The War Obama Wanted

Who are we supporting in Libya? The question has been raised - I can provide an answer: either we're supporting Libyan rebels with experience fighting American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, or we're supporting rebels with no combat experience whatsoever.

I suppose I've merely rephrased the question in an even more uncomfortable (at least, for those who should have an answer) manner: are we supporting Libyan rebels with experience fighting American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, or are we supporting rebels with no combat experience whatsoever? (Please set aside any fantastic notion that we're only protecting civilians and not supporting rebels at all - when you bomb one side in a war you're supporting the other.) The US military doesn't need-to-know the answer ("Our mission is not to support any opposition forces," the general said) - they are following orders from the Commander-in-Chief, who - not surprisingly - seems rather loathe to examine that point too closely. (Or at least doesn't want to talk about it.) American reporters (also not surprisingly; they've been quite supportive of the government lately - it's like the 90s all over again!) - don't seem too eager to raise the question, either.

Since I know the answer, I believe it's only fair I give it...

At Reason, Michael C. Moynihan says he can't get to Libya, "So I offer this to all of those brave journalists in the field, both in Benghazi and Tripoli, who seem to be ignoring a rather important issue." His offer is this question:

"Who is it that these strikes are supporting?"

For those of us skeptical of the intervention in Libya (but will nevertheless cheer if Qaddafi, veteran scumbag and funder of scumbags, disappears from the world stage), one of the many unanswered questions is: "Who is it that these strikes are supporting?" When I visited Libya, the purpose of the trip was to demonstrate the successful government campaign against the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), an al-Qaeda farm team that worked with bin Laden in Sudan and Afghanistan and whose stated goal was the overthrow of the "secular" (by LIFG standards) Qaddafi regime. Through a series of prison initiatives ultimately called "corrective studies," the government released almost all of its "rehabilitated" LIFG prisoners who, it claimed, had renounced terrorism. And when the regime was teetering last month, as a sop to the more extreme elements in the protest movement, the government released its remaining LIFG prisoners.

When I met a handful of these guys last year, as security officials loomed, scribbling in notepads, they unconvincingly claimed that they had seen the light, denied that they had been tortured, and said, without emotion or inflection--that tone that one heard in Stalinist show trials, when poets and ex-party officials confessed to being "wreckers" and Trotskyite saboteurs--that they were adherents of the Green Book and terribly sorry for their past offenses. It was a thoroughly unconvincing performance (though some of the other Western visitors were very much convinced). Soon after my visit, CNN's Nic Robertson did a few reports, coordinated by the Qaddafi Foundation, that detailed the "new jihad code that threatens al-Qaeda"--the LIFG's "corrective studies" program.

Among those LIFG members released (and now very much involved in the anti-Qaddafi rebellion), Abdul-Hakim al-Hasadi - subject of the Italian media story linked at the top of this post, and profiled here. Libyan prisons aren't the only ones he's inhabited: "I was captured in 2002 in Peshawar in Pakistan, while I was returning from Afghanistan where I fought against the foreign invasion. I was turned over to the Americans, detained for a few months in Islamabad, then turned over to Libya and released from prison in 2008," he says - by way of denying he was in Guantanamo.

Afghanistan isn't his only area of interest:

Al-Hasadi told Il Sole 24 Ore that he personally recruited "around 25" Libyans to fight in Iraq. "Some have come back and today are on the front at Ajdabiya," al-Hasadi explained, "They are patriots and good Muslims, not terrorists." "The members of al-Qaeda are also good Muslims and are fighting against the invader," al-Hasadi added.

(Andrew Exum noted Libya's - "and specifically eastern Libya" - contribution of foreign fighters to Iraq immediately prior to the start of US involvement in the war in Libya here.)

That version of Al-Hasadi's quote is edited, but the full quote (as reported by Il Sole 24 Ore) is interesting too. Translated:

In 2007, the U.S. military in Baghdad issued a list of foreign mujahideen who were fighting alongside the insurgents: about 112 Libyans, 52 (including some suicide bombers) were from Derna. "I've sent them about 25," states Haqim. "Some have returned and are now on the front of Ajdabiya, they are patriots and good Muslims, not terrorists. I condemn the September 11 attacks, and those against innocent civilians in general. But members of al-Qaeda are also good Muslims and fight against the invader." An ambiguous speech. Yet it is unusual to hear a man accused of joining al Qaeda call for the imposition of a no-fly zone and international raids against the strongholds of the rais.

