As President Barack Obama and other administration officials explain what the United States is doing — and not doing — in Libya, it's clear that the president is determined to avoid getting drawn into another bloody, costly, unilateral American commitment like the Iraq War.

Obama has outlined other goals, too, including saving lives and identifying our country with the protesters in the streets and the leaders who will emerge when the authoritarian rulers who have dominated Libya (and other countries in the region) have stepped — or been pushed — aside.

And, of course, the president has said that Col. Muammar Gaddafi must go.

The military action taken to establish and then enforce a no-fly zone was one part of the overall U.S. strategy for achieving these aims.  The air strikes themselves had specific, limited purposes: save lives and give the anti-Gaddafi forces a fighting chance. That was the military mission, not overthrowing Gaddafi (regime change, if you will).

To go further, to try to accomplish all our strategic goals by military means, would require the sort of full-scale and long-term military engagement that has brought more than 100,000 deaths (Iraqis, Americans, and allies) in Iraq and a U.S. financial cost of about $1 trillion (so far). Does anyone seriously believe the United States has the will — and the resources — to take on yet another war?

Using diplomacy, economic sanctions
Instead, Obama has set course to get Gaddafi out by employing some of the other tools of statecraft, rather than by sending an American military expeditionary force. He's used diplomacy effectively to get the United Nations Security Council, NATO and the Arab League to endorse action against Gaddafi, including establishment of the no-fly zone and seizure of some $30 billion in assets. Economic sanctions were also put in place, making it tougher for Gaddafi to re-supply his forces.

Obama engaged in high-level public diplomacy as well, particularly with his March 28 speech to Americans — and the world — a persuasive (if slightly overdue) use of the bully pulpit to advance policy goals.

The president, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and other administration officials have succeeded in building broad support in NATO councils and the international community for the combination of diplomacy backed by force that's been followed so far. Unlike in Iraq, America does not stand nearly alone this time.

Reserves right to act alone
Even as he stressed the international consensus for the actions against Gaddafi, Obama has been careful to reserve the right of the United States to act by itself if our vital national interests are directly threatened. He does not believe Iraq was such a threat to our national security in 2003, nor that Libya is now, despite our concern about what happens there. Afghanistan is different, he maintains, because it was from there that al-Qaida attacked us.

This careful balancing of goals, risks and benefits, tools and methods, was how we drew it up on the blackboard at the National War College. The result is perhaps not so much an Obama Doctrine — the president himself says there is no such one-size-fits-all strategy — as it is an illustration of the principles and the approach he brings to national security questions.

No one can tell where and when the next crisis will appear, but we can deduce some things about how Obama will deal with it: His default preference will be for diplomacy over war; he will try mightily to act together with allies, rather than alone unless there is a direct, specific threat to the United States; he will defend development and humanitarian assistance as wise investments, valuable preventive medicine and in keeping with the American instinct to help people in need; he will define specific goals, then try to advance them by drawing on all the tools of statecraft — diplomacy, military force, covert action, economic carrots and sticks, public diplomacy, foreign aid, intelligence, law enforcement — not any single instrument.  

It's a sound strategic approach, perhaps most vulnerable in the Libya application for the failure to adequately consult with Congress. Still, critics who don't like it should have to offer an alternative approach that is as rational, comprehensive and well calculated to achieve our goals. It isn't good enough to claim any given intervention would be neat and quick, over soon, and cost little. We've seen that movie before and know how it turns out.  

Dick Virden, Plymouth, is a former foreign service officer who taught national security strategy at the National War College.