Clinton defends ouster of Libya’s Gadhafi

Hillary Clinton is defending the Obama administration’s decision to topple Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi in 2011 despite the turmoil that has followed in the region.

“Gadhafi had American blood on his hands. He had been responsible for the murder of innocent passengers on an airline, he had supported terrorism. He was a bad actor,” Clinton said in an interview that aired Monday on NBC’s “MTP Daily.”

As then-secretary of State, Clinton was one of the chief proponents of the U.S.-led military campaign that ousted Gadhafi. While his fall and death was hailed at the time, a stable government never fully developed in Libya, and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is now operating in parts of the country.

MTP Daily host Chuck Todd noted that the George W. Bush administration had successfully negotiated with Gadhafi to halt his nuclear program, which Clinton called a “very big positive.”

But she said that while the international community had called for action, there should have been more support as the country worked to foster democracy.

“They participated in two elections to try to elect people that they thought would move them into the modern world, leaving the Gadhafi past behind,” she said.

“They didn’t get enough support internally, and they didn’t get enough support externally first and foremost from the people who were most heavily invested, the Europeans and the Arabs, in my opinion.”

Clinton also reiterated her view that the administration’s plan to arm Syrian rebels to fight ISIS has been a failure, as just a handful of rebels have been trained. She had initially recommended that path to fighting President Bashar al-Assad in a Syrian civil war.  

“When I recommended it, it was several years ago. And I can’t sit here and tell you that if we had done what I and General Petraeus and Secretary Panetta and others had recommended, we would have made more progress on the ground.”

She sidestepped the question of how to deal with Russia’s alliance with Syria, and said she’d prioritize both fighting ISIS and forcing out Assad.

“I think that we’re going to have to, as they say, walk and chew gum at the same time. And that will be to, you know, do the best we can with our friends in the region to go after ISIS and try to, you know, push them out of Iraq and then try to, you know, deal with them and the territory they control in Syria,” she said.

“You can’t really do one without the other. But ousting Assad has to be a political process.”