Vivvo CMS 4.1 http://www.pri.org/ ©2010 Spoonlabs d.o.o. http://www.pri.org/files.php?file=rss_682409203.gif http://www.pri.org/ http://www.pri.org/stories/world/africa/intervention-in-libya-why-not-darfur.html Africa Wed, 06 Apr 2011 14:25:00 -0500 International forces didn't intervene in the Darfur crisis, so why did it happen so quickly in Libya? http://#77 Iraq is an oppressive rgeime, and Afghanistan is a narco state Perhaps so; but then again you've taken your eye off the ball. Both those things had also been the case, depuis longtemps, prior to the US incursions. The point of the whole inter Africa Tue, 15 May 2012 19:15:46 -0500 #77 Iraq is an oppressive rgeime, and Afghanistan is a narco state Perhaps so; but then again you've taken your eye off the ball. Both those things had also been the case, depuis longtemps, prior to the US incursions. The point of the whole interventionist exercise, seen from a bird's-eye point of view, was never the integrity or improvement of those local systems (though that woulda been an optimal outcome had it been possible to achieve and I'd agree the effort has fallen far short of achieving them): the point was the defense of an entire world system under attack.Here's what you forget: US territorial security/stability and global security/stability are deeply intertwined, seeing as how the US is, like it or not, the ultimate guarantor of a great deal of the latter. Upset one factor in a profound fashion and you upset the other, with unforeseeable consequences but they're likely to be grave.1. US territory was attacked on 9/11/01, in an egregious act of war perpetrated moreover (and rather surprisingly) by a non-state actor;2. The egregiousness of the act, coupled with the bizarre novelty of its having been executed by an international non-state actor (consider that the USSR, a far deadlier enemy, never did such a thing), constituted a wholly new model of warfare and aggression. If this new model were allowed to gain purchase or be perceived as being successful, it would be repeated over and over in an open-source fashion, and the consequences for global security and order, under present organizing principles, could have been profoundly destabilizing. Now some leftist chuckleheads might of course cheer that development, but y'know after all, there's always kids smokin' in the boys room, and they seldom amount to much. Hey, ask me how I know.3. So realistically, matters had to be dealt with. Laxity was not really an option. Did you want to see San Diego blown up with a home-made bomb, and then a global nuclear war as a consequence? Them was your sort of options; sadly, Pete Seeger records were not exactly on the table. As Morrissey so bluntly put it, Unruly boys who will not grow up must be taken in hand. 4. As it happens though, we had the misfortune in this crisis of having fools like Bush and the neocons at the helm at the time, each with their bizarre and unhelpful side-agendas; and so, even though a strong response was in order, the responses which they happened to choose reeked of unwisdom.5. It does not follow from that unwisdom, that no response whatever was the correct reply.6. All of which is to say that, your proposition that Iraq and Afghanistan are not now presently fonts of justice and enlightenment, doesn't signify much of anything with respect to the general global problems at hand. I'll concede that it's an outrage to the peoples of those countries that they have to put up with this ****, but that all goes to much bigger problems of which the present troubles are but a part. Nevertheless I agree that the whole thing should have been handled with much greater wisdom and a more subtle and skillful hand.7. All the same, there's no QED residing in generalized anger, even if it's justified, that those places aren't in peace and good order. They weren't before and they aren't now, and it's not clear what could have or can be done to make them so. But of course it was also the height of folly to intervene crudely and make them even worse. PRI: Public Radio International