. Security Council 2011a).
By the time the Council returned to the subject on March 17, circumstances on the
ground had changed significantly. The insurrection had transformed into a full-fledged
civil war between Libyan security forces and local insurgents bolstered by military defec-
tors. In Benghazi, a newly minted Interim National Transitional Council (NTC) headed
by the defecting Minister of Justice—a liberal reformer—claimed leadership of the resist-
ance. The notoriously unpredictable Qaddafi and his most important son, Saif al-Islam,
resorted to dramatic rhetoric to intimidate their foes, raising fears for the safety of civil-
ians, especially in Benghazi. In his infamous February 22 zenga zenga (alley-to-alley)
address, the Libyan “Guide” promised that “millions” would “march to purify Libya inch
by inch, house by house, home by home, alley by alley, corner by corner, person by person
to clean the dirt and impurities” (Moammar Qaddafi Speech 2011). In subsequent
speeches, he offered the rebels amnesty if they laid down their arms, but also warned,
“We will have no mercy” on “unbelievers” and “traitors” (Kuperman 2013, 113 n. 29;
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PRESIDENTIAL DECEPTION ON LIBYA | 673

Kirkpatrick 2011; New York Times 2011a). A government-launched offensive recaptured

several rebel-held towns and threatened the rebel bastion of Benghazi.
Politically embarrassed by their belated support of the successful “Arab Spring”
revolts in January and February in neighboring Tunisia and Egypt, the United States,
Great Britain, and France now called upon Qaddafi to leave power. More than that, they
established contacts with the NTC (France on March 10 even recognized it as “the legiti-
mate representative of the Libyan people”), undertook military planning for a “no fly
zone” to protect the rebels from government air attacks, and quietly set in motion prepa-
rations to aid the rebels. In contrast, other external actors emphasized diplomatic meas-
ures. The U.N. Secretary-General urged “all parties in this conflict to accept an
immediate cease-fire” (U.N. Secretary-General 2011) and appointed a Special Envoy to
make contact with both sides and other Libyan “stakeholders” to determine “how best to
resolve the current crisis” (U.N. Security Council 2011b). Africa’s regional organization,
the African Union (AU), put forth a “road map” emphasizing an immediate ceasefire and
an “inclusive transitional period” leading to democratic political reforms. It appointed a
High-Level Committee of Presidents and the AU’s Chairperson to facilitate “inclusive
dialogue” between the warring parties (Weissman 2013).
In further response to the changing crisis, the Security Council passed Resolution
1973 10-0 with 6 abstentions. It contained four central paragraphs (U.N. Security Coun-
cil 2011c, 2–3):

1. Demands the immediate establishment of a cease fire and a complete end to violence
and an end to all attacks against, and abuses of, citizens.
2. Stresses the need to intensify efforts to find a solution to the crisis which responds to
the legitimate demands of the Libyan people and notes the decisions of the Secretary
General to send his Special Envoy to Libya and of the Peace and Security Council of
the African Union to send its Ad Hoc High Level Committee to Libya with the
aim of facilitating dialogue to lead to the political reforms necessary to find a peace-
ful and sustainable solution.
4. Authorizes member states to take all necessary measures. . . to protect civilians and
civilian populated areas under threat of attack in [Libya], including Benghazi, while
excluding a foreign occupation force of any form. . ..
6. Decides to establish a ban on all flights in the airspace of [Libya] in order to help
protect civilians. [This did not apply to flights authorized under paragraph 4]

As Qaddafi’s forces approached Benghazi on March 19th, the United States, Britain,
and France, acting under Paragraph 4, launched a seven-month, multinational air war
against the Libyan regime. That struggle effectively ended on October 20th when an
American Predator drone and two French Mirage attack planes struck a convoy transport-
ing the already deposed and fleeing Qadaffi, leaving him to be murdered by nearby rebels
(Chivvis 2014, 167).
The air war began as separate, coordinated national campaigns; the predominant
U.S. operation was christened “Odyssey Dawn.” Within two weeks NATO absorbed
these under the aegis of “Operation Unified Protector.” While the three Western powers
continued to be the major actors, they were joined by five other NATO countries, Sweden
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674 | WEISSMAN

and three non-NATO Arab partners—Qatar, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Jor-
dan. The air war saved the rebels from immediate defeat. More than that, along with
direct military assistance from several NATO countries and Qatar, it eventually enabled
the insurgents to overthrow the regime (Mueller 2015, 1).
An unnamed U.S. official described the American military role in Libya as “leading
from behind,” a term that provoked controversy over the Obama administration’s leader-
ship in foreign policy generally (Chivvis 2014, 9). Yet this characterization can be mis-
leading. While the United States drastically reduced its air strikes when Odyssey Dawn
transitioned to Unified Protector, it still accounted for 27% of total air sorties. It pro-
vided the NATO operation with its only drones (unmatched for close air support in urban
fighting), 75% of its Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance data and its refueling
tankers, and the bulk of its targeteers and strategists. Although the Commander of Uni-
fied Protector was a Canadian, the head of Air Operations was an American as was as the
Supreme Commander of NATO itself (Mueller 2015, 4, 42–46). Moreover, U.S. diplo-
macy played a decisive role in the Security Council’s passage of Resolution 1973, the
organization and maintenance of the NATO military coalition, and the shaping of its
political framework.

