Libya And The Credibility Of NATO

NATO has been with us for more than a half century now.  It served its purpose well during the Cold War by providing Europe with a credible capacity to commit suicide.  It was this American furnished capacity which convinced the Soviet Union time and time again that there was nothing to be gained by either invading Europe or merely threatening to do so.  Occupying a radioactive wasteland was not a profitable foreign policy course of action.

With the ending of the Cold War, the demise of NATO was cheerfully forecast in numerous quarters both in the US and Europe.  As was the case with Mark Twain, reports of death were premature.  Still the Big Question remained: What role would NATO serve with the end of the Warsaw Pact/Soviet threat?

The affray in former Yugoslavia which marked so many of the years otherwise dominated by Whitewater and assorted Ladies of the Oval Office appeared to provide an alternative mission for the semi-defunct alliance.  At the time, you may recall, there was debate over whether or not the US had a bull in the Bosnian herd.  More than a few Deep Thinkers of the Clinton administration believed it to be a purely European matter.  A few held the contrary opinion, that the fate of ethnic and religious minorities in the rapidly and energetically disassembling one time country presented a challenge to American values and norms.

The European house was divided on the issue.  Some political leaders and public intellectuals remembered that World War I had its origins in the conflict zones of Bosnia and adjacent areas.  While the analogy was both poor and unconvincing, it did take hold on some imaginations.  But others held different views.  Germany, for example, stood back while providing assistance to one of the successor mini-states, Croatia.

Finally, the US did what the US was expected to do--make a decision and provide leadership.  The Clinton administration having been convinced by advocates of air power that a few strikes from the blue would suffice to bring the Serbs to their senses authorized an air interdiction effort to be conducted under the official auspices of NATO.  With the aid of a few anemic air forces from others of the alliance, the US did "shock and awe" the Serbs.  There were more than a few collateral civilian casualties as when the bombers visited Belgrade.  The deaths and destruction did not do the trick, so ground forces were ultimately (and quite reluctantly) added to the force package.

The US did step back a bit after the opening weeks of the intervention, but there is no doubt the heavy lifting was performed by American forces both air and ground.  When the dust settled, there was a general agreement that NATO had passed the test, imposing peace and saving Muslims from the killing fields.  This conclusion can be debated but was nonetheless almost universally accepted.  NATO had a new lease on life.

The Bosnian precedent was in play when NATO after 9/11 invoked Article V of the charter for the very first time and joined with the US in the invasion of Afghanistan.  This nasty little war started with whoops of unrestrained enthusiasm.   Now, a decade later the enthusiasm is not even a dim memory, and most of the NATO contingents still in country are seeking the earliest departure date possible.

Other NATO members who joined the invasion have long since gone.  Part of the reason for the early bailouts and reluctant remaining can be assigned to the pathetic leadership offered by the Bush/Cheney administration, particularly their decision to march off to Iraq with the job in Afghanistan barely begun let alone finished.  The Great Adventure in Regime Change in Iraq was not widely supported in NATO.  Even in those NATO members which accompanied the US on the road to Baghdad, the support was not deep and had no real potential to be prolonged.

The combination of "mission leap" in Afghanistan and invading Iraq undercut the capacity and political will of NATO for out-of-theater operations.  Worse, the style and strategy of the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld crew severely eroded American leadership in the alliance.  A widespread distaste for being seen as instruments of a made-in-the-USA policy with no authentic European interests grew to the mutual disadvantage of both the US and NATO.

It is within this context that the NATO operations in Libya must be considered.  The actions must also be viewed against the backdrop of the Obama understanding of multi-lateralism and American leadership in such.  Context and backdrop frame the current operations in Libya.  The manner in which the framing operates does much to explain why and how the credibility of NATO is at stake.

The importance of credibility resides not with the continuation of NATO.  The alliance will soldier on.  Rather it lies with how NATO is seen by states hostile to either or both Europe and the US.  This list includes the obvious--Iran--and the less self-evident or longer term such as Pakistan, Russia, China, and non-state actors having state support or safe haven.

To be a credible instrument of deterrence, the alliance must be seen and generally understood as possessing both the military means and political will necessary to wage effective war at all levels of the intensity spectrum from the smallest asymmetrical conflict to full bore conventional war with or without a nuclear aspect.  Any perceived failure by NATO in either military means or political will can erode the deterrent potential of NATO as it can that of any individual nation-state.

When the newly muscular Nicholas Sarkozy determined that France would be on the mythical "right side of history," he could have opted to put together a "coalition of the willing" in the manner of George W. Bush on the eve of invading Iraq.  There was at least one other "willing" state, the UK.  Between them, Sarkozy and Cameron could have induced (dragooned?) other states into joining the coalition.  But, Sarko and Cameron did not take this route.

The reason is easy to see.  As had been shown so plainly and painfully by the US and its "coalition" in Iraq, such ad hoc assemblages have lesser legitimacy than that possessed by older, well established systems such as NATO.  The most legitimate but most inhibiting route of all was that taken by Sarkozy and Cameron--a Security Council resolution with ultimate execution under the flag of NATO. The biggest insect in the ointment was not the Security Council--even though, as might have been anticipated, the resolution was too limited to allow the accomplishment of the ultimate goal, the removal of Gaddafi--but rather the role and attitude of the US as defined by the Obama administration.

