Legal Commentary

Libya

By David Bernstein

Foreign Policy:

British Prime Minister David Cameron said on Tuesday that Arab sentiment was, ?if you don?t show your support for the Libyan people and for democracy at this time, you are saying you will intervene only when it?s about your security, but you won?t help when it?s about our democracy.?

Well, yeah. Nations put their armed forces at risk to promote the security of their people. Trying to impose democracy elsewhere by military force is not only a philosophically dubious mission for a military (especially if conscripts are involved), but has at best a checkered history of success, and often doesn?t exactly seem to win the plaudits of the relevant population.

Full post as published by The Volokh Conspiracy on March 19, 2011 (boomark / email).