Public Justification of the U.S./NATO Military Mission:

Protecting Civilians

In a series of major public statements by the president and State Department offi-
cials from March 18 to June 15, the administration set forth its military objectives and
related policies. All of the essential points, which are distilled and excerpted below, were
laid out by the end of March and maintained throughout the intervention:

The military mission of the U.S. and its allies in Libya is to protect innocent civilians from
“immediate danger.” It is “narrowly focused on saving lives,” a “well-defined goal” that was
expressed in U.N. Security Council Resolution 1973. This objective is distinct from our
“broader goal of a Libya that belongs not to a dictator but to its people,” which we and
others “will actively pursue through non-military means.” Military action has become nec-
essary to prevent “the prospect of violence on a horrific scale,” heralded by Qaddafi’s
threats—not only in Benghazi where “thousands of civilians would very likely have been
slaughtered,” but also in other Libyan population centers. Our military campaign will end
when the Libyan Government complies with three non-negotiable conditions that we and
our allies “agree” are found in the U.N. resolution: unilaterally implement a cease fire, stop
advancing on Benghazi and pull troops back from populated areas it has “forcibly entered,
occupied or besieged” and allow humanitarian assistance to flow.
The nationwide uprising also demonstrates that Qaddafi has “lost the legitimacy to lead and
must go.” Failing to respond to this tyrant’s attempt to overrun his opposition “would
undercut democratic aspirations in the region and embolden repressive leaders.” However
the political and economic change we seek in the Middle East and North Africa “will not
and cannot be imposed by the United States or any foreign power.” In Libya’s case,
“broadening our military mission to include regime change would be a mistake.” It would
“splinter our coalition,” “likely” require “U.S. troops on the ground,” “or risk killing
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PRESIDENTIAL DECEPTION ON LIBYA | 675

civilians from the air.” Our costs “and share of the responsibility for what comes next”
would be high. Still, since Libya will be a “dangerous” place as long as Qaddafi remains in
power, we and our partners will pressure him to leave “through non-military” political and
economic means: denying his regime arms, cutting off its cash, and aiding the opposition.
Qaddafi’s political demise “may not occur overnight.” However, “the approach we are pur-
suing has succeeded before in the Balkans.” NATO’s military humanitarian intervention
“ended with [Serbian leader Slobodan] Milosevic withdrawing his forces from Kosovo. But
an effort to support democracy and human rights in Serbia did not end there. We kept up
the political and economic pressure and one year after the military operation ended, the peo-
ple of Serbia ousted Milosevic and then turned him over to The Hague” (U.S. Africa Com-
mand 2011a; White House 2011a,b; U.S. Africa Command 2011b; U.S. Department of
State 2011; New York Times 2011b; U.S. Department of State and Department of Defense
2011).

The True Purpose of U.S.-Led Military Intervention: Beyond

Civilian Protection to Effecting Regime Change

There is no reason to doubt that a primary—and probably necessary—motivation

for the U.S./NATO-led air campaign in Libya was humanitarian concern over a potential
bloodbath, although President Obama reportedly told his National Security Council
(NSC) that “the atrocities threatened don’t compare with atrocities in other parts of the
world” (Hastings 2011, 9). Nevertheless, from its earliest days the intervention was also
aimed at ousting the Qaddafi regime. This conclusion, which contradicts what the
Administration told the public, is based on an analysis of three mutually reinforcing
types of evidence: postintervention statements by key American and allied officials and
related contemporaneous testimony, U.S./NATO conditions for ending the air campaign,
and the nature of U.S.- and NATO-related military operations. Furthermore, although
U.S. policy purported to defend U.N. Resolution 1973, close examination shows that it
was inconsistent with some of its major terms.

Revelations of Western Officials

Asked by the author to comment on the conflicting statements by former Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director and Secretary of Defense Panetta and President
Obama quoted at the beginning of this article, a high-ranking participant in the critical
NSC meetings of March 15 and 17, 2011, observed, “It was pretty clear in the discussions
that it was going after Qaddafi and ultimately seeing him step down. There was no dis-
cussion of doing this as a set up for negotiations” (Interview with high-ranking U.S. offi-
cial at NSC March 2011 Libya Meetings, July 9, 2015).
The same conclusion has been drawn by New York Times journalist David E. Sanger
who interviewed a number of members of Obama’s national security team and obtained
the notes of participants in the NSC meetings. “NATO and its allies weren’t going into
Libya as peacekeepers to referee a protracted settlement between loyalist and rebel forces,
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676 | WEISSMAN

and they couldn’t pretend that was their role,” he writes. “To solve the problem Qaddafi
had to go. The UN resolution had to allow enough room to make that the de facto goal”
(Sanger 2012, 346).
In his memoir Duty, former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates discusses his losing
role in the intra-administration debate over intervention. He leaves no doubt concerning
his opponents’ intentions: “I opposed the United States attacking a third Moslem country
within a decade to bring about regime change, no matter how odious the regime.” Gates
later complained to his staff that he had tried to raise the issues of “an open-ended con-
flict, an ill-defined mission, Qaddafi’s fate and what came after him” with the president,
but he “had not been interested in getting into any of that” (Gates 2014, 511, 522).
Gates’s retrospective account of the decision making is supported by little noticed
congressional testimony he gave on March 31, 2011. The secretary loyally defended the
administration’s distinction between its military goal of protecting civilians and its polit-
ical one of removing Qaddafi. But he went on to implicitly subvert this dichotomy by
suggesting two ways in which military operations could also promote regime change:

