Academic

OKAY, THIS ACTUALLY WAS SMART DIPLOMACY: In U.S.-Libya Nuclear Deal, a Qaddafi Threat Faded Away. ?

By Glenn Reynolds

OKAY, THIS ACTUALLY WAS SMART DIPLOMACY: In U.S.-Libya Nuclear Deal, a Qaddafi Threat Faded Away. “Senior administration officials and Pentagon planners, as they discuss sanctions and a possible no-fly zone to neutralize the Libyan air force, say that the 2003 deal removed Colonel Qaddafi?s biggest trump card: the threat of using a nuclear weapon, or even just selling nuclear material or technology, if he believed it was the only way to save his 42-year rule. . . . Today, with father and son preparing for a siege of Tripoli, the success of a joint American-British effort to eliminate Libya?s capability to make nuclear and chemical weapons has never, in retrospect, looked more important.”

UPDATE: Reader John Eschenbrenner emails: “Oh, what I wouldn’t have given to be a fly on the wall when the NYT made the decision to print an article that would dare to suggest that George W. Bush did something right.”

Full post as published by Instapundit.com on March 01, 2011 (boomark / email).