Libya: When Multi-National Military Interventions Go Wrong

One can best describe the principle behind forming international security organizations (ISOs) using an old Sioux saying: “One arrow alone is easy to break, but five together is far more difficult.” These ISO partnerships allow for the centralization of response, a pooling of resources, and a semblance of neutrality, while the partner states maintain their independence (Abbott and Snidal (1998). In addition, ISOs have increasingly become involved in humanitarian missions, especially with military interventions for peacekeeping and even regime change when they believe it is warranted (Finnemore 1996).

This transition indicates a global norm shift away from the traditional state’s national interests for security and moving towards a globalist society and altruistic ideals (Barnett and Finnemore 1999). The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is one such ISO, and Western allies created it as a strategic alliance against the Soviet Union. Since the end of the Cold War, NATO has served in numerous security roles, including Bosnia during the Balkan civil war and Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. NATO was also the primary ISO involved in aiding the regime change in Libya during the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings.

Libya was once the foremost name in state-sponsor of terrorism next to Iran. Still, after years of severe international sanctions and a post-9/11 ultimatum by former President George W. Bush, Libya’s leader, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, surprisingly reversed his stance. Gaddafi expelled the last of the remaining foreign terrorist organizations he was providing material support and a haven to in a few short years. He became a leading counterterrorism partner to the U.S. and its allies. Similarly, he suspended his country’s weapons of mass destruction programs. However, Gaddafi was still a brutal dictator who oppressed his people and crushed all opposition to his power mercilessly and would be the motivation for the U.S. and NATO to intervene when the spark of rebellion ignited in Libya during the 2011 Arab Spring Uprisings (Killing Gaddafi, 2017).

During the Libyan revolution, radical Islamist terror groups infiltrated and influenced rebel militias and began asserting dominance in the direction the country would take. Once Gaddafi was deposed and summarily unceremoniously executed, the extremists’ power swelled and preyed upon the power vacuum left by the hasty withdrawal of Western military forces. The collapse of Libya had other global impacts, not just in providing a renewed haven for numerous foreign terrorist organizations to launch attacks but also economically due to the lack of government control of Libya’s oil reserves and facilities. This latter aspect has additionally afforded the regional terror groups who now control some of those facilities access to near-limitless financing from illicit oil profits (ISIS in Libya, 2016). The U.S. and NATO intervention was a moral and ethical decision to take from an altruistic perspective. Unfortunately, this decision has created an even more significant global security threat and humanitarian crisis.

There did not appear to be a clear and concise plan for withdrawal from the conflict in Libya by the U.S. and NATO forces after the Libyan revolutionaries removed Gaddafi from power, and without foreign aid to help stabilize and rebuild, Libya quickly descended into chaos (Blanchard, 2018; Boeke and De Roy van Zuijdewijn, 2016). Moreover, the empowered and emboldened foreign terrorist organizations like Ansar al-Sharia and Al Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb exploited the instability to further entrench themselves in Libya as a base of operations in Northern Africa. These FTOs, flush with resources and weapons from the material support provided to the militias they had infiltrated and from raiding former Libyan military caches, made it even more dangerous and more challenging for the provisional government to disrupt and dismantle.

In retaliation and as a show of force to further assert their dominance in the region, elements from these Al Qa’ida affiliates organized an assault on the U.S. Embassy Temporary Mission Facility and CIA Annex in Benghazi on the eleventh anniversary of the September 11^th attacks. The siege resulted in the killing of the Chief of Mission and three other Americans and a further distancing by the developed world from Libya, pushing the unstable nation further into the status of a failed state and solidifying the country as a terrorist safe haven.

The U.S. and its NATO allies forewent diplomatic measures and almost immediately escalated to intervene militarily in Libya during the Arab Spring uprising to protect civilians and prevent mass atrocities by Gaddafi and his forces attempting to quell the rebellion. With the increased military pressure on Libya’s military, Gaddafi could not divert the assets he had allocated to combating Islamic extremists in the region. These dangerous FTOs insinuated themselves into the revolution and hijacked many anti-Gaddafi forces (Angel, 2016). Firmly entrenched in the militias that would become the foundations of the new Libyan interim government, the FTOs became highly influential, flush with weapons and resources garnered during and succeeding the civil war, especially in Benghazi, which had a long history of insurgency in Libya.

As the security situation in Libya rapidly deteriorated, almost all the industrial nations suspended diplomatic and humanitarian missions to the failing state, further strengthening and emboldening Al Qa’ida and its affiliates. Attacks against Western interests progressively increased and culminated with a full-scale assault of the U.S. Embassy Temporary Mission Facility in Benghazi on September 11th, 2012, leaving U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans dead.

Without the U.S. and NATO military intervention in the Libyan rebellion during the 2011 Arab Spring, Gaddafi’s military would likely have succeeded in suppressing the insurrection and preventing the large-scale infiltration by foreign terrorist organizations. Moreover, with a victory by Gaddafi’s forces over the rebel militias, Libya most likely would not have descended into a failed state and terrorist haven, setting the conditions for the successful attack on the Benghazi TMF and CIA Annex by Al Qa’ida affiliates the following year.

Unfortunately, this event was highly politicized, especially leading up to the 2016 U.S. presidential election, so the decision-making and policy failures in this military intervention have created information gaps in the root causes of the rekindled Libyan terror state.

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References:

ISIS in Libya: A Major Regional and International Threat. 2016. The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center. https://www.terrorism-info.org.il/Data/articles/Art_20943/E_209_15_1076923854.pdf.

Killing Gaddafi. Directed by Jacques Charmelot. 2017. Paris, France: Ammo Content. DVD.

Abbott, Kenneth W., and Duncan Snidal. 1998. “Why States Act through Formal International Organizations.” The Journal of Conflict Resolution 42 (1) (02): 3-32.

 Barnett, Michael N., and Marsha Finnemore. 1999. “The Politics, Power, and Pathologies of International Organizations,” International Organization, 53(4), 1999, pp.699-732.

Blanchard, Christopher. 2018. Libya: Transition and U.S. Policy. Washington, D.C.: Congressional Research Service. https://fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33142.pdf.

Boeke, Sergei, and Jeanine De Roy van Zuijdewijn. 2016. Transitioning from military interventions to long-term counterterrorism policy. Leiden, NL: Leiden University, 2016. http://icct.nl/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/transitioning_from_military_intervention_mali_2016.pdf.

 Finnemore, Martha. 1996. “The Culture of National Security: Constructing Norms of Humanitarian Intervention,” in Peter J. Katzenstein (ed.), The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996).

Ben Varlese is a former U.S. Army Mountain Infantry Platoon Sergeant and served in domestic and overseas roles from 2001-2018, including, from 2003-2005, as a sniper section leader. Besides his military service, Ben worked on the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq’s protective security detail in various roles, and since 2018, he has also provided security consulting services for public and private sectors, including tactical training, physical and information security, executive protection, protective intelligence, risk management, insider threat mitigation, and anti-terrorism. He earned a B.A. and an M.A. in Intelligence Studies from American Military University, a graduate certificate in Cyber Security from Colorado State University and is currently in his second year of AMU’s Doctorate of Global Security program.

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