Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

[KanadaHye]

Re: Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12944905



This operation is meant to be all about no fly zone.

Why are the striking tanks and jeeps.
Don't they know tanks and jeeps do not fly??

As for killing "friends" ......

Well, the rebellion was SO HUGE that if it wasn't for Libyan military air power, the rebels would have crushed the Libyan citizens.... errrr "Gaddafi sympathizers". So seeing that the "rebels" were never large in numbers, the "no fly" zone was actually intended to be an interventionist "bomb the entire Libyan military zone". However, you'll see that the Libyan military is playing "unfairly" as they are using decoys.... errr "human shields" to trick/throw off the air power from the "Coalition" forces.

[Joseph]

Re: Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

Libya is on the way to being a failed state, the fault of both Gaddafi and the Rebels/NATO. The rebels do not have a remote chance to win without aggressive NATO support and if NATO lessens its role Gaddafi's forces gain the upper hand (as they generally have in the field), they will slaughter their rebels and civilians whole sale. I don't see a solution. The rebel forces look like an absolute joke.

[retro]

Re: Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

Libya is on the way to being a failed state, the fault of both Gaddafi and the Rebels/NATO. The rebels do not have a remote chance to win without aggressive NATO support and if NATO lessens its role Gaddafi's forces gain the upper hand (as they generally have in the field), they will slaughter their rebels and civilians whole sale. I don't see a solution. The rebel forces look like an absolute joke.

Maybe so, however the rebels clearly have considerable popular support and guerrillas armies are not to taken likely. Gaddafi is clearly facing a uprising and if more high ranking former regime members and military officials decide to coup. Gaddafi's regime could still be toppled.

It's telling that the Libyans foreign minister has had to flea for his life. Apparently the EU sold Gaddafi's regime $300 million USD worth of military equipment, only last year and this whole affair is a farse.

In recent weeks, the American military has been monitoring Libyan troops with U-2 spy planes and a high-altitude Global Hawk drone, as well as a special aircraft, JSTARS, that tracks the movements of large groups of troops. Military officials said that the Air Force also has Predator drones, similar to those now operating in Afghanistan, in reserve.

Air Force RC-135 Rivet Joint eavesdropping planes intercept communications from Libyan commanders and troops and relay that information to the Global Hawk, which zooms in on the location of armored forces and determines rough coordinates. The Global Hawk sends the coordinates to analysts at a ground station, who pass the information to command centers for targeting. The command center beams the coordinates to an E-3 Sentry Awacs command-and-control plane, which in turn directs warplanes to their targets.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, who recently retired as the Air Force’s top intelligence official, said that Libya’s flat desert terrain and clear weather have allowed warplanes with advanced sensors to hunt Libyan armored columns with relative ease, day or night, without the need for extensive direction from American troops on the ground.

But if government troops advance into or near cities in along the country’s eastern coast, which so far have been off-limits to coalition aircraft for fear of causing civilian casualties, General Deptula said that ground operatives would be particularly helpful in providing target coordinates or pointing them out to pilots with hand-held laser designators.

The C.I.A. and British intelligence services were intensely focused on Libya eight years ago, before and during the successful effort to get Colonel Qaddafi to give up his nuclear weapons program. He agreed to do so in the fall of 2003, and allowed C.I.A. and other American nuclear experts into the country to assess Libya’s equipment and bomb designs and to arrange for their transfer out of the country.

Once the weapons program was eliminated, a former American official said, intelligence agencies shifted their focus away from Libya. But as Colonel Qaddafi began his recent crackdown on the rebel groups, the American spy agencies have worked to rekindle ties to Libyan informants and to learn more about the country’s military leaders.

A former British government official who is briefed on current operations confirmed media reports that dozens of British Special Forces soldiers, from the elite Special Air Service and Special Boat Service units, are on the ground across Libya. The British soldiers have been particularly focused on finding the locations of Colonel Qaddafi’s Russian-made surface-to-air missiles.

A spokesman for Britain’s Ministry of Defense declined to comment, citing a policy not to discuss the operations of British Special Forces.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/31/wo...el.html?src=mv

[Joseph]

Re: Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

Maybe so, however the rebels clearly have considerable popular support and guerrillas armies are not to taken likely. Gaddafi is clearly facing a uprising and if more high ranking former regime members and military officials decide to coup. Gaddafi's regime could still be toppled.

It's telling that the Libyans foreign minister has had to flea for his life. Apparently the EU sold Gaddafi's regime $300 million USD worth of military equipment, only last year and this whole affair is a farse.

