If we had listened to the interventionists, we would have been at war with Libya long ago.
by Matt Welch
It is reasonable to conclude that if John McCain had won the presidency, the United States military would be at this moment engaging in war with Libya, by enforcing a no-fly zone over the embattled country and probably arming the anti-Qadaffi rebels. After all, that's what the Arizona Senator has been advocating for the past two weeks.
But in fact an alternative-universe McCain presidency could have put us on war footing with Libya as early as January 2001, had he beaten George W. Bush in the Republican primaries back in the days of federal budget surpluses. After all, it was McCain during the 2000 campaign who was advocating pro-active regime change in Tripoli, asserting during one presidential debate that he would "revise our policies concerning these rogue states—Iraq, Libya, North Korea—those countries that continue to try to acquire weapons of mass destruction and the means to deliver them," and then "institute a policy that I call 'rogue state rollback.' I would arm, train, equip, both from without and from within, forces that would eventually overthrow the governments and install free and democratically-elected governments."
And as he made clear in his original speech unveiling this radical doctrine of pre-emptive pro-democracy war, President McCain would have backed these revolutionary operations with the full power of the U.S. military. "If you commit to supporting these forces, accept the seriousness of the obligation," he cautioned. "Don't abandon them to the mercies of tyrants whenever they meet with reversals as the administration did in the north of Iraq....The world's only superpower should never give its word insincerely. We should never make idle threats."
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