[There] is our ability, in the current circumstance, to continue attacking his ground forces
and continuing to attack and degrade his capabilities, with no opportunity for resupply. So,
his military, at a certain point, is going to have to face the question of whether they are pre-
pared, over time, to be destroyed by these air attacks, or whether they decide it’s time for
him to go. . .(We) continue, and the alliance will continue, to degrade Qadhafi’s military
capabilities. It wasn’t that long ago that there were uprisings all across Libya, and Qadhafi’s
forces were on the defensive. They were—they either turned and joined the oppositionists
or they retreated out of some of these cities. It was only because his military capabilities
remained intact that he was able to put down those uprisings. So, there’s clearly a lot of peo-
ple across Libya that are ready to rise up against this guy. If we can sufficiently degrade his
military capability, it seems to me that then gives them the opportunity to do that (U.S.
Congress 2011a, 10, 17).

Gates even suggested a way that U.S. allies could strengthen the rebels directly:

So I think that what the opposition needs as much as anything right now is some training,
some command and control, and some organization. It is pretty much a pick-up ballgame at
this point. And as I got a question yesterday in one of the briefings, the truth is in terms of
providing that training, in terms of providing assistance to them, frankly there are many
countries that can do that. That is not a unique capability for the United States, and as far as
I am concerned, somebody else should do that (U.S. Congress 2011b, 14).

The United States’ two major collaborators in the Libyan war held similar views.
According to a British official who was intimately involved with policy making through-
out the crisis, “Soon after the bombing began the objective was regime change. It was
keyed by the ‘house to house’ ‘Zenga Zenga’ speech as I recall though we were still then
saying it was to protect civilians and the Libyans have to decide” (Interview with British
official, December 6, 2012). Indeed at the outset British Defense Minister Liam Fox told
the BBC, “Mission accomplished would mean the Libyan people [were] free to control
their own destiny. It is very clear—the international community wants his regime to
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PRESIDENTIAL DECEPTION ON LIBYA | 677

end.” He added that “regime change is not an objective” of the Western military opera-
tion but “it may come about as a result of what is happening among the peoples of Libya”
(Marquand 2011).
As for the French, military historian Jean-Christophe Notin, who interviewed Pres-
ident Nicholas Sarkozy’s top military and political counselors, writes that the “Limited
Defense Council” of top policy makers voted on March 18 that the “final state sought” by
the military operation was “the departure of Qaddafi” (Notin 2012, 137, 235). A French
diplomat who advised on Libya policy commented, “I initially saw the NATO operation
as a continuation of the political effort to start a transition. Qaddafi was unacceptable and
about to commit mass murder” (Interview with French official, December 17, 2012).
As time passed, America’s unavowed policy of military-generated regime change
appears to have been shared privately with other governments. For example, during con-
sultations in Washington April 20–21 with Secretary of State Clinton and several senior
American officials, a high-level AU delegation reported being informed “a cease fire in
the U.S. view should also include Col. Qaddafi’s departure from power” (AU 2011, 9). In
contrast, Clinton’s top deputy, James Steinberg testified to Congress on March 31 that
“our narrowly defined mission. . . does not include regime change” (U.S. Africa Com-
mand 2011b) and on May 12 that “we assembled an international coalition. . . with a clear
limited mission. . . to protect Libya’s civilian population” (U.S. Department of State
2011).
Some public statements by U.S. and NATO officials hinted obliquely at the real
truth. As early as April 14, in a New York Times op-ed, Presidents Sarkozy and Obama
and British Prime Minister David Cameron implied that even if Qaddafi met their mili-
tary demands, NATO would, in some undefined way, continue its action against him:
“However, so long as Qaddafi is in power, NATO must maintain its operations so that
civilians remain protected and the pressure on the regime builds” (Obama, Cameron, and
Sarkozy 2011).
In a May 25 press conference with Cameron, Obama described the military mission
of protecting civilians in a way that it became practically indistinguishable from regime
change:

And so we are strongly committed to seeing the job through, making sure that at a mini-
mum, Qaddafi doesn’t have the capacity to send in a bunch of thugs to murder innocent
civilians and to threaten them. I believe we have built enough momentum that as long as
we sustain the course that we’re on, that he is ultimately going to step down (White House
2011c).

If the mission were defined so broadly that it included the elimination of Qaddafi’s
“capacity” to “send in a bunch of thugs” to murder civilians, the implication was that its
goal extended beyond protecting civilians from attack to rendering the regime impotent.
No longer did the president seem to accept the notion, expressed in his March 28 speech
to the nation, that a Libya with Qaddafi in power would remain “dangerous” after com-
pletion of the NATO military mission, but that would be a political problem to be
addressed by “non-military means.” Similarly suggesting a confounding of military and
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678 | WEISSMAN

political objectives, on June 6 NATO’s Secretary-General gingerly observed, “I also think

it is hard to imagine a complete end to all attacks against civilians as long as Qadhafi
remains in power” (NATO 2011b).
A climactic U.S. –Libya meeting produced a private expression of the real policy
along with a public hint of its nature. On July 15, a little more than a month before the
rebels drove Qaddafi from the Libyan capitol, American officials secretly met members of
the Libyan government in Tunisia. The Americans warned, “If Qaddafi refused to leave,
NATO would continue its operations until he did” (Chivvis 2014, 152). Afterwards, the
same officials discussed the meeting with reporters from the Washington Post and New
York Times. However, while the resulting news stories mentioned the U.S. demand that
Qaddafi leave power, they drew no explicit link to the ongoing NATO campaign (Wan
and Warrick 2011; Cooper and Burns 2011).

