Libya - the 'rough beast'

Former Lt. Gen. Robert Dubik has both advice and hindsight on Libya for President Obama. Among the best hindsight, that Juan Cole and other liberal interventionists need to heed, comes from Bosnia, per Dubik, but could also come from Afghanistan or even, to some degree, Iraq, and that is — air power doesn't "win" anything. Libya once again shows that, if not boots, tanks and Bradleys on the ground are necessary.

The advice? If we're not going to pull out or just "avoid losing," then we have to do more, he says:

To give (rebels) a fighting chance, NATO must put military advisers and combat air controllers on the ground — not just British, French and Italian, but also a small number of American ones.

Try selling that to Congress and the American public, Mr. Nobel Peace Prize. Actually, no, let war hawks Lindsey Graham and John McCain go on the sales line first.

Then, let's see the Juan Coles of the world are still so gung-ho about interventionism.

The "rough beast"? Riffing on W.B. Yeats, Libya is part of the Arab gyre of Roger Cohen's focus. And, Bethlehems in the Middle East as birthplaces for world-transforming events are few and far between. The actual site is the birthplace, if anything, to riff on the Arab world, of Israeli perfidy, Palestinian Authority ineptness, corruption and weakness and ... a Hamas threatening to be born with more virulence than ever.

With that in mind, Preznit Kumbaya had better be damned sure he gets different rebels in Libya straightened out before further intervening.