I wasn’t expecting to be surprised by the foreign policies of the UK and US but it was the way the media reported that most interested me. When I left Poland who would, and how to, deal with Libya was the number one discussion topic in the media. Gazeta Wyborcza carried a column entitled, “Libya, chcemy pomoć” written by Radsloaw Sidorski but as yet Poland’s assistance has been of the not-doing-anything variety. (I understand there are several good reasons why but I won’t go into that here).
When I arrived in the UK all the media were focussed on the UK elements of the operation: our brave lads in Tornados screaming in from the desert with the French lending the odd hand (underplaying the French has been a British Media priority since the advent of print). In the red-tops the language came straight out of the Beano, breathlessly excited that the UK could play a leading part in what's effectively become a bit of NATO gunboat diplomacy.
In the US things were a little different. There was less criticism of the US’ slow start in taking thel ead in the operation against Gaddafi. A lot of the focus was on the embarrassment that, even though Potus had called for Gaddafi to go, he was still there in his ‘lair’. The US sees itself as a change-maker and the new US foreign policy approach under Obama was widely perceived as more humiliating than a relief after Iraq and Afghanistan.
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