-Who are we to challenge the regime in the first place? This is the -way in which humanitarian interventionism has greased the way for -purely imperial war.
Bullhockey-- from human rights challenges to Belgium's mass murder in the Congo at the end of the 19th century (led by among others Mark Twain) to denunciations of the fascist regimes in Europe in the 1930s to attacks on colonialism in the 1950s to denunciations of death squads in El Salvador and Apartheid in South Africa, the left has always called for challenges to bad regimes.
Progressives usually support non-violent means as a way to do so, usually arguing that it is support for such regimes early on that get them to the point of becoming so dangerous that war is the only answer.
But the idea that we should have no opinion and do no organizing to support those who resist oppression is repugnant to my idea of global solidarity. That kind of national sovereignty argument is just Bull Connor/Pat Buchanan states rights rhetoric taken to the global level as its logical end point.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with humanitarian interventionism in principle-- the left has believed in it for centuries. What is opposed is its use on behalf of corporate interests in a violent form, when non-violent solidarity is both more likely to lead to a just result and imposes less costs on the population.
-- Nathan Newman