Thoughts on the Libyan War: Operation Odyssey Dawn and “Obomba”

As an American who has spent significant time in Libya, made friends in Libya, and even lived there for a short time, I’ve been keeping fairly abreast of the goings-on in the recent news and I find myself having to speak out on the matter.  As a citizen whose country has been at war on behalf of other nations for over a decade, yet never going to war for our own defense, and whose nation is in the worst economic situation in the last eighty years, I find myself unable to conscionably condone yet another war in a foreign country that we’re not really going to actually “fight” especially when I’d imagine we’re doing so for free. We can’t take care of our own country, yet we’re qualified to help them take care of theirs?

By now you should know Operation Odyssey dawn has gone into effect; the code name for our newest military debacle where we put our noses and our fighter jets somewhere they don’t belong and do it for nothing. Our country is broke. We owe TRILLIONS of debt and we’re spending BILLIONS on this effort for little to no recompense. Let me amend that.. absolutely no recompense, for our efforts.  When will this stop? Sure, life sucks all over the world and dictators are everywhere, but I don’t see us bombing the communist dictators of China. Why the hell are we in Libya?

Already, this close to the forming of the new “joint venture” (and I use that term very loosely), all the foreign governments who are pushing us to back this no-fly-zone enforcement of  UN Security Council Ruling 1973 are wondering where the money is going to come from and what we’re actually there to do, and oh yeah… whose going to do it? President Obama came out and said plainly that ousting Gadhafi is NOT the goal of the U.N operation, but other allies are stating at the same time that it’s the key objective. Left hand; meet right hand. You two should talk before you get on international television and start spouting sound-bytes.

The same day, Obama, (in one of the rare smart things I’ve ever heard him say) told the Washington Post that we (the US) are seeking to hand over the reins of leading this operation to another country over the next several days but no one seems to know who is going to take over for us. Then one of our own think-tank directors pretty much sums it up clearly and says it’s gonna stay in our lap like someone’s stinky child… no one else wants it. I mean why not? We’re already fighting two wars. What’s a third to our economic deficit? With the possible exception of the Roman Empire, I’m pretty sure no country in mankind’s civilization has ever fought three wars on three different fronts when none of them concerned their own country.

Right now NATO is a complete Cluster-*$#k, no one knows what’s going to happen, and we have no idea how to plan this? Seriously?

I’ve been to Libya.. I’ve sees Gadhafi’s compound. Every single living soul in Tripoli knows where it is… it’s the only one with sniper towers every 50 meters, surrounded by a blockade of stone, and with the pointy barrels of guns sticking out of it. If we’re going to do this to help the Libyan people, we could be in and out in less than an hour.  Pick our targets of opportunity, drop in a few JDAM warheads, bug back out to the USS Enterprise  or the USS Kearsarge parked off the coast and be home before dinner. Boom. The entire “war” would be over in less than a day. We could obliterate the entire country with the firepower banked on those two warships.. so why can’t we kill one old fat dictator and his two bastard sons? And all that is even IF the Libyan people want us there in the first place. If they ask, sure. We’ll come over there with a few hundred million dollars worth of jets and firepower for your defense. Then we’ll send you a HUGE bill, payable in crude oil. Hell, we’ll even help rebuild Ras Lanuf and Brega oil fields for that! Why not? That’s a sensible approach to assisting another country. Not this “let’s fly around and take potshots at tanks” crap we’re doing now.

Journalists are getting rebels and civilians stating that Gadhafi is bombing family homes with tanks,and that’s killed over 90 and wounded over 1000 in Misrata alone. And that was just on Tuesday; one day. In a city of only 300,000, injuring 1000 per day seems like good enough reason to drop bombs on everything spouting a gun-turret and let the dice fall where they may. Might we hurt some civilians? Yes, it’s war. Shit happens. But I guarantee we won’t kill a thousand TOTAL in the country if we went in there and wiped him out in one afternoon. Here’s an idea to help save the innocents. “Attention Libyan People: When you hear the roaring sound of jets overhead, run in the opposite direction of the bad guys and don’t come back for a day or so. We’ll take care of the rest!” There. I just saved thousands of innocent lives. Ya happy?

According to reports coming out of Libya, the rebels who actually ARE fighting him are trying to give us the coordinates of his tanks and military targets but we’re not bothering to answer their calls.  Thanks Admiral Sam Locklear. We appreciate your coordinate effort to get intel from the locals! For God’s sake, we’ve already dumped 161 Tomohawk cruise missiles into the country at about 1.2 million each. We’re already in this for 200 million at in a couple days with nothing to show for it! According to the CSBA (Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments) our no-fly zone will cost about 400-800 million to implement and over 100 million per week to maintain it. Are you telling me we can’t paint a target on this guys head for less than a billion dollars and pull the trigger? I’ll make you a deal. Give me half that and I’ll go over there and put a bullet in him myself. I think with half a billion dollars I could probably get some pretty serious firepower working over there. What the hell are we doing?

Obama, get off your sorry ass and get our country out of the wars you already promised to get us out of, you lying sack of manure. Haven’t your policies ruined this once-great country enough in the brief time you’ve been in office? We don’t belong in Libya and if we ARE going to go there, let someone who knows what the hell they’re doing lead the charge.  If you’ve never been in the military you certainly don’t deserve to lead the most powerful one on earth, not to mention your lack of foreign policy is kinda scary. I hear southeast Asia loves you.. you should go back there and run for office!

Either stay out of their country, or go over there with all our might and have our jets back home by week’s end!