Humanitarian Crisis In Ivory Coast: Time For Military Intervention?

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Last Monday, the President gave a 28-minute speech on his decision to engage in military action in Libya. He cited preventing mass slaughter as a reason for engaging in humanitarian aid through military operations.

CNN tried to fashion an “Obama Doctrine” out of it:

The gist: The U.S. can intervene in conflicts overseas “when our safety is not directly threatened, but our interests and values are,” he said. Case in point: The potential slaughter of Libyans rebelling against Col. Moammar Gadhafi.

I think our values were threatened when 1000 people were massacred in the Ivory Coast:

When the pop of machine guns began on the morning of March 3, Moussa N’Diaye, a car washer in Ivory Coast’s main city of Abidjan, hurriedly pulled down the shutters on his roadside shop. He climbed atop a nearby wall and watched the unfolding scene with horror. “I wanted to get down from the wall, but I was just in shock,” he says, speaking in hushed tones. “An armored car approached, and from somewhere the noise of guns was still going on. Bodies fell.”

After a third week of running gun battles in Abidjan, the former pearl of West Africa looks to be sliding irretrievably toward a repeat of the 2002 civil war that divided the country into a government-controlled south and rebel-held north. On March 3, in the opposition stronghold Abobo district, a protest by several hundred women against President Laurent Gbagbo turned into a bloodbath when the army opened fire, mowing down the protesters and killing at least six women. “The armored car didn’t stop for the dead bodies,” says N’Diaye. “Some people had to run to pull them out of the way.”

The humanitarian crisis in the Ivory Coast, right now,  is worse than Libya’s. Will we soon be engaging in humanitarian aid through military operations to prevent more bloodshed?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Hat tip: Charles B.