Libya Poll: Plurality Of U.S. Public Supports Airstrikes, But Majority Unsure of Goal

WASHINGTON -- According to a poll released Monday by the Pew Research Center, a plurality of Americans support U.S. airstrikes in Libya, but a majority say they see no clear goal to international involvement.

The new survey found that 47 percent of adult respondents thought that the United States and its allies made the right decision by conducting military airstrikes in Libya, while 36 percent thought it was the wrong decision. However, half of all respondents said the United States and its allies had no clear goal in their involvement. Thirty-nine percent said they did think the coalition had a clear goal.

The poll also found disagreement over what the goal of international involvement should be. While 46 percent said it should be to remove Qaddafi, 43 percent said that it should be to protect civilians from violence.

Although only a few organizations have polled the American public on Libya since airstrikes began, other recent surveys suggest that the presence or absence of a clear goal in the public eye could be a key issue. While a simple approve/disapprove question on a Gallup poll released last week found similar levels of support for "current military action" in Libya as the new Pew poll (47 percent approved of U.S. action and 37 percent disapproved), a CBS News poll found much higher support when they told respondents that "the U.S. military and other countries have begun cruise missile and air strikes in Libya in order to protect civilians from attacks by Qaddafi's forces." The CBS News question found approval of airstrikes at 68 percent and disapproval at 26 percent.

Most respondents to the Pew survey said they do not believe the United States will make a speedy exit from Libya -- 60 percent said U.S. military involvement "will last for some time," while 33 percent said it "will be over fairly quickly." However, only 35 percent of respondents said they thought America was leading military involvement there, while 57 percent said the nation was just part of a coalition.

The Pew survey was conducted March 24-27 among 1,002 adults, and had a margin of error of 4 percentage points.

Comments

[Bob Reeves]

02:25 AM on 04/08/2011

We are not only at war in Libya. We have limited all our military actions to those approved by a United Nations commander. We are not leading the fight. We are providing our obscene military strength to the world’s nations. We are actually cooperating with someone. We are saying to the world they have a right to make a decision. We are showing the world that we can follow orders. A true miracle, the nations of the world can influence the obscene military power of our country. Libya has Oil, a dictator and a poor population. Normally, we wouldn’t screw up a sweet deal like that. But we did. We gave up money for people. It’s a big deal. For the first time in many years we proved to the world that our country could be civilized.

[jgallery]

12:22 PM on 03/31/2011

Why the confusion? O filled us in a mere 9 days after the fact. His goals are crystal clear - as is his explainaton of why Lybia vs syria, Bahrain, Darfur, Congo etc -
He just received an award for transperancy - it was during a closed door cereomony but it was for transperancy none the less - he is all about clear.

[Bart DePalma]

09:17 AM on 03/30/2011

Why should the American people know the President's objective in Libya when the President himself has no clue beyond not wanting to get blamed for a repeat of Rwanda.

If Gaddafi is still in power this fall, the Obama incompetence narrative gets another chapter.

[Vomit The Blue Pill]

10:53 PM on 03/29/2011

Nobody wants another war, this poll is a lie.

[stacy sanders]

08:00 PM on 04/03/2011

yeah it never happened......

[URDRWHO]

10:39 AM on 03/29/2011

Errrrrr!!! When are we going to stop???

Way back when I supported the initial war in Iraq but soon realized there would be no end. Support turned to non-support.

We are in Afghanistan, which BTW I never supported. Nobody ever wins in that place.

Now we are in Libya.

I believe in a strong military to defend our country but this crap isn't defense, it is offense.

I am old enough to have friends that are high pay grade types like colonels, etc. I have yet to meet anyone that has been to Afghanistan that doesn't think it is a fubar tour.

Our people are being put in harms way for the benefit of the rulers to walk around with their chest thrown out.

Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!!!

[stacy sanders]

08:03 PM on 04/03/2011

libya is for the benefit of obama to be able to walk around with his chest out

[darkflite]

09:46 AM on 03/29/2011

I don't know one person who initially supported nor does now support Osama's air strikes in Lybia. The media is simply inaccurate.

[Arthur Spooner]

09:46 AM on 03/29/2011

No surprise there. With the MSM going ga ga over what Newt thinks on a day to day basis or that Trump is revising the birther battle cry, it's no wonder.

