Yes, but we'll get blamed for that, and for their jihad. The entire portfolio of fanatics is reactive, remember. Without action from another party, they would sit around like broken wind-up toys. Anyway, we're still in Phase I: Why Won't You Do Something?
They are certainly proactive, but it is starting to look like thier ambitions are greater than their means. They don't have the weaponry, and no amount of enthusiasm is gonna make up the shortfall. It's soon gonna be decision time soon for a foreign power to intervene. An Arab country would be best, but NATO will eventually have to step in to prevent them from being entirely crushed. They are in a catch 22 position. If they side with the rebels, they overstep thier mandate, but if they don't and the rebels are slaughtered, well, they'll cop the blame. It should be remembered who the main protagonist is though, Gaddafi. He could end all this now. But as far as he is concerned, why should he? He's still got a strong hand to play, and the dealing ain't done yet. I feel this is gonna get a whole lot worse before it gets better - for everybody. This is just a sideshow of the potential war to come. The best thing now would to be sending Gaddafi a TLAM with a pretty pink bow on it. Good-bye problem...
Perhaps. It won't be long before the ravens give way hawks if my analysis is anywhere near correct. AlQueda appear to be in there giving the rebels training and instruction if my sources are correct. I wonder how the CIA on the ground are getting along with them..Maybe they can all catch up and swap old war stories. There's only two ways I can see this ending. Either Gaddafi is killed, or his command structure is killed. At the moment, he's sitting pretty. Someone's going to have to take command of the situation and end this. One missile would save more lives on both sides than any number of airstrikes against his soldiers. They're paid to die, and he'll use up as many of them as he wants to before this is done.
The Libyan military has apparently been degraded 25% by the allied campaign. This of course leaves 75% intact. The rebels are outnumbered 10-1 by the soldiers and without artillery or other heavy weapons. it's looking bretty bad.
And hello lots and lots of more problems. We're not trusted in that region, and with recent and past history, I can't really blame them. Taking Gaddafi out will cause more trouble inside and outside Libya than you can imagine. The rebels are now offering a ceasefire provided Gaddafi withdraws his forces from the cities and allows peaceful protests- those are the kinds of conditions I was personally hoping for, from both sides, from the start. We should treat this as a classic peacekeeping operation and do what we can to stop either side from killing civilians, and pull our air forces out soon if it looks like neither side is interested in true peace.
Thr rebels want to trust us Taking out his army will be worse in terms of lives lost and leaving an un-defended Libya on the edge of the EU that any-one with a tank regiment could ransack A good humanist hope, but laughed off as expected. More chance of flying to the moon with banana-powered rocket shoes It's never gonna work till Gaddafi is dead, or gone, or preferably both. No! of course not! Libya is not a big player in oil. It only controls 2% of the trade, and besides, when do gas-prices ever come back down? Although the rebels are somewhat cornered, they should be fairly well protected by NATO. Egypt, thier brothers should give them arms. It would be an arab-arab handout, and nobody would complain. If Egypt bought the weapons from the UK say, who would train them? We have challenger II main battle tanks, we'll sell say fifty to Egypt and where they go after that, who cares! 2.5 Million a tank, second hand. 1 careful lady driver, battlefield grey. 100,000 miles or so, full service history, and we'll chuck in 25 DU sabots for free! 8-10 gallons to the mile, gas turbine engine. 105mm main gun. Gyro-stabilised fire-on-the-run technology...how many can I put you down for, Ali?
But they don't trust us, and they won't trust us as long as there's even the potential for ulterior motives, which is specifically why they asked us to keep our boots off their ground and not to go after Gaddafi directly. I don't see how going after isolated batteries of heavy weaponry and other targets of opportunity, away from civilian populations, would lead to more civilians being killed. If Gaddafi were to try and retaliate by killing more civilians, it would be all the more reason to intervene. I wouldn't worry about any neighbours invading Libya either- who's going to ransack and face NATO's wrath, maybe Chad perhaps? It sounds very much like the rebels are making reasonable demands so far. If neither side is willing to respect such conditions in practice and they just laugh it all off, then we shouldn't be there. Now the news reports are saying the rebels have shown more organization and discipline of late, possibly due to foreign assistance, so you might be totally wrong on this. I think the biggest mistake is to try and say there are any guarantees as far as how this fighting will end. I can only guarantee you that certain actions will piss ordinary Libyans and the rest of the world off, and I don't think we need that kind of trouble.
