Kadafi as Villain Is Misinformation

Moammar Kadafi is back in the news, this time because the Washington Post has uncovered evidence that some American news media were duped in August into believing that the Libyan leader was gearing up a new round of anti-American terrorism.

There was no real evidence that Kadafi was up to his old tricks. Neither was there evidence, as some in the media apparently were led to believe, that the United States had another military raid lined up to retaliate.

The Reagan Administration “disinformation” campaign of late summer appears to have been intended only to spook the mentally unstable Kadafi into a new bout of depression. Critics of the ploy believe that it may have provoked him instead to renew his active support of terrorism, and there is even the suggestion that it may have led him to order or at least encourage the bloody Sept. 5 hijacking of Pan Am Flight 73 in Karachi, Pakistan.

There is some evidence, though apparently not conclusive, of marginal Libyan involvement in the hijacking. But the suggestion that the Administration’s disinformation campaign provoked Kadafi into ordering or even assisting in the hijacking is patently absurd.

Terrorist attacks take months and months to prepare. The assault on the Pan Am jet was sophisticated and complex; surely preparations were well under way by mid-August, when the disinformation campaign first reached the media.

Equally preposterous is the notion that Kadafi was directly behind the attack. The hijacking most surely was staged by the Abu Nidal apparatus, perhaps with the assistance of a dissident Palestinian wing of Fatah headed by Abu Mousa. Abu Nidal and Abu Mousa--though they gratefully accept assistance from Libya, Syria, Iran and other ultraradical states--operate principally on their own and in behalf of their own objectives. Their strategy in attacking American targets is to test the depth of U.S. support for Israel, the willingness of Americans to shed blood “for Israel’s sake.”

Kadafi, odious as he is, is little more than a supporting actor in the current terrorist outbreak. His attempts to build his own apparatus have been woefully ineffective, and he has fallen back into a supporting role. He contributes funds to Abu Nidal and others, and his “diplomats” provide them with some logistical assistance, but he is neither their mastermind nor their master. Major terrorist groups use him as a resource to a much greater degree than he uses them. Furthermore, other states such as Syria and Iran are of much greater importance to them.

One of the more unfortunate aspects of the looming debate on the Administration’s disinformation campaign and Kadafi’s role in the Karachi hijacking is that it will strengthen the American public’s mistaken impression that the Libyan leader is a key terrorist player.

The Reagan Administration must shoulder much of the blame for exaggerating his importance. It promoted him as the personification of terrorism mainly because it believed him to be the easiest of the villains to scuttle, and it sorely wanted a victory. Perhaps it also reasoned that his downfall would serve as a warning to Syria and Iran, but deep down it had to know that it was pandering to political expediency. Kadafi’s fall cannot be the solution, because the Libyan dictator is only peripheral to the problem.

In searching for a response to terrorism the Administration finds itself in a terrible dilemma. The President has talked tough, but there are few arrows in his quiver and their efficacy is questionable. His “teflon” presidency may yet be soiled by the ineffectiveness of his response to terrorism, as his predecessor’s was, and the stain may prove to be even more enduring. Jimmy Carter, after all, never cast himself as Rambo.

The odds against toppling Kadafi through a disinformation campaign are weighty indeed. Nor will limited bombing raids cause him to tumble. Even if they did, what effect would the Libyan’s fall have on other state sponsors of terrorism? Would Syria and Iran fear our aerial attacks? Would we dare launch massive bombing raids to chasten them?

We need to keep the pressure on the state sponsors, by political means and on occasion by military means. But we also need to confront the terrorists directly--through a massive, on-the-street police effort in countries that are willing to work with us and through a massive, covert “enforcement” program in the countries that are not.

We must not allow terrorists a safe haven anywhere. We must seek them out wherever they are and neutralize them.

And we had best get started. Time is passing, and the situation isn’t getting any better.