Punching the tar baby

One of my favorite childhood fables was the Wonderful Tar Baby Story. Based loosely on an African folk tale, this story by the fictional Uncle Remus featuring the cunning Brer Fox and the resourceful Brer Rabbit, contains a valuable lesson for our recent intervention in Libya. Perhaps our leaders would do well to revisit this story before committing ourselves to deeper involvement in this bizarre and risky adventure. With apologies to Uncle Remus, I will paraphrase the story for those who may not be familiar with it. The sly old Brer Fox, intent on catching Brer Rabbit, decided to construct a large doll—The Tar Baby—out of tar and turpentine, put a hat on it, and set it on a log by the side of the road. Retreating to a concealed position on the other side of the road, the fox sat silently waiting for the rabbit to come along.

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After awhile Brer Rabbit came hopping down the road and, noticing the Tar Baby, stopped to say hi. “Morning,” the rabbit nodded to the Tar Baby. But the Tar Baby, of course, said nothing in reply. Miffed, the rabbit again bid the Tar Baby a good morning, and the doll sat motionless, failing to give the rabbit the courtesy of a reply. Each time the rabbit greeted the Tar Baby, he was met with silence, and each time he was ignored, the rabbit became angrier. Eventually the mute presence of the Tar Baby caused the rabbit to become so worked up that he decided to punch the Tar Baby in order to show it some manners. With the first punch, the rabbit became stuck in the gooey mixture that was the Tar Baby. Predictably, the more the rabbit tried to wrestle free, the more hopelessly entangled he became. Unable to subdue the Tar Baby with the first punch, the rabbit threw another, after which both paws became inextricably mired in the tar. Then, the story goes, the rabbit, unable to free his paws, elected to kick the Tar Baby—with one foot and then the other. All the time the cagey fox sat silently from his vantage point, licking his chops and laughing to himself at the rabbit’s self inflicted troubles. But the rabbit did not stop with just his paws and his feet; rather he decided to head butt the Tar Baby, until he was irretrievably stuck with no hope of wriggling free.

And there stood the rabbit, in one heck of a gooey mess, entangled in a Tar Baby that did nothing at all to provoke him—all because the rabbit chose to be offended by it.

Now fast forward a century and a half from Uncle Remus to Libya. Here we have Muammar Gaddafi (whichever of the dozen ways you want to spell it). He is an unlovable, nut job, crazy like a fox, and no friend of the United States. In fact he has in the past been one of the world’s leading sponsors of terrorism. However, after some U.N. sanctions a couple decades back and a bombing by the United States, he did lay low for almost three decades, renounced his nuclear program and even cooperated in the investigation of his own state sponsored acts of terror and made reparations. Now, mind you, this does not make him a good man. He is an evil man and a lunatic and probably no friend of his own people. Yet, during the past couple decades, he has been, like the Tar Baby--when it comes to the interests of the United States-- rather inanimate and mute. He has not bombed our country or the interests of the United States, and near as we can tell, he has laid low for quite some time—as least when it comes to provoking the United States. He has, of late, posed no particular direct threat to our country and has largely been sitting on the side of the road until we chose to hop on by. And, like Brer Rabbit, we decided to punch him in the nose. Landing missile strikes on Libyan soil to disable his air defenses, we landed the first punch in the nose of the Tar Baby that is Libya. We were stuck, but as yet, not irretrievably. Sending our fighter jets to bomb his military assets, we have landed the second punch with our other hand. A little more stuck—but perhaps we could yet wriggle loose. But it does not end there. Now we have sent in the CIA—to analyze the turf and see if the people we purport to back are deserving of arms, ammo and equipment, or whether we are about to back the same people who are killing our young men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan. Our first foot is now stuck. Now Obama is seriously considering arming the rebels—perhaps providing arms that will be used against us elsewhere. In doing so, he will have kicked with the other foot—which has not happened yet, but may well. God help us if we commit ground troops to Libya—in which case we will have head butted the Tar Baby and become hopelessly mired in an ill-considered war that we should not want and cannot afford. There are a lot of bad people in the world and many are dictators who are both dangerous and unlovable. Many of them do not like us much and some are avowed enemies of our country. But if they do not pose a direct threat to the critical interests of the United States and its people—if they are sitting on the side of the road, largely mute and inanimate, do we need to punch them in the nose? Frankly, Uncle Remus’ tale articulates a far more cogent lesson for non-intervention in Libya than any justification for the intervention than the President has heretofore announced. Now Uncle Remus’ tale, I should note, ends happily for the rabbit. In the end, he tricks Brer Fox into throwing him into the briar patch, which is the rabbit’s home turf. But for the fact that the fox pulled him out, the rabbit would have been stuck in the Tar Baby—if not eaten by his nemesis. But, unlike the rabbit in the Tar Baby tale, we are about to become stuck in the mire that is Libya—uncertain in our goals, uncertain as to the motives and the intentions of those we are backing—and with no one to pull us out.