The Outsider

On October 20, 2011, the four-decade rule of Muammar Gaddafi came to a brutal end when Libyan rebels, supported by NATO bombers and Predator drones, captured, tortured, and killed the fugitive leader. A few days later, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton took credit for his downfall with an infamous boast: “We came, we saw, he died.” But instead of the new democratic dawn envisioned by Western governments, Libya descended into prolonged, bloody civil war. Amidst the chaos, human trafficking and even open-air slave markets flourished. There’s a case to be made that the dream of liberal internationalism perished along with Gaddafi that day.