White House: Success in Protecting Libyan Civilians

May 8, 2011— -- While the Obama administration continues to celebrate the death of Osama bin Laden, their troubles in the Middle East have not come to an end. In an interview with "This Week" anchor Christiane Amanapour, the President's National Security adviser insisted that the United States would not increase its presence in Libya due to NATO's success in protecting the embattled nation's civilians.

"NATO is still running this operation now, we're supporting it," Donilon told Amanpour. "They have the assets that are needed for them to engage in the civilian protection mission, and they are engaging."

Recalling NATO's ineffective war policy in Bosnia, where the U.S. "gave the Europeans the lead and they weren't able to protect the civilians," Amanpour asked if the United States policy of "leading from behind" will be ineffective in achieving the desired results in Libya.

"Will the U.S. step up more involvement?" Amanpour asked the White House National Security Adviser.

"No," responded Donilon. "When the president made this decision, there was an immediate threat to 700,000 Libyan civilians in the town of Benghazi. We've had a success here in terms of being able to protect those civilians. Now we need to continue that civilian protection mission and continue to put the pressure on Gadhaffi."