No, my point was actually to regard those lives. Gadaffi was ovethrown by his people, it was a conflict of their choosing and there is no known civilian casualty in that invasion by the way. But wars can be avoided and civilian lives saved if dictators big and small knew their invasion was a guarantee if they threatened a mighty country they can't resist.
If you are going to have a war anyways, use that horror as a signpost that tells others "this is what will happen to you" to avoid more wars. If you say "we're sorry, won't happen again" guess what? It will happen again because they will use direct or indirect means to threaten other nations and the by the actions of one dictator millions die. This isn't about justifying war but about preventing it.
I could see an argument being made with Saddam, considering the treatment of the Kurds. But Libya post Gaddafi has had more extrajudicial killings than even under the bloodiest parts of his reign. In part by collapse of the new government allowing terrorists to run rampant, but also in part because the new government before the collapse was partially staffed by the bloodthirsty lunatics he was repressing.
One of the first actions of the new Libyan government was to instate the death penalty for blasphemy. Which was then used on anyone from political opposition to women daring to seek education. The government collapsed before any sentences could be carried out, but that's intent to apply repression on a vastly broader scale than Gaddafi cared to.
