Facilitating dialogue to promote open and multi-faceted discussion and awareness

I remember driving home from work while listening to an interview on NPR of a doctor from a hospital in Libya. In the interview my heart was stirred for the people of Libya. The doctor bravely let the world know that his hospital was surrounded pro-Qadhafi forces and some Saudi forces as well, and that they were not allowing the wounded to come to the hospital. In essence there was a siege on the hospital, and resources were quickly running out. He was exhausted as he retold accounts of how nurses had been harassed and the sheer helplessness of his and his patient’s situation. And as the interview ended, he let out one last plea. He begged for the west to not turn a deaf ear to the Libyan people. He blatantly called for international intervention on the behalf of the people against the brutal oppression of their government. And then the music slowly faded in, and the interview was done.

I was moved by this. Not in a simple “Oh wow, that sucks” kind of moved. But in a legitimate, heartfelt, deep prayer for this man and for the people of Libya. My mind wandered to what I can do for them, which was really nothing. I was quickly becoming frustrated with the U.N. and their turtle-paced debates over imposing a no-fly zone to help protect the Libyan people. And when the no-fly zone was finally imposed and I saw the videos of French fighter jets speeding across the North African sky, the whole aura of the situation changed.

But still, the whole idea of military intervention in Libya is a tentative one for me. Basically, the U.N. and the U.S. are using just war theory to justify our intervention, saying we are protecting the people of Libya from their oppressive ruler and his regime. But this specific practice of just war theory is not an even distribution across the board. According to the Catechism for the Catholic Church, there are 4 distinct scenarios in which legitimate military intervention is acceptable.

• he damage inflicted by the aggressor on the nation or community of nations must be lasting, grave, and certain;
• all other means of putting an end to it must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective;
• there must be serious prospects of success;
• the use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated. The power of modern means of destruction weighs very heavily in evaluating this condition.

While surely these conditions seem to be met by the events in Libya, what of the many other countries that find themselves in the same situation? Some of these other countries have been dealing with these scenarios for many years while not being given much attention besides a few sanctions that oftentimes hurt the civilians much more than the governments. Let’s take a few for example.

Bahrain has been caught up in the recent zeitgeist of uprisings against oppressive regimes. The brutal Sunni monarch, along with Saudi Sunni’s have oppressed the mostly Shiite population, as they have risen up in democratic and peaceful protest against the government. Bahrainis have even supplicated the UN and international forces for intervention in Bahrain, to no avail except for the resignation of UN office workers in the capital of Manama.

Yemen is yet another country undergoing violent oppression from a long-lasting ruler. President Ali Abdullah Saleh has been in power in Yemen since 1978, and has tried to violently suppress the protesters calling for a change in ruler. Last Friday, more than 41 protesters were killed by security forces in the capital of Sanaa.

In Iran, the brutality of the government is simply a historical phenomenon, although it continues today. The irony of the Iranian president condemning the regimes in the middle east that are oppressing their peaceful protesters is overwhelming, considering his violent suppression of the youth revolts last year and protests going on recently. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had this to say about Iran recently:

And of course, the humanitarian crises going on in Burma, China, and many other countries around the world. What of them? they meet these requirements for military intervention, but the cost of intervening is much more.

I tentatively agree with the action imposed by the U.N. and the international coalition against Qadhafi, but I believe that the idea of human rights here is a two-faced issue. Granted, Qadhafi has attacked civilians as they have peacefully called for democratic change throughout the nation and on numerous accounts have begged for international intervention. But if we move according to this moral impulsion, what does this mean of the humanitarian crises happening in other countries? Say Yemen, or Burma, or even Iran? Why does this moral impulsion apply to Qadhafi and Libya and not these other brutal regimes?

I’m sorry to think that this may be because the political, collateral, and opportunity cost is less with Libya than with these other countries. Yemen has been an ally in our war on terror, Iran is a festering cauldron with many allies in the region, and Burma’s condition would not benefit the U.S. either way, maybe the same with Bahrain.

This is why I tentatively agree with the coalition’s actions against the Libyan regime’s brutal suppression of democratic protesters, but it sets up an uneven expectation on the U.S. and the U.N. which shows the blatancy of the feebleness of our so-called “just war” approaches. And this is why I’m skeptical of “Just War” theory in the first place, because in reality, we justify the things that are desirous to justify, and others cannot be justified. It’s not an empirical justification, rather a selfish one. So, in reality, it seems the cost for military intervention against Libya is just at the right price for us to go in…