Surely Juan Cole Deserves Some Credit Too

Tripoli, 22 August (see Immoral Minority, etc.)

Great article by Juan Cole ("Top Ten Myths about the Libya War," 08/22/2011, Informed Comment) who surely gets to take a bow for not only supporting Libyan FF, but supporting the limited air support by the US/UK/France/Nato since before its inception.  From my, admittedly circumscribed view, I would only question 2 of his myths:

1. " The United States led the charge to war. There is no evidence for this allegation whatsoever."  Doesn't this go against the Lizza, New Yorker article which stated, some months ago: "Nonetheless, Obama may be moving toward something resembling a doctrine. One of his advisers described the President’s actions in Libya as 'leading from behind'"? ("The Consequentialist: How the Arab Spring remade Obama’s foreign policy," by Ryan Lizza, New Yorker, May 2, 2011)  Lizza's article (and the adviser) might be wrong, but I don't recall Mr. Cole taking them to task earlier.
2. "The Libyan Revolution was a civil war. It was not, if by that is meant a fight between two big groups within the body politic."  This is more a judgement call.  Charles Tilly's definition of a revolution is when two groups of elites appeal to non-elites and the two blocks fight to control state apparatus.  In a revolutionary situation,civil wars often are a stage.  That appears to have happened over the past few months.  I think Cole rightly wants to show that Qaddafi's support among non-elites was not that strong.  I agree.  But, for as long as it lasts, I think we can term this a civil war, because Qaddafi did have some, if limited, support

Those are my caveats to an otherwise outstanding string of great articles on Libya.  Which is why Informed Comment is on My Blog List to the left of this blog.