Hamas were one of the first to condemn Gaddafi! Seems like you don't remember things as vividly as you think
And if you read what I posted again, you should realise that I was commenting on support of the NATO intervention itself, not support of Gaddafi's actions re the initial street protests.
Is there a NATO live feed I don't know about
There were live new reports coming from Benghazi, both from residents of the city using social media and from a few remaining journalists. So no, there wasn't a live NATO feed but there were live people there who witnessed the initial NATO strike on Gaddafi's tanks.
They're not doing it for the right reasons, are they?
And precisely what reasons are they doing it for? How do you know what the real reasons are?
Before you claim that the real reason is access to Libya's oil, I did point out earlier that the West already had access to Libya's oil under Gaddafi. There were contracts signed and business ventures in operation, with all the foreign staff required. The revolution interrupted production, which is still largely stalled. This has cost businesses a lot of time and money.
Now, if making money out of Libya's oil was the primary motive for all Western actions in Libya, then the smart option would have been to help Gaddafi crush the revolution quickly. Much quicker and easier. Much less disruption to business. Ever think of that before?
I don't think large segments of western people support the foreign policy of their leaders. Afaik the UN sanction was to protect civilians (by using depleted uranium
) not to take sides in a civil war or help with regime change--if it did the Russians and Chinese wouldn't have voted in favour of it.
I think you will find that large segments of the European population actually would support this particular action. I wouldn't blame them either.
Depleted uranium is neither here nor there. It's simply standard anti-tank munitions these days, for very good reasons (ie: it's extremely effective at knocking out tanks). So if you want to protect civilians by knocking out tanks that are about to massacre them, chances are you might be firing off some DU rounds.
You're correct about the initial UN resolution. Obviously the scope was a bit murky and there has been some scope creep. Is this necessarily a bad thing? How long did you want the civil war to drag on for?
Also Gaddafi didn't start killing his own people a few months ago, he's been at it for decades. Where was the great heroic NATO then? Wasn't it the Italians who were getting cosy with him? The Brits sending the SAS to train his forces?
Which completely misses the point. The question is not whether they should have done anything earlier, but whether or not taking action when they did was a bad thing.
ETA: You appear to think that being consistent with the actions of past adminstrations should trump all else. Your argument appears to be that because nobody took action when Gaddafi committed atrocities in past decades, nobody should ever have taken action when Gaddafi committed atrocities this year. Do you regard this as a compelling argument? Would you be prepared to make this argument to our Libyan members?
Topic: Re: Libya