I recently read, with great interest, Raye May's opinion piece on NATO's intervention with Libya, and I have to disagree with her assessment.
Miss May, and Colonel Gadhafi, would have us believe that al-Qaida is responsible for the rebellion in Libya. We've heard this same rhetoric in Syria, Yemen, Egypt and Tunisia.
The stated goals of the revolutions that make up the Arab Spring are incompatible with al-Qaida's jihad and bloodlust for a caliphate.
Freedom of expression and the right to choose your own leaders are not high on the al-Qaida agenda. They are, however, high on the agenda of Libya's National Transition Council.
To claim that the rebels in Libya are all al-Qaida trained is, frankly, an insult to the average Libyan worker, intellectual or family man, untrained in military tactics that saw it fit to lay his life down for his country.
The American Revolution echoes in Libya, and we should be proud of it.
Miss May also, though indirectly, calls Libya "Obama's Iraq" and nothing could be further from the truth. You might as well call Kosovo "Clinton's Vietnam."
Iraq is a disastrous, deadly, costly and ill-conceived miscarriage of American unilateralism and foreign policy. Realistically, there will be American troops in Iraq for the better part of this decade.
The war in Libya is, as far as Western obligations are concerned, almost over.
Furthermore, Libya, as the right-wing pundits will mercilessly point out, was a mission lead primarily by Europeans. The French and NATO commanders deserve most of the credit in aiding the rebels' overthrow of Colonel Gadhafi. Obama and America have led from the behind the entire operation.
Miss May's last point is that the American economy is in too great a mess to support intervention in foreign affairs. Her point is well-taken, but slaughter does not end when the American economy tanks.
There was once a time when our economy was in a worse state, and it would have been all too easy to say, "Let foreign problems stay foreign. We must focus on our own problems first." And Hitler would have conquered Britain.
The Lend-Lease program was successful in the early 1940s, and NATO's military intervention in Libya was successful now.
Raye May's concern for American soldiers and the economy is noble, though her conclusions flawed.
Alexander Roberson
President Emeritus, College Democrats
senior, history
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