Libya updateObama: Coalition cannot militarily force Gaddafi to leave
The Obama administration is continuing to send mixed messages about the direction, purpose, and effect of the U.S.-led missile strikes on Libya, with conflicting statements from the top about Col. Qaddafi’s grip on power five days into the campaign; the coalition’s air dominance has been achieved, but administration officials have not offered a clear picture as to what the no-fly zone is expected to yield; the president reiterated that the coalition does not “have military tools at our disposal in terms of accomplishing Qaddafi’s leaving,” though he has said it is U.S. policy that Qaddafi should go; Libyan Foreign Minister Musa Kusa spoke by telephone Sunday night with assistant secretary of State Jeffrey Feltman; no details were released
Libyan tank explodes after air strike // Source: tribune.com.pk
Ever since the War Powers Act was passed in 1973, members of Congress complained, when the president sent American soldiers to fight, that he was in violation of the act. Presidents of both parties said the act was a violation of the constitution, and ignored it (the act, not the constitution) when it suited their purpose. The issue of the constitutionality of the act remains unresolved.
Donald Rumsfeld, defense secretary under former President George W. Bush, was right to point out the lack of clarity about the campaign at the higher echelons of the Obama administration, even as he was stretching it when he referred to this confusion as the reason why the president did not go to Congress to ask for an approval for the use of U.S. forces.
Rumsfeld speculated that President Obama did not first come to Congress — before committing American forces to the Libya campaign — precisely because of confusion over the mission.
“I suspect that one of the reasons that the administration didn’t go to Congress is they didn’t know what to ask for,” Rumsfeld told Fox News on Tuesday. “They didn’t know precisely with clarity and sufficient precision what it is they wanted the Congress to approve and the coalition clearly has not come to an agreement as to what their mission is.”
Rumsfeld said that if the allies can’t, as their primary goal, define the mission, then “you are doomed.”
“The mission determines the coalition and the coalition not ought to determine the mission,” Rumsfeld said. “I don’t think they have agreed on a mission and the mission should have been decided before the coalition.”
The Obama administration is continuing to send mixed messages about the direction, purpose, and effect of the U.S.-led missile strikes on Libya, with conflicting statements from the top about Col. Qaddafi’s grip on power five days into the campaign.
The coalition’s air dominance has been achieved, but administration officials have not offered a clear picture as to what the no-fly zone is expected to yield.
The president, in the meantime, reiterated that the coalition does not “have military tools at our disposal in terms of accomplishing Qaddafi’s leaving,” though he has said it is U.S. policy that Qaddafi should go.
Here are the latest developments, based on reports by the BBC, Fox News, and the New York Times.
