Obama needed less prodding on Libya than the doves in his staff may have imagined. Behind Obama's turnaround on Libya

On Tuesday afternoon, as Libyan leader Muammar Qadhafi moved in for the kill on pro-democracy rebels challenging his regime, an agitated President Barack Obama turned to his national security team in the White House and demanded: “I want to see all of the options.”

To the surprise of some in the room, Obama wanted alternatives that moved considerably beyond the mere imposition of the no-fly zone long advocated by hawks in the administration and European allies, to a broader range of military options that included attacks on pro-Qadhafi armor and artillery advocated by his U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice days before.


Obama had one demand, according to people close to him: Not one American boot could touch one grain of Libyan sand.

Between 9 p.m. and midnight, Obama’s team of somewhat hesitant warriors, led by Defense Secretary Robert Gates and National Security Adviser Tom Donilon, reconvened with Obama in the White House, according to senior administration officials, to hammer out the language of what would become U.N. Resolution 1973 when the U.N. Security Council approved it early Thursday evening.

The administration official who was one of the strongest proponents for direct action, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was traveling in Europe and North Africa, too exhausted to join the discussion via secure link. Yet over the next 48 hours, Clinton and Rice would work the phones, twisting the requisite arms to win a 10-0 Security Council vote.

Obama’s rapid transition from skeptic of military intervention to advocating an even broader mandate than his European partners was a reflection of the president’s visceral fear of a massacre in the Libyan Sahara — and his recognition that the Arab League, by signaling its support, would mean the intervention was not just something carried out only by the U.S. and Europe, Obama aides told POLITICO.

“Building the international coalition was vital for the president, it was a threshold question,” said a senior administration official, on condition of anonymity.

It allowed Obama to align his support for the growing wave of pro-democracy youth rebelling against sclerotic dictators — with concrete policy to back it up.

Obama needed less prodding than the doves in his staff may have imagined. Even though he was personally inclined to oppose intervention — haunted by the Iraq War — he amped up his anti-Qadhafi language early in the crisis, shifting to a call for his ouster minutes after the last ferry with U.S. citizens left Libya’s Mediterranean coast.

Over and over, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters that all options were “on the table.” And as the rebels faltered, Obama took increasing heed of Clinton’s reminders of the costs of inaction during the Rwanda genocide when her husband was president.

Still, the result of Obama’s late-in-the-game decision is an ungainly hybrid of a military enterprise with no guarantee of success.

The U.N. has the mandate to create an international coalition led by France and Great Britain, with pilots from nearby Mideast countries — but its most powerful partner, the U.S., will likely play a back-seat role, providing logistical support, intelligence and possibly launching missile strikes on Qadhafi’s infrastructure.

And it’s possible the help won’t arrive in time to save rebels holed up in four pockets, the biggest in Benghazi, a city of 700,000 that could turn into a killing field if recaptured by Qadhafi’s army of hardcore loyalists and mercenaries.

Then there’s the feasibility of the larger underlying mission — ousting Qadhafi through the destruction of his military infrastructure, a kind of regime change on the cheap.

“The use-of-force resolution is focused on protecting civilians, not removing Qadhafi from power … but everything else we’re doing is aimed at pressuring him to give up power,” said a senior administration official.

Yet by foreclosing the possibility that U.S. ground troops will engage Qadhafi if airstrikes alone fail, Obama and his allies run the risk of creating a long-term stalemate with a wily despot.

“I don’t think it will be [a success]… I agree with Secretary [of Defense] Robert Gates,” said Micah Zenko, an expert on post-WW II conflict with the Council on Foreign Relations.

“We can do this, but I don’t think it will have much effect on the ground … And what is your desired end?” he added. “They [the Obama administration] don’t want to take the lead on this because intervening in civil wars doesn’t have a good outcome historically.”

Former Bush National Security Council official Elliott Abrams, a frequent Obama critic, said the president’s move does put Qadhafi on the defensive — but it would have been far more effective had it been made two weeks ago when Qadhafi seemed on the verge of being deposed.

“We’re setting up a stalemate here,” he said.

Yet Obama, speaking at the White House Friday afternoon, insisted the mission would be “focused” on preventing the slaughter of civilians, suggesting that doing so alone might force Qadhafi out of power.

In stark, personal language that echoed the warnings of his predecessor, George W. Bush, to Saddam Hussein, Obama suggested the U.S. would commit air and naval assets to a possible fight in Libya but stopped short of saying he advocated all-out regime change.

“Here’s why this matters to us: Left unchecked, we have every reason to believe that Qadhafi would commit atrocities against his people. Many thousands could die. A humanitarian crisis could ensue,” said a grim-faced Obama in his brief remarks in the East Room.

Obama articulated two immediate goals for the mission — “protecting innocent civilians in Libya and holding Qadhafi” accountable for human rights violations. A third longer-term objective, he said, was ensuring that international peace efforts not “ring hollow.”

He stressed that the U.S., while taking a leadership role, was part of a much broader coalition that included the enthusiastic participation of France, Britain and the Arab League, adding that in the wave of rebellion engulfing the region “change cannot and will not be imposed by the United States.”

At times, Obama seemed to be speaking to the Libyan leader directly, outlining a set of demands that included a troop pullback from four besieged Libyan cities and restoration of fuel, water and transportation lines to the besieged pro-democracy fighters.

“These terms are not negotiable,” he said, adding that the allies would use “military action” if the terms weren’t met immediately.

Clinton, meanwhile, dismissed the Qadhafi regime’s claim it was breaking off its attacks on rebels hunkering down in the east of the country — saying she was “not responsive or impressed by words” but needed to see “actions on the ground and that is not yet at all clear.”

It’s wasn’t clear Qadhafi’s forces were honoring the cease fire. A spokesman for the rebels told The Associated Press that attacks were ongoing in both east and west Libya. And on Friday night, American intelligence officials detected a mass of pro-Qadhafi troops headed east toward Benghazi.