Secretary of State Clinton
href="https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2011/03/01/world/africa/international-us-libya-usa-clinton.html">defended
the State Department budget in Congress this week by pointing out that
diplomatic interventions can prevent expensive wars. Now the State
Department has a spectacular opportunity to demonstrate Secretary
Clinton's argument by example. It can support robust diplomatic
efforts to resolve the crisis in Libya without a further escalation in
violence.
Pipe dream? The Wall Street Journal
href="https://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703300904576178114237424854.html">reports
today that the price of oil fell on world markets when Al
Jazeera
href="https://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2011/03/20113365739369754.html">reported
that Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi had accepted a plan proposed by
Venezuela that called for a multinational commission to mediate the
conflict with rebel groups; Reuters
href="https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/UPDATE-4-Oil-slips-talk-peace-targetukfocus-1562795861.html">reports
that Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa said the peace plan was
"under consideration."
Of course, this doesn't mean that peace is about to break out. For
example, a leader of the rebels has reportedly rejected the call for
peace.
But here are some facts that should create an opening for diplomacy:
the armed rebels seem to have very little military prospect of taking
Tripoli. The Libyan government seems to have very little military
prospect of retaking most rebel-held territory.
Meanwhile, Defense Secretary Gates and other U.S. military leaders
have quite rightly
href="https://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/03/world/africa/03military.html">thrown
cold water on the prospect of any significant Western military
intervention, including a "no fly zone," which, as U.S. military
leaders have rightly pointed out, would not simply be a matter of
waving your magic wand and saying "no plane flying for you," but would
require bombing Libya's extensive anti-aircraft missile capabilities
in order to let U.S. planes own the sky. Such bombing, of course,
would be likely to produce Libyan civilian casualties. And, as
Secretary Gates has rightly pointed out, the last thing the U.S. needs
right now is a war in another Muslim country.
Moreover, there is no UN Security Council authorization for foreign
military intervention, and very little prospect of one, and very
little prospect of NATO agreeing to a significant military
intervention without UN authorization, in part because a significant
military intervention without UN authorization would be a blatant
violation of the UN charter, something that people in Washington tend
to forget when it is convenient to do so but people in European
capitals care about on a more ongoing basis. And without NATO
agreement, the U.S. can't use military bases in Europe for offensive
action. Furthermore, the Arab League has stated its strong opposition
to external military intervention. And even among the Libyan rebels
and in rebel-held territory, there is division over calls for Western
military intervention.
In addition, as U.S. military leaders have pointed out, the U.S. has
not been able to confirm any reports of the Libyan use of air power
against civilians. There are certainly credible reports of horrible
human rights abuses, but they seem to have been carried out with guns
rather than planes. If you want to stop that through military
coercion, you can't do it with planes; you need ground troops. And
no-one is seriously contemplating that.
Meanwhile, the conflict in Libya has
href="https://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/03/world/africa/03refugee.html">produced
a humanitarian crisis, with some 150,000 migrant workers fleeing
the violence piling up at Libya's borders. Refugee accounts suggest
attacks on civilians from both sides of the conflict, with black
African civilian refugees saying they were targeted by rebel forces
who assumed they were mercenaries, suggesting that Western efforts to
arm the rebels could make the West complicit in human rights abuses.
Furthermore, it is far from obvious how much pressure international
sanctions can bring to bear on the Libyan government in the short run.
The Libyan government "can fall back on as much as $110 billion in
foreign reserve holdings to fund its operations for perhaps months to
come," the Washington Post
href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/01/AR2011030106450.html">reported
this week.
Meanwhile, the continuing conflict in Libya is driving up the price of
oil. AP
href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/03/AR2011030302133.html">reports
today: "Gasoline has climbed more than 29 cents per gallon since
the uprising in Libya began in the middle of February, costing
Americans an extra $108 million per day to buy the same amount of
fuel." A significant and sustained spike in the price of oil could
stall economic recovery in the world, significantly increasing
unemployment in the U.S. and worldwide.
In short: the world has many powerful incentives for acting to reduce
the violence, and no plausible military option for doing so. That
suggests that despite rhetoric to the contrary, there is an objective
basis for diplomacy.
No doubt some will argue against efforts towards a political solution
on the grounds that "there must be accountability" for Gadhafi and his
lieutenants for alleged war crimes, and a consequence of political
efforts to end the violence might be a political agreement that limits
such accountability. But while the demand for accountability is a just
demand, it is not all-trumping over other just demands; in particular,
it is not all-trumping over the just demand for peace. To say that the
demand for accountability must be all-trumping over the demand for
peace, and that the conflict must continue until the demand for
accountability for Libyan leaders is realized, would be to make a
trade-off that privileges accountability over the lives of Libyan
civilians, a trade-off that Westerners should be very hesitant to
make. Moreover, for U.S. policy to insist on this trade-off, when we
have never held any U.S. political leader legally accountable for the
illegal invasion of Iraq, which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of
thousands of Iraqis, when no-one has suggested that efforts to do
would lead to violence, wouldn't pass the international laugh test.
State Department, show us your stuff. Show Congress why diplomacy
should be fully funded. Use your skills and contacts and levers to
press for a diplomatic resolution of the crisis in Libya. Readers can
add their voice to those pressing for a diplomatic solution
href="https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/act/nobombsforlibya">here.