If more Libyan troops defect to the rebel side, you could be right.

[londontsi]

Re: Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

NATO seems to be keen to keep the military balance,
OR
They hate Arabs of any shape or form, period.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12997181

Libyan rebels near Ajdabiya 'killed in Nato air strike'

Rebels in eastern Libya say their forces have been mistakenly hit in a Nato air raid.

Doctors in Ajdabiya told the BBC 13 rebel fighters had been killed by the strike on a rebel tank position.

The BBC's Wyre Davies reports chaotic scenes on the outskirts of Ajdabiya, with rebel forces in retreat reporting being hit by Nato air strikes.

It is the third such incident in recent days involving international forces deployed to protect Libyan civilians.

One rebel commander told the BBC he saw at least four missiles land among rebel fighters.

Many people have been killed and many more have been injured, he said.

The rebels had been taking a group of tanks, armoured vehicles and rocket launchers near the front line between the towns of Ajdabiya and Brega in more than 30 transporters.

Ambulances were seen heading in the opposite direction, towards the hospital in Ajdabiya, following the apparent Nato hit.

There is considerable anger among rebel troops after what appears to have been a terrible mistake, our correspondent says.

Rebel forces in the area began retreating on Wednesday after heavy bombardment from government forces.

They had been calling for more Nato air strikes in recent days

There has been no confirmation from Nato over the incident yet.

[KanadaHye]

Re: Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

I don't see how you can logistically target an enemy without soldiers on the ground... I don't care how much technology there is, without intelligence on the ground, you're just firing blindly.

[KanadaHye]

Re: Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

Yep, that's what I thought.

West inching closer to ground troops in Libya

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2...fi-rebels.html

[retro]

Re: Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

If the British invade Libya, Gaddafi is screwed.

Russia's foreign minister isn't happy and is inffering that the British and French are operating outside of the UN's mandate.

Britain sending military advisers to Libya

Britain said Tuesday it is sending military advisers to help organise Libyan rebels, even as western powers denied they could soon break their taboo against putting foreign boots on the ground.

The announcement came as France strongly warned against sending any coalition troops into Libya, where a two-month revolt against Moamer Kadhafi's regime has stalled and civilian casualties are mounting.

Foreign Secretary William Hague insisted the addition of about 12 military advisers to Britain's diplomatic team in the rebel stronghold of Benghazi did not breach a UN resolution authorising air strikes against Kadhafi's forces.

"They're not boots on the ground, this is not British ground combat forces going in... There is going to be no ground invasion of Libya," Hague told BBC television.

Hague said the British advisers would not arm or train the rebels, but would help them develop organisational structures, communications and logistics and coordinating humanitarian aid and medical supplies.

"They're people with the expertise in those sorts of things. They're not there, I stress, to train fighting forces, to arm fighting forces or of course to take part in any fighting themselves," he added.

The rebels "clearly lack that organisational experience and, yes, we do think that with that experience they will be able to save lives, in Ajdabiya, perhaps in Misrata," he said.

With thousands clamouring to escape the besieged rebel city of Misrata, Britain said it would charter ships to pick up 5,000 migrant workers after a ferry rescued nearly 1,000 on Monday.

In Paris, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said Tuesday that he was "entirely hostile" to the idea of sending coalition ground troops into Libya -- even special forces to guide air strikes.

Juppe brushed off a call from Axel Poniatowski, the influential chairman of the French parliament's foreign affairs committee, for elite allied forces to be deployed to help identify targets for coalition jets.

http://www.expatica.com/fr/news/fren...ya_143678.html

[retro]

Re: Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

Gaddafi should of swallowed his pride and stood down. According to Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini the conflict has so far killed 10,000 people and wounded 55,000.

Libya rebels plead for foreign forces or 'we will die'

MISRATA, Libya — A rebel official in Libya's besieged city of Misrata desperately pleaded Tuesday for Britain and France to send in troops to help against the forces of strongman Moamer Kadhafi, saying "if they don't, we will die."

In what was the first request by any insurgents for boots on the ground, a senior member of Misrata's governing council, Nuri Abdullah Abdullati, said they were asking for the troops on the basis of "humanitarian" principles.

Previously, he told journalists, "we did not accept any foreign soldiers in our country, but now, as we face these crimes of Kadhafi, we are asking on the basis of humanitarian and Islamic principles for someone to come and stop the killing."

"Before we were asking for no foreign interference, but that was before Kadhafi used Grad rockets and planes. Now it's a life or death situation."

