I told the king that developments in the Middle East had come because the regimes had failed to address the legitimate grievances of their people. Iran did not start the unrest but could exploit it. He needed to let the crown prince go forward with the national dialogue and be an example to the entire region, since there were hard-liners on both sides. I suggested to both the crown prince and king that they find a new and different role for the prime minister, who was disliked by nearly everyone but especially the Shia; lift constraints on the media as well as on civil society and human rights groups; announce the results of the investigation into the deaths of demonstrators in a timely and transparent way; move forward in integrating the Shia into the security services and Bahrain defense force; and promote basic civil rights in the social, media, and political arenas. Bahrain had a chance to show the region how to deal with public and political pressures and how to preserve stability, I said. “There can be no return to the status quo ante. You are a close ally, we are prepared to defend you against Iran, and we want to help you here as well. As you make difficult decisions to address the concerns and aspirations of your people, we will stand with you.”
The crown prince and king both were positive in their responses to my suggestions, but the royal family was split, and the hard-liners had the edge. The Sunnis in Bahrain, and elsewhere in the Gulf, were watching apprehensively. The ineffectiveness of my diplomacy became apparent two days after I left Manama, when more than a thousand Saudi troops moved into Bahrain to ensure that the royal family and the Sunnis remained in control.
The same day I was in Bahrain, the Arab League voted to call upon the UN Security Council immediately to impose a no-fly zone in Libya and to protect the Libyan people and foreign nationals in Libya. It also asked for UN cooperation with the Libyan opposition’s Transitional National Council, headquartered in Benghazi. On the plane home from Bahrain, I told reporters that if we were directed to impose a no-fly zone, we had the resources to do it. But, I continued, “the question is whether it is a wise thing to do. And that’s the discussion that’s going on at a political level.”
The situation in Libya forced everyone’s hand. Qaddafi’s forces began to have some military success and pushed east. By March 14, there was real danger they could soon move on Benghazi, and few doubted that the city’s capture would lead to a bloodbath. The president convened the NSC on the afternoon of March 15. He was not happy with the options his advisers offered. He was particularly frustrated when Mullen described for him why a no-fly zone likely would have little effect on the movement of ground forces or in protecting innocent civilians. He told the NSS to come up with better options, and then he, Mullen, and I left for a meeting and dinner with the combatant commanders. Afterward he reconvened the NSC for another two hours. It was plain that to slow or stop Qaddafi’s eastward military progress, a Security Council resolution would need to authorize not just a no-fly zone but also “all necessary means” to protect civilians. Qaddafi’s bloodthirsty rhetoric about killing “the rats” in Benghazi, the action of the Arab League, and strong British and French pressure for NATO to act, I think, together persuaded the president that the United States would need to take the lead at the UN and in organizing the military campaign to stop Qaddafi.
On March 17, the principals met for an hour and a half, and then we met with the president. We rehashed all the arguments, and then the president went around the room one last time. Biden, Mullen, Donilon, Daley, Brennan, McDonough, and I opposed getting involved. Clinton, Rice, Power, and Rhodes argued we had to. The president said it was a close call, but we couldn’t stand idly by in the face of a potential humanitarian disaster—he came down on the side of intervention. There would be no use of American ground forces, except for search and rescue if one of our pilots went down over Libya, or if Qaddafi made a move to use his chemical weapons. We would take the lead in destroying Qaddafi’s air defenses but then scale back our involvement, primarily helping others to sustain the no-fly zone. The active participation of Arab air forces was essential, even if their numbers would be small. Rice was directed to pursue a tougher UN resolution that would provide for the protection of civilians, thus allowing us to bomb a broad range of Libyan military and command-and-control targets (the latter including Qaddafi’s residences). In a private side conversation with me after the meeting, the president said the Libyan military operation had been a 51–49 call for him.
Rice worked a near-miracle at the UN in securing the tougher Security Council resolution. Russia, China, Germany, India, and Brazil abstained. The air campaign against Qaddafi began March 19. It was supposed to be a highly coordinated operation, but French president Sarkozy wanted a little extra publicity, so he sent his planes in several hours before the agreed start time.
The president would have been justified in thinking there was broad support in Congress for what he intended to do. On March 1, the Senate had unanimously passed a resolution calling on the UN Security Council to impose a no-fly zone and to protect civilians in Libya. There was vocal and bipartisan support on the House side as well. He gathered some of the congressional leaders in the Situation Room midday on March 18, and several others were piped into the room via speakerphone. Obama told them about the military role we would play and the limits he had set. There was no real disagreement. The president asserted that he had the authority to act in Libya under the War Powers Act without congressional approval but that he was complying with the provisions of the act in terms of notifying Congress.
When considering military intervention, presidents virtually never consider the cost—Obama included, when it came to Libya. I received estimates that the Libyan operation as we planned it would cost between $800 million and a billion dollars through September. Even the Defense Department didn’t have that kind of cash lying around, especially since Congress was funding us under a yearlong continuing resolution at about $20 billion less than the president’s proposed budget. The debate between us and OMB was whether to add the Libya cost to the FY2011 war supplemental, send Congress a separate supplemental request, or force us to find the money internally.
As is usual when the president makes a momentous decision, the White House wanted key cabinet members blanketing the Sunday talk shows. I avoided that onerous duty the first weekend because I left for Russia and the Middle East on the nineteenth. As I was flying back to Washington on March 25, the White House communications gurus proposed I go on all three network shows the next Sunday to defend the president’s decisions on Libya. Exhausted from the trip, I agreed to do two of the three. Then I took a call from Bill Daley, who pushed me hard to do the third show. I told Daley I’d make him a deal—I would do the third show if he’d agree to get funding for the Libya operation included in the Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) appropriation (the war supplemental). I said, “I’ll do Jake Tapper if you’ll do OMB.” Daley whined, “I thought it would cost me a bottle of vodka.” I shot back, “Bullshit. It’s going to cost you $1 billion.” Daley had the last laugh. The president and OMB director Jack Lew refused to approve moving the Libya funding into the OCO. The Defense Department had to eat the entire cost of the Libya operation.