What Axl Rose Can Teach Us About Fighting in Libya

In the words of that timeless philosopher Axl Rose.

“What’s so civil about war anyway?”

My hands are tied

For all I’ve seen has changed my mind

But still the wars go on as the years go by

With no love of God or human rights

‘Cause all these dreams are swept aside

By bloody hands of the hypnotized

Who carry the cross of homicide

And history bears the scars of our civil wars

(full lyrics below the fold).

So I was walking to get my coffee and the first song Pandora thought I should hear was Civil War. This was one of the howl at the moon songs we used to serenade the entire barracks with when we were lit up. I have said before I think it is a great song and a brilliant anti-war anthem. If it doesn’t make you thinnk about the true cost of war and the failure of humans to live peacefully, then you are not paying attention

We are again looking at a foreign war and I have been trying to square in my own mind how we can justify it. I want to throw up when I hear newscasters toss around phrases like spending our blood and treasure. STFU! we are sending men and women to fight and die, have the stones to speak straight about that. It is the most consequential decision we can make and should always be a last resort.

Now that the UN has blessed a no fly zone, we will see what happens next. This action is obviously much later than it should have been and many Libyans have been slaughtered because of that failure. Once it was obvious that there was a serious resistance in Libya, we should have made some overt gesture of support. Gaddafi is a pathetic facade of a true tyrant, and he has never been particularly brave. He wet himself when Reagan launched some buzzbombs at him. He caved on his WMD programs when W deposed Saddam. Doesn’t it seem likely that if a bunch of his fighter jets blew up and holes appeared in all his runways that he might have chilled out and decided rich in exile beats being returned to your component molecules?

So what now? The Libyans are starting to talk like a good chickening out wouldn’t be the worst thing, but Madame Hillary wants to see the actions meet the words. I can’t see any scenario where US troops on the ground is a good thing, besides some Special Forces helping the rebels learn to play Army. But maybe some Egyptian tanks flying UN and Arab League colors parked near Benghazi might sharpen up the decision-making process for Gaddafi and his spawn. If he keeps hitting the rebels we can obviously give him a good taste of precision-guided weaponry and he really doesn’t have any way to oppose us.

If there was ever a time for that vaunted international community to step up and act this seems like an easy one. Strangle him economically, diplomatically and if need be literally. Personally I think he will cave shortly and go pitch his tents in somebody else’s desert oasis. If he doesn’t then it gets sticky, and all options for escalation seem to require some direct intervention. There is not much sentiment in favor of that and our own Sec Def said land war in the Middle East would be insane so this is not time for a reprise of the shores of Tripoli. In the end I think we will try to pressure him out and if that fails, we will destroy as much of his weaponry, infrastructure and personal property as possible. Insha Allah that will do the trick.

“What we’ve got here is failure to communicate.

Some men you just can’t reach…

So, you get what we had here last week,

which is the way he wants it!

Well, he gets it!

N’ I don’t like it any more than you men.” *

Look at your young men fighting

Look at your women crying

Look at your young men dying

The way they’ve always done before

Look at the hate we’re breeding

Look at the fear we’re feeding

Look at the lives we’re leading

The way we’ve always done before

My hands are tied

The billions shift from side to side

And the wars go on with brainwashed pride

For the love of God and our human rights

And all these things are swept aside

By bloody hands time can’t deny

And are washed away by your genocide

And history hides the lies of our civil wars

D’you wear a black armband

When they shot the man

Who said “Peace could last forever”

And in my first memories

They shot Kennedy

I went numb when I learned to see

So I never fell for Vietnam

We got the wall of D.C. to remind us all

That you can’t trust freedom

When it’s not in your hands

When everybody’s fightin’

For their promised land

And

I don’t need your civil war

It feeds the rich while it buries the poor

Your power hungry sellin’ soldiers

In a human grocery store

Ain’t that fresh

I don’t need your civil war

Look at the shoes your filling

Look at the blood we’re spilling

Look at the world we’re killing

The way we’ve always done before

Look in the doubt we’ve wallowed

Look at the leaders we’ve followed

Look at the lies we’ve swallowed

And I don’t want to hear no more

My hands are tied

For all I’ve seen has changed my mind

But still the wars go on as the years go by

With no love of God or human rights

‘Cause all these dreams are swept aside

By bloody hands of the hypnotized

Who carry the cross of homicide

And history bears the scars of our civil wars

“We practice selective annihilation of mayors

And government officials

For example to create a vacuum

Then we fill that vacuum

As popular war advances

Peace is closer” **

I don’t need your civil war

It feeds the rich while it buries the poor

Your power hungry sellin’ soldiers

In a human grocery store

Ain’t that fresh

And I don’t need your civil war

I don’t need your civil war

I don’t need your civil war

Your power hungry sellin’ soldiers

In a human grocery store

Ain’t that fresh

I don’t need your civil war

I don’t need one more war

I don’t need one more war

Whaz so civil ’bout war anyway