The Obama Doctrine
In an excellent post, James Joyner points to Dan Nexon's post on Obama's speech:
I might be wrong, but I don't consider the "Humanitarian-intervention-against-militarily-weak-fossil-fuel-producing-countries-in-strategically-important-regions-that-are-also-located-near-many-large-NATO-military-bases-and-are-run-by-dictators-who-kind-of-piss-us-off-and-have-no-powerful-allies Doctrine" the stuff of Grand Strategy. But if you read between the lines, that's pretty much the gist of what Obama had to say tonight.
I do not find it the stuff of coherence or prudence. But the ad hoc nature of this foreign and military policy decision does not bother me. I am not big on "Grand Strategies" either. However I do object to the lack of logic and coherence regarding the Libya intervention. In my view, each ad hoc situation must have logic and coherence. I do not see them in the Libya intervention.
There are two major objections I have to the rationale for the military intervention provided by President Obama last night. The first is the manufactured notion that events in Libya will quell the "Arab Awakening" in Tunisia and Egypt (oh BTW, who knows how that is going to turn out.) What is the evidence for that? Was Gaddafi planning on marching into Egypt? Surely not. Moreover, Syria, Bahrain, Jordan, and dare I say it, Saudi Arabia, are not that far away. More . . .
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