The following is a guest post by TIME‘s Vivienne Walt, who is attending the meeting in London over the future of Libya.
Ten days after French and U.S. jets launched Operation Odyssey Dawn in an effort to halt Muammar Gaddafi’s advance on Libyan rebels, the 37 countries involved in the sprawling military coalition converged in London …
The U.S. and its allies saved the Libyan rebellion from being crushed by Gaddafi, and will continue to restrain the dictator from rolling back rebel gains. Now, “We will deny the regime arms, cut off its supply of cash, assist the opposition, and work with other nations to hasten the day when Gaddafi leaves power,” President Obama said …
“My fellow Americans,” said President Ronald Reagan during a soundcheck for a TV appearance in 1984. “I’m pleased to tell you today that I’ve signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes.”
Reagan was joking, of course. Not only was the U.S. not going to bomb the Soviet Union; he knew full well …
Moshe Ma’oz has spent his adult life studying Syria. He advised Israeli Prime Ministers Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin on how best to make peace with the regime headed Hafez Assad, the father of the current president, Bashar Assad, who faces protests across the country. The rebellion is clearly triggered by the revolts known …
The question is not whether Libya’s rebels will capture Colonel Gaddafi’s birthplace of Sirte, or storm his citadel in Tripoli; it’s whether NATO will hand them those prizes by escalating its air war with the aim of destroying Gaddafi’s regime. Coalition air strikes have broken the grip of Gaddafi’s forces on the cities of eastern Libya …
One April evening in 1984, an after-work drink took a surreal turn. On the way to a bar, we skirted a police cordon at the entrance to St James’s Square in central London; we had barely lifted our pints before armed officers clattered into our midst and informed us that the cordon had been extended. We were not to leave. The Libyan …
Yesterday, TIME’s Monica Mark reported from Abidjan of the spiraling crisis in the Ivory Coast:
The erstwhile beacon of prosperity and stability in West Africa has been held hostage for five months by incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo, who has refused to cede power after losing a November runoff presidential election. Instead, he has
…
In a conflict that has raged for 63 years, all violence can be termed “retaliation”. Israeli warplanes and tanks pound targets inside the densely populated Palestinian coastal enclave of Gaza in response to the dozens of rockets and mortars fired by militants over the past ten days; Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other smaller Palestinian …
Never mind who will command the Libya air war; the far larger problem lies in determining its purpose, terms and limits, and in honing a realistic strategy in terms of the limited commitment – both by measure of time and scale – of most of its authors.
By all accounts, Libya’s air force and its air defenses have been taken out of the …
Just days ago, the U.N. Security Council passed a landmark resolution mandating intervention in Libya, backed by what seemed like tacit international consensus on the intolerable behavior of the Gaddafi regime. U.S., French and British aircraft commenced strikes on Libyan military positions, reversing the advance of pro-government forces …
An embattled leader — who has maintained his grip on power for years, is constantly dogged by allegations of corruption, and is well versed in the dark arts of politics — announced to much relief Tuesday a date by which he would finally step down. And in other news, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh said much the same.
Uprisings …
President Barack Obama seems determined to relinquish the hot potato of U.S. leadership over the Libya air war as quickly as possible, although disputes within NATO have prevented the Alliance stepping up to take charge of a mission whose strategic objectives remain unclear. Having effectively prevented Colonel Gaddafi from sending …
Here’s an example of democracy in action, a privilege Western politicians are keen to extend as widely as possible. Today, members of Britain’s House of Commons discussed the wisdom of enforcing a no-fly zone over Libya. At 10.17 pm, almost seven hours after the start of their debate and more than three days after the establishment of …