[Gmoney1]

09:42 AM on 03/29/2011

who are these folks being polled - have any of you been polled - why don't they tell us where they're polling and other polling demographics -

[dlbnext]

09:32 AM on 03/29/2011

U.S. public believes whatever the billionaire owned media tells them to believe. Why do you think they want democracy in Lybia, the Lybians don't even know what it is.

[den1953]

09:16 AM on 03/29/2011

Unlike Iraq or Afghanistan the people are the only ones that know what the outcome for Libya can be, this is why the United States should have never dismantled the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan......

[twwv8]

08:42 AM on 03/29/2011

If CBS had worked "puppies" into their question they could have gotten 70%.

[Cacey]

07:21 AM on 03/29/2011

I suggest that the reason a majority are unsure of the goal is that the goal hasn't been fully defined given the speed of actions that have been taken and the ever changing flux of the situation.  As the President noted last night, the two primary goals for the international action were to stop the slaughter of Libyan people and prevenent the neighboring and fledgling democracies of Egypt and Tunisia from being overrun by refugees fleeing from Libya.  Anyone who does not view regional stability as a major part of this is fooling themselves.  Once the situation is under control, there will be determinations as to the next steps and I applaud the President and international communities both in Europe and the Arab states for their methodical actions.

[brit prof]

07:18 AM on 03/29/2011

Do you support the bombing of Libya?

Yes, absolutely!

And what do you see the goal of this bombing being?

I have no idea.

Pathetic!

[omega777]

08:01 AM on 03/29/2011

The rebels in Libya are in the middle of a life or death civil war and Moammar Gadhafi is still in power and yet somehow the Libyan rebels have had enough time to establish a new Central Bank of Libya and form a new national oil company.  Perhaps when this conflict is over those rebels can become time management consultants.  They sure do get a lot done.  What a skilled bunch of rebels - they can fight a war during the day and draw up a new central bank and a new national oil company at night without any outside help whatsoever.  If only the rest of us were so versatile!  But isn't forming a central bank something that could be done after the civil war is over?

[den1953]

09:17 AM on 03/29/2011

No so pathetic if you were a Libyan citizen being shelled by Ghadafi forces!

[brit prof]

05:19 PM on 03/29/2011

Or by American ones.

[morgan1]

06:20 AM on 03/29/2011

I am always suspicious of any poll. I am over 50 and have never been polled in person or by phone. Here is another one stating how the "majority" of Americans support some Neocon warmongering cause. Sorry. I don't believe this for one second. I know no one at work, at church, or socially who supports our involvement in Libya. It seems we have done enough damage. We either armed Gaddafi directly or indirectly as we are the worlds largest arms merchants, and now we have set out to destroy what we did to make him an even worse dictator. Way to go. Not enough profits? Well, hell, let's arm both camps. All the US cares about is having whoever run Libya to do what we want. I am sure somewhere in Exxon and the Pentagon are plans for bases and MacDonalds.

[Cacey]

07:11 AM on 03/29/2011

I'm well over 50 and having had a long career in marketing, have significant experience in polling and combined with judgement and some common sense have developed very effective programs because of polls.  At the same time, the US is made up of countless communites, which tend to think much the same and there are other communities similar to your's where you would know no one at work, church or socially who doesn't support our involvement in Libya

[apocalypzia]

09:10 AM on 03/29/2011

I have a lot of experience in marketing and marketing research, and I believe your point is well taken, Morgan1. It's often not so much who is polled that can slant results but what they are asked. Any professional researcher worth his or her salt would demand to see the actual questionnaire before trying to decipher survey results. You'll notice in articles like these there is rarely an opportunity to do that.

Tell a pollster what results you want a survey to produce and I guarantee you a high likelihood of being able to get a representative sample of 1000 people to give you exactly what you want based on how the questions are precisely phrased.

As they say, there are lies, damn lies and statistics.

[whitewater]

06:17 AM on 03/29/2011

The insanity of it is that we had clearer goals in Iraq. If Ghaddafi is not gone this year, it will be another Carter debacle. If we are still entangled at midyear, it is another Iraq.