David Cameron sought to reassure the nation and Parliament on Monday that the military mission in Libya would not drag the country into another protracted Iraq-style occupation.
Speaking during a six-hour debate that culminated in an overwhelming vote in favour of military action by Parliament, the prime minister said: “This is about protecting people and giving the Libyan people a chance to shape their own destiny.”
“This is different to Iraq. This is not going into a country, knocking over its government and then owning and being responsible for everything that happens subsequently,” Mr Cameron said.
The prime minister stressed the fact that the military action had been given a clear legal justification by a UN resolution, which was never granted for the Iraq war.
A total of 179 British soldiers were killed in the controversial Iraq war, which was given the green light by Parliament almost exactly eight years before. The vote was passed then by 412 to 149, with a major rebellion from within the ruling Labour Party.
This time the action was supported across the benches, with only 13 MPs not give their backing to the military action. This level of support was not reflected in a public poll carried out over the weekend, with only one in three backing the creation of the UN-backed no-fly zone.
Of 2028 adults interviewed for the ITV/ComRes online poll, only one in three agreed it is right for the UK to take military action against Colonel Gadhafi’s forces in Libya.
According to the poll published on Tuesday, nearly half (49 per cent) agreed that military action in Libya is an “unnecessary risk” for the nation to take. Only half of those polled said they had a good understanding of why the nation is planning military action in Libya.
Labour leader Ed Miliband supported Mr Cameron, saying: “We have seen with our own eyes what the Libyan regime is capable of. We’ve seen guns being turned on unarmed demonstrators.”
The few dissenting voices in Parliament focused largely on the uncertainly of where military action would ultimately lead.
“I’m far from convinced that the public are behind this,” said MP Jeremy Corbyn.
“They are very concerned about where it leads to because they’ve been through the miserable experience of Iraq and they have deep concerns additionally about Afghanistan,” he said.
The government said on Tuesday that the Libya operation would be funded from a Treasury reserve and not from the defence budget.
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