{"id":962,"date":"2011-04-09T07:23:12","date_gmt":"2011-04-09T14:23:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/?p=962"},"modified":"2011-04-09T07:28:15","modified_gmt":"2011-04-09T14:28:15","slug":"did-obama-avert-a-bloodbath-in-libya","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/?p=962","title":{"rendered":"Did Obama avert a bloodbath in Libya?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/sgandhi3.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/sgandhi3.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"sgandhi\" width=\"3652\" height=\"1476\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-968\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/sgandhi3.jpg 3652w, https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/sgandhi3-300x121.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/sgandhi3-1024x413.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 3652px) 100vw, 3652px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The following article appeared in the Chicago Tribune.<\/p>\n<p>April 3, 2011<br \/>\nThe Chicago Tribune<\/p>\n<p>Did Obama avert a bloodbath in Libya [<\/p>\n<p>Panicking over a dubious threat<\/p>\n<p>By Steve Chapman <\/p>\n<p>Remember when a crusading president, acting on dubious intelligence,<br \/>\ninsufficient information and exaggerated fears, took the nation into a<br \/>\nMiddle Eastern war of choice? That was George W. Bush in 2003, invading<br \/>\nIraq. But it&#8217;s also Barack Obama in 2011, attacking Libya.<\/p>\n<p>For weeks, President Obama had been wary of military action. What obviously<br \/>\nchanged his mind was the fear that Moammar Gadhafi was bent on mass<br \/>\nslaughter \u2039 which stemmed from Gadhafi&#8217;s March 17 speech vowing &#8220;no mercy&#8221;<br \/>\nfor his enemies.<\/p>\n<p>In his March 26 radio address, Obama said the United States acted because<br \/>\nGadhafi threatened &#8220;a bloodbath.&#8221; Two days later, he asserted, &#8220;We knew that<br \/>\nif we waited one more day, Benghazi ( a city nearly the size of Charlotte<br \/>\n(N.C.) ) could suffer a massacre that would have reverberated across the<br \/>\nregion and stained the conscience of the world.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Really? Obama implied that, absent our intervention, Gadhafi might have<br \/>\nkilled nearly 700,000 people, putting it in a class with the 1994 genocide<br \/>\nin Rwanda. White House adviser Dennis Ross was only slightly less alarmist<br \/>\nwhen he reportedly cited &#8220;the real or imminent possibility that up to a<br \/>\n100,000 people could be massacred.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>But these are outlandish scenarios that go beyond any reasonable<br \/>\ninterpretation of Gadhafi&#8217;s words. He said, &#8220;We will have no mercy on them&#8221;<br \/>\n\u2039 but by &#8220;them,&#8221; he plainly was referring to armed rebels (&#8220;traitors&#8221;) who<br \/>\nstand and fight, not all the city&#8217;s inhabitants.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have left the way open to them,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Escape. Let those who escape<br \/>\ngo forever.&#8221; He pledged that &#8220;whoever hands over his weapons, stays at home<br \/>\nwithout any weapons, whatever he did previously, he will be pardoned,<br \/>\nprotected.&#8221; . . .<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n<p>The following article appeared in the Chicago Tribune.<\/p>\n<p>April 3, 2011 The Chicago Tribune<\/p>\n<p>Did Obama avert a bloodbath in Libya [<\/p>\n<p>Panicking over a dubious threat<\/p>\n<p>By Steve Chapman <\/p>\n<p>Remember when a crusading president, acting on dubious intelligence, insufficient information and exaggerated fears, took the nation into a Middle Eastern war of [&#8230;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","odd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=962"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/962\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":972,"href":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/962\/revisions\/972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.derykhouston.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}