Libya's uprising against Muammar Gaddafi becomes the test case for how far the Obama administration will go in backing the Arab Spring. This is the first installment of a two-part Fault Lines series, and it traces the internal debate inside Washington over intervention: air strikes and a no-fly zone weighed against the risk of another open-ended military commitment in the Middle East. Correspondents speak with officials, analysts, and Libyans living through the fighting to lay out what the United States actually wants from the outcome, beyond the stated goal of protecting civilians. The film sets Libya against the wider wave of uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt, asking why Washington moved to act in one country while treating allies elsewhere with caution. It is less interested in the battlefield than in the calculation behind the decision to enter it, and in what that calculation reveals about American strategy as the old order in the region comes apart.