His plea came as Kadhafi and rebel forces exchanged fierce gunfire and rockets in southeast Misrata.

The din subsided only briefly when NATO planes were heard overhead, but picked up immediately afterwards.

The rebels in Misrata, which has been under siege for more than a month and seen hundreds killed, have no direct contact with coalition forces. Abdullati said the request had been sent last week to the rebel Transitional National Council (TNC) in Benghazi, but there had yet been no reply.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp...272997d1cd.4f1

[Federate]

Re: Muammar Gaddafi and Libyan crisis

Financial Heist of the Century: Confiscating Libya's Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWF)

by Manlio Dinucci

The objective of the war against Libya is not just its oil reserves (now estimated at 60 billion barrels), which are the greatest in Africa and whose extraction costs are among the lowest in the world, nor the natural gas reserves of which are estimated at about 1,500 billion cubic meters. In the crosshairs of "willing" of the operation “Unified Protector” there are sovereign wealth funds, capital that the Libyan state has invested abroad.

The Libyan Investment Authority (LIA) manages sovereign wealth funds estimated at about $70 billion U.S., rising to more than $150 billion if you include foreign investments of the Central Bank and other bodies. But it might be more. Even if they are lower than those of Saudi Arabia or Kuwait, Libyan sovereign wealth funds have been characterized by their rapid growth. When LIA was established in 2006, it had $40 billion at its disposal. In just five years, LIA has invested over one hundred companies in North Africa, Asia, Europe, the U.S. and South America: holding, banking, real estate, industries, oil companies and others.

In Italy, the main Libyan investments are those in UniCredit Bank (of which LIA and the Libyan Central Bank hold 7.5 percent), Finmeccanica (2 percent) and ENI (1 percent), these and other investments (including 7.5 percent of the Juventus Football Club) have a significance not as much economically (they amount to some $5.4 billion) as politically.

Libya, after Washington removed it from the blacklist of “rogue states,” has sought to carve out a space at the international level focusing on "diplomacy of sovereign wealth funds." Once the U.S. and the EU lifted the embargo in 2004 and the big oil companies returned to the country, Tripoli was able to maintain a trade surplus of about $30 billion per year which was used largely to make foreign investments. The management of sovereign funds has however created a new mechanism of power and corruption in the hands of ministers and senior officials, which probably in part escaped the control of the Gadhafi himself: This is confirmed by the fact that, in 2009, he proposed that the 30 billion in oil revenues go "directly to the Libyan people." This aggravated the fractures within the Libyan government.

U.S. and European ruling circles focused on these funds, so that before carrying out a military attack on Libya to get their hands on its energy wealth, they took over the Libyan sovereign wealth funds. Facilitating this operation is the representative of the Libyan Investment Authority, Mohamed Layas himself: as revealed in a cable published by WikiLeaks, on January 20 Layas informed the U.S. ambassador in Tripoli that LIA had deposited $32 billion in U.S. banks. Five weeks later, on February 28, the U.S. Treasury “froze” these accounts. According to official statements, this is "the largest sum ever blocked in the United States," which Washington held "in trust for the future of Libya." It will in fact serve as an injection of capital into the U.S. economy, which is more and more in debt. A few days later, the EU "froze" around 45 billion Euros of Libyan funds.

The assault on the Libyan sovereign wealth funds will have a particularly strong impact in Africa. There, the Libyan Arab African Investment Company had invested in over 25 countries, 22 of them in sub-Saharan Africa, and was planning to increase the investments over the next five years, especially in mining, manufacturing, tourism and telecommunications. The Libyan investments have been crucial in the implementation of the first telecommunications satellite Rascom (Regional African Satellite Communications Organization), which entered into orbit in August 2010, allowing African countries to begin to become independent from the U.S. and European satellite networks, with an annual savings of hundreds of millions of dollars.

Even more important were the Libyan investment in the implementation of three financial institutions launched by the African Union: the African Investment Bank, based in Tripoli, the African Monetary Fund, based in Yaoundé (Cameroon), the African Central Bank, with Based in Abuja (Nigeria). The development of these bodies would enable African countries to escape the control of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, tools of neo-colonial domination, and would mark the end of the CFA franc, the currency that 14 former French colonies are forced to use. Freezing Libyan funds deals a strong blow to the entire project. The weapons used by "the willing" are not only those in the military action called “Unified Protector.”

Il Manifesto, April 22, 2011

Translated from Italian by John Catalinotto

Manlio Dinucci is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Manlio Dinucci

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=24479