This description is also interesting for the same reason: "Shaven, long hair, jacket and blue jeans, Ali Faraj, 42, did not look like an extremist."

If you like, you can imagine "I condemn the September 11 attacks, and those against innocent civilians in general" as being spoken without emotion or inflection by a clean-cut rebel in that tone that one heard in Stalinist show trials. Whether delivered in that tone or not, turning to the aforementioned Nic Robertson's CNN report we learn that's exactly what the Libyan "corrective studies" program was all about:

Leaders of one of the world's most effective jihadist organizations, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), have written a new "code" for jihad. The LIFG says it now views the armed struggle it waged against Col. Moammar Gadhafi's regime for two decades as illegal under Islamic law.

The new code, a 417-page religious document entitled "Corrective Studies" is the result of more than two years of intense and secret talks between the leaders of the LIFG and Libyan security officials...

In essence the new code for jihad is exactly what the West has been waiting for: a credible challenge from within jihadist ranks to al Qaeda's ideology.

While the code states that jihad is permissible if Muslim lands are invaded -- citing the cases of Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine -- the guidelines it sets down for when and how jihad should be fought, and its insistence that civilians should not be targeted are a clear rebuke to the goals and tactics of bin Laden's terrorist network.

CNN was given exclusive access to the Abu Salim jail where the code was written to talk to the LIFG prisoners...

So, perhaps as a result of our efforts Libya will soon be governed by former al Qaeda jihadists transformed by Qaddafi himself into "exactly what the West has been waiting for." If so, how much of that re-education stuck (beyond saying the slightly more right things) is another fine question. Obviously while in 2009 "The LIFG says it now views the armed struggle it waged against Col. Moammar Gadhafi's regime for two decades as illegal under Islamic law" they've subsequently changed their minds.

If nothing else, the above information should help identify the key words in this LA Times article, headlined "U.S. finds no organized Al Qaeda presence in Libya opposition, officials say." Here's a sample paragraph:

A U.S. intelligence-gathering effort that began shortly after anti-Kadafi forces started seizing towns in eastern Libya last month has not uncovered a significant presence of Islamic militants among the insurgents.

One wonders if similar statements like "U.S. intelligence has uncovered an insignificant presence of Islamic militants among the insurgents" or "U.S. finds disorganized Al Qaeda presence in Libya opposition" are also true.

But this comment to the Times from an unnamed "congressional staffer who receives intelligence briefings" is probably the right way to characterize our Libyan allies: "There ought to be a concern and recognition that there may be such a linkage. There should also be an appreciation that the opposition is not a uniform, monolithic movement."

One way of looking at that as a positive: no matter how many Libyans (freelance or under an al Qaeda banner) fought Americans (and Iraqis and Afghans) in Iraq or Afghanistan - and survived for a trip home ("1,000 trained men"?) - there aren't enough to defeat Qaddafi's army, even with American, French, and British air support. So they can't make up more than a fraction of any force that could possibly succeed in Libya. On the downside "Mr. Sayeh said the rebels had been working to better organize their ranks to include members of specialized units from the Libyan Army that would attack Colonel Qaddafi's forces when the time was right. But evidence of such a force has yet to materialize."

In other words, the answer to the question "are we supporting Libyan rebels with experience fighting American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, or are we supporting rebels with no combat experience whatsoever?" is...

Some of each.

Not a good answer, perhaps. But this New York Times account of action on the Libyan front bears it out:

The rebels appeared to have fallen into some disarray as they returned from Ajdabiya, with one commander at the checkpoint trying to marshal them with a barely functioning megaphone. He tried organizing the assembled fighters into columns for an attack, but nearly fell off the truck as he ordered the fighters to move.

"I know most of you are civilians," he said. "But we have to charge." Only a few trucks inched forward as other fighters stood and argued among themselves.

(More to follow...)