Doug Mataconis at Outside the Beltway ("an online journal of politics and foreign affairs analysis") wrote this last August and it still stands true.
Money quote(s):
"While the battle for Tripoli still rages, it is rather apparent at this point that the final collapse of the regime of Muammar Ghadafi is, if not totally destroyed, on its last legs and that his 42 year old one man dictatorship is at an end. Not surprisingly, that has led many people to the conclusion that President Obama’s decision to back the UN/NATO mission in Libya in March was justified because, well, it worked. While President Obama will get, and does deserve, some degree of credit for achieving the goal of overthrowing Gadhafi at a minimal cost to the United States in lives and money, however, none of that success eliminates the serious questions that were raised by the Obama Administration’s decision to intervene in Libya, and the manner in which they went about doing so."
No one disputes the president's authority, as commander-in-chief, to give order to the military in the absence of a Congressional authorization; there's a whole procedure worked out about this in the War Powers Act.
"Leaving aside the all-too-real possibility that Libya will descend into civil war and chaos and that we’ll be faced with a Somalia-like situation within striking distance of Europe and the shipping lanes of the Mediterranean Sea, one of the truly unfortunate dangers of the “success” in Libya is that it reinvigorates an interventionist argument whose credibility had been, thankfully, called into serious doubt by our decade-long involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan."
And:
"(N)either the United States nor NATO are going to suddenly go out on “humanitarian” missions when the risks are too high, which is why the people are Syria shouldn’t count on anyone coming to their aid any time soon, but all that really does is create an argument that justifies interfering in the internal affairs of other nations as long as they aren’t strong enough to actually fight back too hard. It’s neither moral, nor is it a proper use of American military force, which should primarily concern itself with the protection of the vital national interests of the United States." (Bold typeface added for emphasis. - CAA.)
Morality is actually something that the use of U.S. military force is, if not uniquely, somewhat unusual in having as a factor, historically speaking at least. It's a fundamental basis for the legitimacy of using military force, which is also based, but not solely, on legality.
"There was, to put it bluntly, no reason to involve ourselves in yet another military action at a time when our troops are already stretched to the limit thanks to two wars we’ve been fighting for ten years, one of which doesn’t seem to have any geographic limitation at all. There was no reason to spend money we don’t have to come to the rescue of allies who aren’t willing to make the investments necessary to protect our own interests. Most importantly, there was no reason to get involved in a conflict in which our own national interests were not implicated in any manner whatsoever."
There's an argument to made that the U.S. "got played" in fronting the heavy lifing for some of our NATO allies in this matter, which was neither within NATO's normal area of operations nor the consequence of responding to an attack on a NATO country.
"Finally, there are the serious legal and Constitutional questions raised by the President’s course of action in Libya. Instead of seeking approval from Congress for the Libya mission, President Obama relied solely on a series of United Nations Security Council Resolutions that authorized force for the sole purpose of protecting civilians. That justification quickly went out the window, though, and it became rather obvious from the start that the United States and NATO were primarily concerned with aiding the rebels, despite their questionable ties, not protecting civilians. While the Administration did notify Congress of the action as required by the War Powers Act, they failed to seek Congressional approval for the same and showed no inclination that they thought they needed to notwithstanding previous statements by the President and the Vice-President to the contrary. When the 60 day WPA time limit approached, they made the absurd argument that the United States was not engaged in “hostilities.” Of course, Congress is partly responsible here as well considering that they failed to take any steps to challenge the President’s clear violation of the law. Nonetheless, the President fought an illegal war, and the fact that it worked doesn’t justify that fact that he acted improperly."
8/23
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