Liberate Libya? At What Cost?

Underreported in the Libyan crisis is a characteristic of the thawar, or revolutionaries, that puts human rights advocates — along with advocates of intervention — in something of a bind: the minimum age for the thawar draft is only only 15. Hard numbers are difficult to come by, but regardless of the percentage of the rebel army that is under the age of 18, any international intervention would be aiding a force that conscripts child soldiers.

Aiding pro-democracy forces is an admirable idea, but how to we reconcile the fact that such support implicitly supports the use of child soldiers? I suppose that imposing a no-fly zone would be the least detestable option. But how much of a difference would that actually make if the rebel forces remain poorly-trained and poorly-armed. During the conflict in Bosnia, the no-fly zone and arms ban imposed by NATO kept the Bosnian military from securing adequate weapons with which to fight Serbian forces. The same could be expected to occur in Libya. But if the West were to arm the Libyan rebels, they would literally be placing guns in the hands of child soldiers.

I’m not really sure what to make of this quandary. There is some romantic aspect of rebels fighting against the Libyan military for the freedom of the Libyan people, even if some of the rebels are young. But the reality that 15 year-olds are fighting in this war shatters any romantic notions that I might have. I can not countenance American involvement in any military action that would support the use of child soldiers, no matter how far removed the US would be from that use, but neither can I countenance sitting idly by while people yearning and struggling for freedom are mowed down by attacks from the sky.

The only option I can think of at the moment would be for an international force to invade Libya, overturning the Quaddafi regime and putting on trial both Quaddafi and his henchmen and the thawar responsible for conscripting child soldiers.  Here my belief in the importance of human rights runs ashore on the rocks of realism. Western involvement in this conflict beyond (and perhaps including) a no-fly zone would likely prove disastrous. Perhaps the US and the rest of the West must just acknowledge that it has no dog in this fight big enough to justify intervention. The moral difficulties of intervention leave as the only moral option one that is practically infeasible.

I am left with a sour taste in my mouth.