The US had even less national and strategic interests in play with respect to Libya than it had in the Bosnian affray.  The uber-realist Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, could adduce only the most hazy of interests in play--that of regional stability--to justify any American involvement in Libya.  Had American decision making been left to the dictates of realism, there would be no US aircraft in the sky over Libya.  However, idealism had its very effective advocates within the administration, the Three Furies of Hilary Clinton, Samantha Powers, and Susan Rice.

Siding with the Three Furies, the Clueless Guy In The Oval then had two critical decisions to make.  The first was definition of the goal of military operations, would they  be restricted to the no-fly and protect the civilians substance of the Security Council resolution or would they be expanded to include the president's expressed desire to rid Libya of Gaddafi.  The second was the role to be played by the US: Would we lead the exercise which implied doing the majority of the heavy lifting or would we hand off to some other executive entity such as NATO and retire to a support position in the relative shadows?

As was to have been expected, Mr Obama split the difference or, to err on the side of accuracy, sat down firmly between two stools on both issues.  Operationally, the US and others would abide by the restrictive provisions of the resolution while rhetorically overkilling Gaddafi.  We would run the show--and do the overwhelming majority of the work--for a few days and hand off to NATO while doing a few specialized missions.

The firm sitting between two stools in each matter has set up NATO for a perceived failure.  By limiting the operations to the narrow focus allowed by the Security Council resolution while continuing to exercise the most belligerent oratory, the US has acted to strengthen the political will of Gaddafi and his sons while simultaneously leading the rebels to believe that we and NATO would assure their victory.  Our hand off to NATO knowing that the alliance lacked not only the basics such as adequate stockpiles of precision munitions and aircraft as well as the most important consideration of all--unity of political will--was not only ill-advised it set up the alliance for a perceived failure.

While there are cheerleaders for NATO who argue eloquently for the alliance, proclaiming that after a rough start matters are improving rapidly, it is hard to accept these arguments at face value.  In point of fact there can and will be no certain security for the non-combatants of Libya as long as Colonel Gaddafi is in charge.  The Security Council resolution was predicated upon the R2P doctrine.  This means that the removal of Gaddafi must be subsumed in the overall orientation to protecting non-combatants.  This does not mean handing the rebels a victory as so many of their amorphous leadership seems to believe but simply the ending of Brother Leader's rule.

The Obama administration should have made US support for the Sarkozy/Cameron program contingent upon the removal of Gaddafi being placed front and center as the public goal of the air effort.  Anything less constitutes an exercise in futility.

The removal of Gaddafi requires more than the establishment of a no-fly zone.  It requires more than the partial neutralization of armor, artillery, or other heavy weapons.  The protection of non-combatants as well as the removal of Gaddafi demands the defeat of Gaddafi's armed forces.

The defeat of the Gaddafi loyalists requires the application of overwhelming force in as time limited a manner as possible.  High combat tempo requires large forces.  NATO lacks these as was well understood by the US.  By handing over responsibility to NATO, the US condemned Libya and the Libyans to a prolonged war in which more people would die and more destruction occur than otherwise would have been the case.

The paucity of forces available to NATO, which has been compounded by the very limited inventories of precision guided munitions as well as the absence of interoperability between some NATO air forces and readily available American PGMs, has assured the air campaign has been characterized by missed opportunities and incomplete successes.  Yes, some tanks and tube artillery have been destroyed, but more tanks, more tubes, and more Grad launching trucks remain often unmolested despite clear skies and good, actionable intelligence.

As the days have gone by in their bloody progress with stalemate seemingly more certain with every sunset, the military competence and political will of NATO collectively are increasingly open to question.  The use of cluster munitions against civilian population centers most notably Misrata as well as the resolute rhetoric employed by Saif Gaddafai recently all bespeak of enhanced will on the part of the current regime to keep itself in power.

The US did not exercise the leadership expected of it.  President Obama did not act as President Clinton did with respect to Bosnia.  This did not sit well with the countries of NATO oriented toward ending Gaddafi's reign.  Nor did the US leaving the frontline for a support position sit well either.  Regardless of national pride and irrespective of the burdens put on the US forces by other commitments, only the Americans have the force necessary to carry out a high tempo operation across the full breadth of Libya.  There was, no doubt, an expectation that the US would do what it has always done in the past--lead and fight.

When the US did not behave as expected--and as Mr Obama himself warned a year or so back in Trinidad--there was consternation in NATO.  There has also been a degree, a high degree of despair, among the rebels who hoped and expected more from NATO--and the US.

The situation has reached a point that the credibility of NATO as a deterrent is at stake.  The generally perceived failure of the alliance to suppress the fourth rate military of Gaddafi to a point that it doesn't threaten non-combatants on an hourly basis has undercut its value.  This implies the US now has a national interest in play in Libya--the perceived credibility of our longest standing military alliance.  Perhaps the time has come for the Americans to get off the bench and back into the war.  We have a good enough reason to.