A Dubious Off-Ramp for the Regime

In a limited defense of the administration’s public rationale, one senior State
Department official told the author that the Libyan leader could have availed himself of
an off-ramp to preserve his power: “Had Qaddafi agreed to complete cessation of military
activities, there would have been no regime change” (Interview with U.S. State Depart-
ment official, September 26, 2012). Yet, as key U.S. officials knew, the conditions he was
asked to fulfill were ones that also threatened to produce regime change. Thus he was
extremely unlikely to accept them unless they were modified to include constraints on
the rebels.
In the beginning, President Obama, joined by Sarkozy and Cameron, had declared
that their military mission would be satisfied if Libyan troops implemented a cease fire,
halted their advance on Benghazi and withdrew from three cities they had just wholly or
partially recaptured from the rebels: neighboring Ajdabiya and the important Western
centers of Misurata and Zawiya. Within less than a month, NATO expanded this list to
encompass “all populated areas [Libyan forces] have forcibly entered, occupied or
besieged,” naming 12 cities and towns. It also specified that the withdrawal would be “to
bases” (NATO 2011a). From the start, the United States and NATO demanded unilateral
Libyan government action; there was no provision for the rebels to stop fighting or with-
draw to bases. Asked at a March 31 congressional hearing whether the rebels would
respect the U.N. and U.S. calls for a ceasefire, Secretary Gates replied, “I just don’t know
the answer to that” (U.S. Congress 2011b, 18).
Had Qaddafi accepted these requirements, which went far beyond those stated in
the U.N. resolution (see below), he would have relinquished territory containing approxi-
mately 700,000 people (in mid-March) to one million people (in mid-April). Uncon-
strained armed rebels would have occupied it. Taking into account the number of
Libyans already under the sway of the insurgency, the government would have lost con-
trol of up to 40% of the population (City Population 2016).
Moreover, such a development would have posed a strategic threat to the regime.
The insurgents would have gained unchallenged control of the two major cities on either
side of the capital—Misurata 125 miles to the East and Zawiya, possessing the sole oil
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PRESIDENTIAL DECEPTION ON LIBYA | 679

refinery in Tripolitania, 30 miles to the west—and several mountain towns southwest of

Tripoli near the Tunisian border. If the rebels had then gotten better organized—perhaps
with the help of NATO powers’ intelligence and military services, which had already
begun to meet them—they could have developed links with opposition elements in Tri-
poli and confronted a demoralized regime. And if the Libyan army responded by breaking
its agreed upon ceasefire, NATO could have punished it. This was by no means merely a
hypothetical scenario. It would be the rebels’ recapture of these very strategic centers dur-
ing the summer of 2011 that precipitated the downfall of the regime.
Key American diplomats understood that Qaddafi was not being offered a persua-
sive alternative to forceful regime change. One official acknowledged to journalist James
Mann “that it wasn’t so simple. If Qaddafi did this, allowing the rebel troops to control
large parts of the country, his regime would probably collapse” (Mann 2012, 298). In an
interview with the author, an important State Department figure in Libya policy
observed,

My view was that Qaddafi couldn’t be trusted even to agree to partition of his country,
much less withdrawing unconditionally from Western towns. He didn’t want to let his
authority go over a piece of the country. It would be dangerous if he did so, and he saw it as
a Jihadist bid for power over the whole country. (Interview with U.S. State Department offi-
cial, October 31, 2015)

Even the aforementioned State Department official who viewed the conditions as a
potential exit ramp did not believe that Qaddafi would genuinely accept them. Rather,
his concern was that “[h]e’d stop, the coalition would dissolve, and he’d pick up again”
(Interview with U.S. State Department official, September 26, 2012).
Because it was so unlikely that Qaddafi would accept the proposed conditions, the
only way to avoid a movement towards regime change would have been to negotiate mod-
ifications with his government. From the outset, however, President Obama pronounced
the terms “non-negotiable” and his NATO partners followed suit. Throughout the inter-
vention, the United States and NATO spurned repeated Libyan government requests to
discuss or negotiate the establishment of a ceasefire with international observers and other
issues (Bilefsky and Landler 2011; Sherwood 2011; Denyer and Fadel 2011; Fahim and
Kirkpatrick 2011; Birnbaum 2011a, 2011b). The United States also declined to chal-
lenge the NTC’s refusal to enter into any negotiations until Qaddafi and his family relin-
quished power (Interview with U.S. State Department official, October 31, 2015;
Kuperman 2013, 115). This stance continued even when the Libyan government, in late
May, announced that it was willing to talk to the rebels and withdraw its forces from
cities if the rebels did the same.
A telling episode transpired when U.S. bombing began. From March 19–22, two
powerful Libyan generals, thought by U.S. officials to be in the “second circle” of power,
tried to arrange ceasefire talks with the American military. One, Yusuf Dibri, was the
head of Qadaffi’s personal security and a longtime intimate of the “Guide”; he was one of
only a half dozen Libyan officials, in addition to Qaddafi and his family members, sanc-
tioned under U.N. Resolution 1970. The other, Ahmed Mamud, was a senior aide to
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680 | WEISSMAN

