I tried to simply republish the old diary by "Setting date stamp to now" but it didn't appear in the "Recent Diaries" list, so I just did a copy and paste job to a new diary. The last diary had over 100 comments so new comments might have been lost - or even disabled if it was in archive.  So I though publishing the diary without comments would help to focus any new discussion on the issue of whether the interventionists had been vindicated by how things have turned out - so far.

Obviously the question of vindication turns on what one considers the original objectives were.

If the prime objective was to protect civilians, do you think the level of casualties which did occur was less than would have occurred under Gaddafi?  Certainly the level of civilian casualties in Syria seems extraordinarily high.

If the prime objective was regime change, then the operation appears to be on the brink of success, but that begs the question as to whether regime change was a legitimate objective, and under what circumstances can it be considered to be legitimate.

If the objective of the exercise was to secure Libya's oil reserves, then it seems doubtful whether any great change will have been achieved.  Libya under Gaddafi was quite happy to sell oil to all and sundry at market prices and this seems unlikely to change. The question of whether there will be increased access by "western" oil majors to Libyan oil and the profits to be made from extracting it is one I am not qualified to answer.

If the objective was a genuine humanitarian one will Libya now be a better place to live?  The jury is still out on that one, I suspect.  Perhaps the answer depends on which tribe you are a member of.

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