The U.S. was reportedly caught off guard last week by a mysterious set of airstrikes in Libya, which senior White House officials told The New York Times were carried out by the United Arab Emirates with support from Egypt. The report, denied by both countries, has sparked concerns that transnational military action without Washington’s endorsement by two of the region’s U.S.-armed powers portends a new era of free-for-all military intervention in the Middle East amid waning U.S. influence.
Since providing limited support to the air campaign that helped topple ex-dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, Barack Obama’s administration has been reluctant to do its allies’ bidding in Libya — a messy conflict whose outcome is seen in Washington as of limited consequence for U.S. interests. But some U.S. allies are more deeply invested, seeing the power struggle among Libya’s rival militias as an extension of their regional effort to exterminate the Muslim Brotherhood and its backers.
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/8/28/libya-air-strikeconcern.html
U.S., analysts caution that even if the strikes were carried out by the UAE, for now they appear to be an isolated event rather than part of a coherent campaign with a clearly defined goal. The very fact that nobody has claimed responsibility for the F-16 air raids underscores the trepidation of their authors about assuming a more assertive military stance in the region.
Since providing limited support to the air campaign that helped topple ex-dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, Barack Obama’s administration has been reluctant to do its allies’ bidding in Libya — a messy conflict whose outcome is seen in Washington as of limited consequence for U.S. interests. But some U.S. allies are more deeply invested, seeing the power struggle among Libya’s rival militias as an extension of their regional effort to exterminate the Muslim Brotherhood and its backers.
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/8/28/libya-air-strikeconcern.html
U.S., analysts caution that even if the strikes were carried out by the UAE, for now they appear to be an isolated event rather than part of a coherent campaign with a clearly defined goal. The very fact that nobody has claimed responsibility for the F-16 air raids underscores the trepidation of their authors about assuming a more assertive military stance in the region.
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