Qaddafi. Retired Rear Admiral Charles Kubic, an American with business interests in
Libya, served as an intermediary for the Generals with U.S. Africa Command (AFRI-
COM) in Stuttgart, Germany. A spokesman for the Pentagon, Pat Barnes, confirmed that
this effort took place. According to Kubic, General Mamud, who spoke English, had a
telephone conversation with Colonel Brian Linvill representing General Carter Ham who
headed AFRICOM. Mamud presented a four-point peace plan that included: a 72-hour
truce to negotiate a formal ceasefire, military-to-military negotiations in Tripoli, and, if
the United States agreed to these proposals, immediate cessation of combat operations
and withdrawal of forces to the outskirts of cities and enlistment of African observers to
monitor the truce. Although this proposal appeared to incorporate major elements of
U.S. and allied conditions (ceasefire and troop withdrawal), while remaining unclear on
others (Would the government return control of towns it had recaptured to the rebels?
Would the rebels also be required to stand down?), AFRICOM and the administration
decided not to enter into discussions. As Colonel Linvill later commented, through the
Pentagon spokesman, “This was a one-way conversation” (Citizens Commission on Ben-
ghazi 2014, 22–23; Kubic 2014; Interview with Rear Admiral ret. Charles Kubic, July
31, 2015; Interview with Pat Barnes, Public Affairs, U.S. Defense Department, Novem-
ber 3, 2015).

A Military Strategy for Ousting Qaddafi

In his book, Toppling Qaddafi, RAND Corporation analyst Christopher Chivvis pos-
its two alternative military approaches to fulfilling the U.N. mandate to protect civilians.
“A limited view of the mandate might imply focusing on specific units that were attack-
ing civilians . . . and generally aiming to separate the regime forces from the rebel held
areas,” he writes, but “allied forces eventually took the position that all of Qaddafi’s mili-
tary forces were viable targets as long as some of them were threatening civilians some-
where in the country. This allowed for strategic attacks against facilities in Tripoli and
elsewhere that would wear the regime down and eventually undermine its ability to
defend itself against the rebels” (Chivvis 2014, 117).
This was the scenario that Secretary Gates had outlined in his March 31 congres-
sional testimony. In fact, during each one of three phases of NATO operations charted
between April 11 to October 23, NATO air strikes fell on the Tripoli region more than
any other zone (Chivvis 2014, 105, 130, 163). While there was no fighting in this zone
until mid-August—and then only briefly—the area possessed lots of military
infrastructure.
Chivvis asserts that taking a limited view of the mandate “would not have made
much sense militarily,” but fails to explain why (Chivvis 2014, 117). Although it is logi-
cal to assume that the nationwide attacks on ammunition dumps, vehicle storage facili-
ties, weapons systems, and multiple command and control points increased the efficiency
of local civilian protection missions against Libyan troops and supply lines, it is not at all
clear that they were mostly essential to protect civilians. In any case, much of the target-
ing appears to have had as much to do with achieving regime change as increasing the effi-
ciency of humanitarian action.
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PRESIDENTIAL DECEPTION ON LIBYA | 681

The most direct example was the multiple attacks—which began in the first days of
the intervention—on the massive compound containing Qaddafi’s offices and residence.
In addition, one of the “Guide’s” sons and three of his grandchildren died in an April 30
strike on their home while Qaddafi was reportedly present. These gradually intensifying
raids not only intimidated his inner circle, they threatened to decapitate the regime. Pub-
licly, U.S. and NATO officials defended them as legitimate strikes on “command and
control” facilities utilized to direct Libyan forces threatening civilians. Privately, in late
April, they acknowledged to the New York Times that they were aimed at “raising the
price of his efforts to continue to hold on to power” (Shanker and Sanger 2011). In late
May they told the Times that intensified attacks were part of a “new strategy” to “drive
out Colonel Qaddafi” which “extends beyond the boundaries of the United Nations man-
date” (Schmitt and Sanger 2011).
By early July, a NATO’s spokesperson was able to declare, “We have degraded
Qadaffi’s military capacity to the point that he is no longer capable of running any major
offensive operation” (NATO 2011c). By this time, with the rebels in full control of the
major Western city of Misurata and mounting their own offensives from there and the
Nafusa mountains, relatively few Libyan civilians were threatened by government
“attacks” (Wehrey 119; Chivvis 2011, 154). Nevertheless NATO maintained the pace of
its air strikes well into September, intensifying its focus on the Tripoli area. After the
capital and other Western population centers fell to the rebels in the second half of
August, Qaddafi’s remaining troops retreated to his home city of Sirte and another
friendly town. These forces posed no threat to surrounding civilians and lacked offensive
capacity. NATO aircraft pursued them anyway.
Alongside the NATO operation, a parallel semi-covert program of direct military
assistance to the rebels by key members of the NATO-led coalition demonstrated the
early and persistent intent to promote regime change. Britain, France, Qatar, and the
UAE in particular furnished significant aid to the insurgents with the approval of the
United States and complicity of NATO. Much of this support was not officially acknowl-
edged until after the war.
Even before the United Nations authorized the use of force, “President Obama
signed a secret finding authorizing the CIA to provide arms and other support to Libyan
rebels” (Mazzetti and Schmitt 2011). As described below, it appears that other countries
largely provided the arms, as Gates had earlier recommended, although the United States
also provided some lethal and intelligence assistance (Becker and Shane 2016). Around
the same time, French intelligence and military officers deployed to rebel-held Benghazi
(Notin 2012, 93–95, 254–55).
As the bombing commenced, Western personnel deployed to rebel command cen-
ters, called “operations rooms,” in Eastern Libya and the UAE to coordinate ground intel-
ligence collection and analysis for NATO strikes and “vet” the rebels for future
assistance. These centers incorporated intelligence and military staff from NATO coun-
tries and two Arab partners: UAE and Qatar. Intelligence collaboration was not simply
for NATO’s benefit; it enabled the rebels to lobby for their preferred targets (Wehrey
2015, 113–15).
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682 | WEISSMAN

