The dramatic attack on the American consulate in Benghazi leading to the deaths of the ambassador and three other US officials on the anniversary of 9/11 — the deadly 2001 attacks on New York’s Twin Towers — signify two things: the state of Libya after the violent ouster of Muammar Gaddafi through US and other Western intervention, and how the evolving scenario in the Arab world is changing 18 months after the Arab Spring swept the region.

Although Libya now has an elected Prime Minister, the profusion of militias often tied to clans have never been tamed; rather, each has been carving out its sphere of influence and control and Tripoli’s central authorities have been unable to exercise control by unifying them. One of the militias, indeed, has custody of Gaddafi’s son Saif, also wanted by the International Criminal Court. It is, indeed, ironical that the regime now in power thanks to Western, particularly US, intervention should preside over such a tragedy.
Of all the Middle Eastern and African countries buffeted by the Arab Spring, Libya, midwifed by the West, is a particularly hard nut to crack because Col. Gaddafi had long abolished all institutions of governance and relied upon himself, his sons and the clan to offer a unique style of polity buttressed by his bizarre ideology of the Green Book. Despite the despotic rule elsewhere in the region, other countries did have institutions, however eroded they were or packed with dictators’ cronies.
The full picture of what happened in Benghazi is still not clear, but it would seem Opposition elements comprising Gaddafi supporters, elements of Al Qaeda and other dissatisfied remnants, used the symbolism of 9/11 and an American film derogatory of the Prophet downloaded on YouTube as an excuse to mount a revenge attack on the United States. The American consulate in now a burned out shell, and while US President Barack Obama has sent marines there and ordered the strengthening of all US missions worldwide, it is surprising how lightly secured the consulate was.
Libya, of course, is still very much a work in progress, but so are other parts of the region singed by the Arab Spring — Tunisia, Egypt and Yemen, to name just three. Although the US essentially brought the post-Gaddafi Libya into being, it found it had little option but to see dictators it had supported for decades bite the dust while the main beneficiaries have been Islamists of various stripes. If the US receives thanks from Libya in the manner it has, the lesson is that different forms of anti-Americanism are very much the norm.
Obviously, the US administration and the army of think tanks will put their thinking caps on to divine how it can cope with the volatility of the Arab world. With the US election campaign in full flow and two immediate crises staring Washington in the face, devising a coherent policy is a tough call. It is, therefore, important that Washington should rethink its policies towards Syria and Iran. President Obama clearly has no stomach for intervening militarily in Syria. Rather, it is countries like Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey that are calling the shots. And among Western nations, France is in the lead in seeking the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad.
The other major problem for America is Iran, but it is in a sense a problem of how to cope with Israel, which is using all the levers it can in the US election year to get Washington to commit itself to giving an ultimatum to Tehran. It is no secret that US administrations are captives of the all-powerful Israeli lobby and must, more often than not, bend to the Israeli will. Additionally, President Obama suffers from the handicap of being viewed as less pro-Israeli than the Republicans although his administration has been extraordinarily generous to Israel, as some of its officials have recognised.
But Mr Obama and his administration face a larger problem. Although the US has signified moving its “pivot” to Asia in balancing the increasing clout of a rising China, the Middle East and North Africa are important regions of the world in view of their oil and gas resources and protecting the state of Israel now occupying most of Palestinian land. Second, US interventions in the Muslim world have been significant failures, with Mr Obama having to carry the can for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Indeed, the question Republicans are asking of Democrats today — Are you better off today than you were four years ago? — can well be asked of Americans in another context: Are Iraq and Afghanistan better off today than they were before US military interventions?
Being the only superpower after the Soviet Union’s fall, successive US administrations have tried to rearrange the world according to their own national interests and priorities. While the previous Republican administration clearly got its priorities wrong, the Obama administration has much to answer for in adopting Afghanistan as its own war and in using massive Nato strength to get rid of Col. Gaddafi. In Syria, the US has faced Russian and Chinese vetoes in securing UN Security Council approval for an ultimatum to Damascus, to be converted into military intervention of some sort.
President Obama does not have much room for manoeuvre, given the tight race he is in for re-election. But it is time for the American elite of the two parties and unaffiliated men and women to refine and redefine their national interest. Apart from China’s rise, many other power centres are springing up, and if the world is not multilateral in the conventional sense, decision-making has become more diffuse. For instance, it is a pity that the US administration fails to realise that it must count the cost in terms of displacing President Assad, in exacerbating a Shia-Sunni conflict, in the larger chaos it would cause in the region and in reconciling the various strands and pastiche of religions and communities that go to make up Syria.