Blowback, Libya: More unintended consequences, less progress on the larger issues

When it comes to Western attempts at armed intervention, the record of recent years – in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya – speaks convincingly for itself.

Unprecedented gains by the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq have drawn the U.S. military back into the fray and have been accompanied by horrendous civilian carnage. The country is politically fractured and the state failing.

A controversial election in Afghanistan, with a highly contested outcome, has been followed by a putative deal on cobbling together a “unity” government. Meanwhile, another instance of “green on blue” insider killings has underscored the parlous prospects facing this “graveyard of empires” following NATO’s withdrawal.

Enough? Not quite. Although not covered nearly as prominently as developments in Iraq or Afghanistan, recent weeks have brought dissolution, civil war and generalized regression in Libya.

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What to make of these events? Above all, it appears that costly Western experiments with the attempted imposition of military solutions in the face of complex, multi-dimensional civil conflicts have served mainly to make matters worse.

The latest example of this form of “blowback” is Libya, which is by all accounts in uncharted waters and  descending into chaos. For the Libyan people, who until recently enjoyed Africa’s highest standing on the UN’s Human Development Index, this outcome represents an unmitigated disaster, with no end in sight.

Could such a catastrophe have been avoided?

Almost certainly.

Have decision-makers and opinion-leaders learned from their mistakes? Not likely. The burden of evidence from the misadventures in Afghanistan and Iraq was already clear at the time of the Libyan intervention, yet those lessons were ignored. Little wonder that the victory celebrations rung hollow.

If this all seems too discouraging, brace yourself.

The larger picture is even more troubling.

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