According to Frederic Wehrey’s well researched and comprehensive analysis of the

role of foreign advisors in the conflict: “Through March and April, NATO members
began building their own relationships with fighting forces across Libya, deploying Spe-
cial Forces. and subsequently liaison officers, dedicated to training and improving coordi-
nation between rebel forces” (Wehrey 2015, 114). With only modest public visibility,
British and French military advisers addressed the rebels’ biggest problem: the fragmenta-
tion of forces even within the same area. These advisers helped create military structures
and communications and logistic systems and otherwise improved coordination (Notin
2012, 324–25; BBC 2011; Erlanger 2011). The United States also announced it was sup-
plying “non-lethal” military equipment to the NTC, including uniforms and body armor,
binoculars, tents, and medicines (U.S. Department of State and Department of Defense
2011). The British chimed in similarly in late June (Chivvis 2014, 157; Walker 2011).
Under the radar, more aggressive support unfolded. With the collaboration of France and
the approval of the United States, Qatar began shipping large amounts of weaponry,
including French-made anti-tank missiles, to the rebels in April (Risen, Mazzetti, and
Schmidt 2012; Notin 2012, 255). It also provided more than a hundred military advisors
(Chivvis 2014, 155).The UAE furnished some supplies, again with U.S. encouragement
and dispatched advisors. In late May or early June, France airdropped arms to insurgents
in the Western Nafusa Mountains (Birnbaum 2011c; Notin 2012, 389–93).
By May and June, British and French ground advisers in Misurata were able “to
coordinate rebels’ movements with NATO air strikes,” which “helped break the siege [of
Misurata] and launch the westward assault towards Tripoli.” In the Nafusa Mountains
campaign, which ultimately enabled the capture of Tripoli, “Qatari and Emirati advisers
arriving in June proved crucial to improving the [NATO} targeting process and, most
critically, coordinating weapons shipment, communications, and training” (Wehrey
2015, 118–19). Qatari Special Forces trained a “Tripoli Brigade” for the anticipated
assault on the capital (Erdbrink 2011). Qatari, British, and French military officers
helped plan and organize that successful attack, which also benefited from the provision
of CIA and other U.S. intelligence on Qaddafi’s forces and coordinated bombing by
NATO (DeYoung and Miller 2011).
Some have suggested that the original goal of U.S. military intervention in Libya was
to protect civilians but that it later morphed into achieving regime change (Chivvis 2014,
5; Chollet and Fishman 2015, 155). However, the cumulative weight of diverse evidence—
the testimony of key U.S., French, and British decision makers, the demands their govern-
ments’ initially made on Qaddafi, their strategic concept for the air campaign and early pro-
vision of advisers and arms to the rebels—indicates they were, from the beginning, aiming
to overthrow Qaddafi. To be sure, the major impetus for internationally authorized force
was fear for the safety of civilians in rebel-held areas if the regime were allowed to crush the
revolt. But the United States and its allies also acted to bring the regime down.

Manipulating U.N. Resolution 1973

Although American officials repeatedly justified their military intervention as
implementing the U.N. Security Council mandate, their actions were, in important
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PRESIDENTIAL DECEPTION ON LIBYA | 683

