The problem with recognising any rebel government in a civil war, however laudable its cause, is that there has to be some certainty that it has the capacity to govern. There is now anxiety about the general breakdown of affairs in Tripoli and the apparent inability of the TNC to offer, so far anyway, coherent leadership and direction. There are heartening reports of people coming together in neighbourhoods to help each other with shortages of water, fuel and food, but welcome though this is, it is not enough. Medical, police, public service and other personnel need to be back at work, power must be restored, water turned on. The list is long.
The unusual feature of this Libyan revolution is the regional aspect of the forces who have combined to overthrow the Gaddafi regime. Whether from the western mountains or Benghazi in east, they have operated in separate groups, armies is too organised a concept, first to liberate themselves and then to go father afield. Having done that they move onto the next objective or return home. Thus in rebel areas there is coherent leadership, but in conquered Gaddafi strongholds, there appears to be a vacuum as in Tripoli. This needs to be resolved quickly, otherwise such populations will see little advantage in freedom and yearn for the return of the tyrant.
When the NATO campaign began, initially without formal control by the alliance then in internal disagreement, Britain, France and the U.S. demonstrated advanced and competent military planning in their initial decisive assault on the advancing columns of Gaddafi’s army, as it pressed forward to Benghazi. Now the need is humanitarian and practical. There appears to be no equivalent plan of civil support, logistical help or humanitarian aid. Military interventions to bring freedom are futile unless in their wake they bring order not chaos, relief not suffering.
In Libya this is especially important because of the regional, tribal and localised forces made up largely of civilians, who represent the armed forces of the revolution. There is no leader, nor is there a government, nor anything that looks like one. There is this National Transitional Council, thus far stuck in Benghazi, strangled of funds and without either the ability or the will to step into the vacuum left by the collapse of the Gadaffi system. This must be addressed as a matter of absolute priority or Libya’s worst days have yet to come.
Finally, the horrific scenes of masses of bodies, some from execution and some from neglect and abandonment of the sick and wounded, remind us, once again, that war is always an uncivilised and brutal way of organising human affairs. It is time to re-think the whole purpose of these military operations and judge them not in terms of military success but in terms of civilian outcome.