Obama: Military Action Has Stopped Gadhafi

President calls intervention in Libya a humanitarian responsibility

Video

President Obama’s speech on Libya (NBC News, March 28, 2011) – “I authorized military action to stop the killing and enforce UN Security Council Resolution 1973.” (26:36)

By Alex Johnson
.com
March 28, 2011

President Barack Obama declared Monday night that the U.S. military action in Libya had “stopped (Moammar) Gadhafi’s deadly advance,” fulfilling what he said was a U.S. responsibility not to “turn a blind eye to atrocities in other countries.” …

In a nationally televised address from the National Defense University in Washington, Obama sought to convince a skeptical Congress and a doubting nation that he was doing the right thing by intervening militarily in a third Muslim nation. He did that by casting the conflict as a moral response to oppression by Libya’s leader, whom he called “a tyrant.” …

In a Gallup poll released last week, 47 percent of respondents said they backed the campaign, the lowest level of support ever recorded in a poll taken at the beginning of a U.S. military action.

The campaign has also run into stiff resistance from members of both parties in Congress, who have complained that Obama did not consult them ahead of time. Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, accused Obama of having committed “an impeachable offense.” …

Obama said the U.S. was just one part of a broad international coalition that had no choice but to act after Gadhafi rejected its ultimatum to “stop his campaign of killing or face the consequences.”

The military action will be turned over to NATO leadership Wednesday, he said, and “the United States will play a supporting role” — mainly intelligence, logistical support and search-and-rescue operations. …

Before the speech, Obama’s deputy national security adviser, Denis McDonough, told reporters that Americans should not be worried that the intervention in Libya could open the door to further U.S. action in the Muslim world, where U.S. forces are already on the ground in Afghanistan and Iraq. …

Full story

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 Related video

Bachmann slams Obama’s Libya strategy (NBC “Today,” March 30, 2011) — Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., tells TODAY’s Matt Lauer that, if she were president, she would not have gone into Libya. (03:39)

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Related reports on this site

Libyan rebel vehicles pack the road between Ras Lanouf and Sirte in eastern Libya on Monday, March 28, 2011. The writing on the truck reads “Free Libya” in Arabic. (Stringer / The Associated Press)

Is Libya Military Action Constitutional? (March 22, 2011)

Libya Air War Begins (March 19, 2011)

NATO Ultimatum to Gadhafi (March 18, 2011)

Libya No-Fly Zone, Airstrikes Imminent (March 17, 2011)

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FROM THE ARCHIVES: One Year Ago — March 28, 2010

Welcome Home, Red Bulls!

The audience stand for the singing of the National Anthem at the start of the community Welcome Home event for veterans and their families at the St. Cloud Civic Center, Sunday, March 28, 2010 [Front right: Aubrey Immelman with Patrick, age 4]. (Photo credit: Jason Wachter / St. Cloud Times)

One year ago today, I featured reporting of a “Welcome Home” event for the Minnesota National Guard’s 34th Infantry Division Red Bulls and other Central Minnesota military veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, organized by the St. Cloud Times and St. Cloud-area civic organizations and businesses.

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FROM THE ARCHIVES: Two Years Ago — March 28, 2009

Bachmann Says “I’m Not a Kook”

Two years ago today, on March 28, 2009, I featured a compilation of reports regarding U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann’s conspiracy theory that the United States would soon be moving to “give up the dollar as our currency and we would just go with a One World currency,” which would mean the U.S. as a country would be “no more.” (Bachmann grabbed the mythical ball and ran with it after China’s central bank governor suggested replacing the weakening dollar as the world’s reserve currency.)