ways, inconsistent with Resolution 1973. Its first operative paragraph demanded the
immediate establishment of a ceasefire. Against the common understanding of this term,
the United States interpreted it as a call for a unilateral cessation of hostilities by the gov-
ernment, not the rebels. However, earlier parts of the Resolution made it clear that the
intent was to restrain both sides. One sentence reaffirmed that “parties to armed conflicts
bear the primary responsibility . . . to ensure the protection of civilians.” Another sen-
tence “took note” of the Secretary-General’s March 16 call for an immediate ceasefire,
which had been addressed to “all parties in this conflict” (U.N. Security Council 2011c,
1–2; U.N. Secretary-General 2011). In addition, neither the ceasefire clause nor any other
part of Resolution 1973 contained the United States’ and NATO’s most consequential
demand: that the government unilaterally withdraw its troops from key towns they had
entered, occupied, or besieged.
Furthermore, the United States and NATO effectively ignored a major theme of
Resolution 1973. The second operative paragraph stressed “the need to intensify efforts
to find a solution to the crisis which responds to the demands of the Libyan people.” In
this connection, it noted the Secretary-General’s appointment of a Special Envoy to Libya
and the AU Peace and Security Council’s decision to send a committee of African presi-
dents to Libya “with the aim of facilitating dialogue to lead to the political reforms neces-
sary to find a peaceful and sustainable solution.” This paragraph, which was drafted by
Council member South Africa (Interview with South African diplomat, July 1, 2012),
supported the U.N. Envoy and AU efforts to persuade the Libyan government and the
NTC to narrow their differences and negotiate a ceasefire and democratic political transi-
tion. Contrary to this diplomatic approach, the United States issued non-negotiable
demands for unilateral government action, supported the NTC’s precondition that Qad-
dafi and his family leave power before negotiations, and behaved as if the sole instrument
prescribed by the Resolution was military power. In this way, they transformed the Reso-
lution into an instrument for regime change.
In mid-June, according to a South African official source, South Africa offered a
draft “Presidential statement” in the Security Council. Such expressions require unani-
mous approval. The proposal clarified the need for any ceasefire under Resolution 1973 to
be “credible and verifiable.” It also reiterated the need for a “political solution to the crisis
which responds to the legitimate aspirations of the Libyan people” and placed new
emphasis on “close coordination” between the U.N. Special Envoy and the AU. However,
the United States, Britain, and France rejected the statement (Interview with South Afri-
can diplomat, July 1, 2012; South African Mission to the U.N. 2011).

The Impact of Dishonesty on U.S. Policy

If the Obama administration had been forthright about what it was trying to do in
Libya, it would have come under strong pressure to limit its policy objectives. Most
important, the U.N. Security Council would have been virtually certain to deny a request
to authorize force to accomplish regime change. The U.S. would then have been left with
the choice of attempting to mobilize NATO in defiance of the official voice of the
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684 | WEISSMAN

international community or modifying its goal. Moreover, opposition in the president’s

party to the intervention would have risen. (Even if the United States had waited until
after the passage of Resolution 1973 to publicly announce its intention, it would have
been perceived as violating a Security Council mandate and become subject to the same
pressures.)
Russia, which was concerned from the start about force being used to further regime
change, but had reluctantly yielded to the humanitarian argument and abstained on
Resolution 1973, would have surely wielded its veto. In explaining his country’s absten-
tion on the Resolution, the Russian representative noted a range of “unanswered” ques-
tions including “what the rules of engagement would be and what limits on the use of
force there would be.” “Provisions were introduced into the text,” he complained, “that
could potentially open the door to large-scale military intervention” (U.N. Security
Council 2011d, 8). After the first day of bombing, the Russian Foreign Ministry
expressed heightened concern:

In this context, we urge the states concerned to stop the non-selective use of force. We
strongly believe that it is unacceptable to use the mandate derived from UN SC Resolution
1973, the adoption of which was quite an ambiguous step, in order to achieve goals that go
far beyond its provisions, which only provide for actions for the protection of civilians.
(Minister of Foreign Affairs 2011)

Throughout the intervention, Russia supported an alternative AU effort to mediate

a negotiated ceasefire and political transition, one that aimed to ease Qaddafi out gradu-
ally in the context of an “inclusive” diplomatic settlement (Weissman 2013). Ironically,
the two most powerful members of the AU—South Africa and Nigeria—had supplied
the winning margin of “yes” votes for Resolution 1973. If the United States and its part-
ners had been transparent about their objectives, it is extremely unlikely that these Afri-
can leaders would have gone along with them. Actually, both countries had initially
opposed Resolution 1973. In the hours before passage, President Obama, Secretary of
State Clinton and President Sarkozy made lobbying calls to South African President
Jacob Zuma, a leader in the AU effort. In the end, South Africa and Nigeria—which was
widely reported to be following South Africa’s lead on the issue—voted “aye” (Chivvis
2014, 60; Cooper and Myers 2011). In explaining their decisions both countries’ repre-
sentatives underlined their expectation that military force would not be used to force
regime change. South Africa’s U.N. Ambassador stated,

As a matter of principle, we have supported the resolution, with the necessary caveats to pre-
serve the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Libya, and reject any foreign occupation or
unilateral, military intervention under the pretext of protecting civilians. It is our hope that
this resolution will be implemented in full respect for both its letter and spirit (U.N. Secu-
rity Council 2011d, 10).

In similar fashion, the Nigerian Ambassador noted “the emphasis of the resolution
on the protection of civilians under threat of attack,” and continued,
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PRESIDENTIAL DECEPTION ON LIBYA | 685

We are also encouraged by the fact that the resolution supports the political path to conflict
resolution, underscoring as it does the efforts of the African Union High Level Committee,
the Secretary-General’s Special Envoy and other interlocutors. (U.N. Security Council
2011d, 9)

After the regime was overthrown, President Zuma stated that NATO had
“undermined” the AU effort (South African Press Association 2011). It is highly ques-
tionable whether the United States would have provided the necessary military resources
to bring Qaddafi down if it had been perceived as acting against the wishes of the Security
Council.
In the first place, the Obama administration was severely split over the proposed
U.N.-authorized use of force to protect civilians. Wary of getting caught in a military
quagmire in “a third Muslim country,” Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of Defense
Gates, White House Chief of Staff William Daley, and National Security Adviser Tom
Donilon all opposed military intervention. According to Gates, Obama privately con-
fided that his decision “had been a 51-49 call” (Gates 2014, 518–19; Sanger 2012, 341–
45; Hastings 2011, 4; Cooper and Myers 2011). Removing the United Nations’ blessing
would have strengthened the opposition within the NSC. In fact, the administration had
previously signaled that the United Nations’ sanction was critical. Gates had privately
informed NATO’s Secretary General “that we supported planning for a no-fly zone but
would need a UN Security Council resolution and explicit regional participation” (Gates
2014, 515). President Obama underlined the importance of the U.N. umbrella in his
March 28 address: “The task that I assigned our forces . . . carries with it a U.N. mandate
and international support.”
Second, in that speech Obama strongly implied that a public acknowledgement of
the full purposes of the military mission would have diminished NATO support. “If we
tried to overthrow Qaddafi by force,” he observed, “our coalition might splinter.” Even
with the limited U.N. mandate, such important NATO countries as Turkey and Italy
(the latter provided the main air bases for Operation Unified Protector and contributed to
the air strikes) were reluctant to use force and had to be pushed into it by the United
States, Britain, and France. Smaller countries participating in the bombing, such as Nor-
way and Belgium, “supported the intervention largely out of a fundamental support for
the United Nations and international law,” a criterion that would have disappeared if the
United Nations had disapproved (Chivvis 2014, 73–74). Nor is it at all clear that the
British and French would have been willing to go as far as they eventually did against
Qaddafi in the absence of a legal U.N. sanction (Seldon and Snowdon 2015, 102, 105;
Notin 2012, 98).
Finally, the president, who had been elected in part because of his opposition to a
war for regime change in Iraq, seemed to appreciate the potential political price of full
disclosure. Arguing in his March 28 speech against broadening the military mission to
include regime change, he cautioned:

We would likely have to put troops on the ground to accomplish that mission, or risk kill-
ing civilians from the air. The dangers faced by our men and women in uniform would be
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686 | WEISSMAN

far greater. So would the costs and our share of the responsibility for what comes next. To be
blunt we went down that road in Iraq.

Had the president expressed his true intentions in Libya—raising the prospect of a
more difficult war that lacked international sanction—there would have been consider-
able discontent within Obama’s core constituency. Days before his address, two public
opinion polls reported that Americans split evenly when asked whether the civilian pro-
tection mission should be extended to include the removal of Qaddafi (Polling.com
2016). Two months later, a congressional vote on the war, the House of Representatives
defeated by 265-148 a resolution to terminate U.S. military operations in Libya
within two weeks. Despite concern about the impact of an abrupt withdrawal on NATO,
one-third of House Democrats voted against their own administration, which claimed it
was pursuing a U.N.-backed humanitarian mission (U.S. Congress 2011c, H3990–
H4021). It appears relevant that the main opponents of intervention in the NSC—the
Vice President, the White House Chief of Staff, and the National Security Advisor—
were officials whose responsibilities included looking out for the president’s political
interests.
So if the administration had been honest, it would have confronted the virtually cer-
tain loss of a legitimizing U.N. sanction and likely difficulties in mobilizing NATO and
its core political constituency. In that circumstance, it might well have sought an alterna-
tive nonmilitary means of supporting regime change as a viable solution to the civil war
in Libya. As I have argued elsewhere (Weissman 2013), there were two other basic choices
if action were deemed necessary to protect civilians and associate the United States with
Arab Spring goals:

1. Support a narrow U.N. protective mandate and the AU initiative. The latter
included negotiations between the government and the NTC to achieve: a ceasefire
monitored by a sizable U.N. peacekeeping force, an inclusive, consensual interim
government, and the adoption of a democratic constitution and elections It envi-
sioned Qaddafi leaving power after a few months of negotiations. Despite opposition
from the United States and NATO, by late June the AU had made significant pro-
gress in separate talks with the two parties. Qaddafi and his government had
accepted “an inclusive dialogue process with the participation of the Transitional
National Council,” the “Guide” absenting himself from the negotiations, and the
withdrawal of forces besieging rebel-contested cities if rebel forces agreed to do the
same; or
2. Implement the publicly avowed two-stage U.S. policy of first using U.N.-authorized
military power to achieve humanitarian protection and subsequently applying politi-
cal and economic pressure to assist the Libyan opposition’s efforts to dislodge the
decaying regime.

Either option would have raised the prospects for a less violent and chaotic political
transition in Libya. Under both, the spread of the fighting would have been curtailed and
the NTC would have had time to develop a more coherent political and military struc-
ture. Under the AU initiative, a U.N. peacekeeping force could have helped maintain a
ceasefire and worked with an interim government to establish unified security forces
 17415705, 2016, 3, Downloaded from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/psq.12294 by Mount Royal University Library, Wiley Online Library on [16/10/2024]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License
PRESIDENTIAL DECEPTION ON LIBYA | 687

integrating the separate rebel militias and government troops. Thus the post-Qaddafi
threat to Libyan political progress and international security—the reign of lawless militias
and the uncontrolled outflow of military stocks and extremist fighters—might have been
significantly constrained. President Obama might well have avoided a later need to con-
sider renewed military operations in Libya to combat the presence of the Islamic State.
In their continuing unwillingness to be fully honest about their wartime objectives,
U.S. officials succeeded in obfuscating the U.S. share of responsibility for their negative
consequences. Thus they managed to avoid public accountability both during the war
and afterwards.

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