Even worse, the rebels don't seem to have any training, organization, logistics, officers, command structure, plans or tactics. They seem to basically be a bunch of teens and twenty-somethings, who armed themselves with weapons taken from abandoned Libyan army bunkers and then rushed to the front with their friends in rusty Toyota pickups. It's brave, but it isn't very effective. One of the American cable news networks was interviewing some retired US general, who was sadly shaking his head at the rebels. He mentioned seeing photos of rebels firing some piece of military ordinance (I forget exactly what) that didn't even appear to have its sight fitted. The general went on to say that any army that appears to expend most of its ammunition firing aimlessly into the air isn't really going to be very fearsome on the battlefield. So what the rebels need most probably isn't weapons so much as it's basic training and military organization. I sense that the tide is running the opposite way. Apparently the United States is no longer flying close support missions for the rebels. According to some reports, we abandoned that role on Saturday April 2. Obama, and hence the US, appears indecisive, moving close-support forces into theatre, then suggesting that they won't be used. I'm not sure that Washington really knows what it wants to do. It feels that it can't just walk away, but it sure as hell doesn't want to get dragged into yet another war in the Muslim world. So it chooses to follow a course the promises failure on both counts. The United States is talking like we expect Europe to step into the breach and shoulder the majority of the burden, which it certainly has the capability of doing. But again, I'm not sure that's really going to happen. I don't see Britain increasing its presence, not in a year in which London annouced dramatic cut-backs in Britain's military in hopes of closing the budget deficit. Besides, David Cameron governs in coalition with the Liberal Democrats, who have kind of become Britain's anti-war party. Cameron wants to do the right thing, but probably (and perhaps rightly) doesn't want to accept the cost of doing it. Unexpectedly, and given the American people's perceptions of their country, ironically, France seems to be the stalwart in this. If anyone wants to act tough in Libya, that person is probably Nicholas Sarkozy. But will France be able to replace the United States in the ground support role? If they can, how long can they keep it up? (Given the rebels' weakness, this Libyan civil war may last a while.) My guess is that France may take a low profile until or unless Benghazi is threatened again, and then Paris is apt to respond strongly like last time. And Obama might possibly change course (again) if Benghazi was threatened, he'd certainly be feeling a lot of heat from the media, and would conceivably order increased US air strikes on ground forces. Will the rest of Europe fill the gap the US leaves behind? Italy has the capability in a great location, but seems loathe to use more of it. Spain could get more involved, but it probably won't. Germany's been absolutely useless. Right. I guess that I see NATO maintaining some no-fly zone combat air patrols, but generally staying clear of the close support mission. So the alliance will end up squarely in the middle. If anyone wants to attack them for intervening in Libya, they can. And if anyone wants to attack them for not doing enough, they can do that too. Neither side will be satisfied, and NATO will receive everyone's blame. And there's this idealistic hope that our intervention will win us the friendship of a whole new generation of Arabic world democrats and freedom fighters. But the high-altitude contrails of our jets flying over without doing anything while those freedom-fighters are being massacred won't make the rebels and their supporters eager to say 'thanks'. It would just play into the Arab street's pre-existing anti-Western prejudices. I'm starting to feel that way too. I have to say that Qaddafi's been far more resilient than I expected him to be. I thought that he was probably in his final 'Hitler-bunker' hours a month ago, as rebellions were springing up everywhere and his army melted away. But he's gathered his remaining supporters and battled back far more successfully than I ever expected.
There's an awful lot of serious points in here, so I'll just take it a little chunk at a time. The thing is, they want help but they're shit scared of being occupied. The US killed so many civillians in Iraq that it's left a legacy of distrust - and who could blame them? Dozens of marines are now kicking thier heels in jail, but it's too late for the victims. They also didn't like the security firms going in with immunity against prosecutiion and just killing anyone they didn't like the look of. Understandably they don't trust the west. The only isolated targets worth hitting have been weapons bunkers used to re-supply the front line forces. Nearly everything that's been hit has been front line armour, arty and SAM sites. I think you might be misunderstanding me, I was talking about saving more lives on both sides by targeting Gaddafi directly. Without much oil at stake, I don't see why a foreign power would threaten them, but without a decent defence capability, territory alone might tempt incursions. Iran wouldn't need an excuse of any kind. They need to make demands appealing to the regime. They are in no position to demand anything much, Gaddafi has not been critically weakened and has no incentive to cede anything to the rebels. It's not his life on the line. This needs to change. Yes, I could be wrong - but I don't think so. They would take six months and a great deal of new weaponry to be a match for the army, who is still 75% intact. That's why we are seeing AlQuada infiltrating. They are there to teach the rebels geurilla warfare, bomb-making and basic weapons training. They're too valuable to go on the front line yet. If Egypt put troops in for example, I don't think anybody would mind that. It's not likely to be egypt though, their Army is quite busy as it is at the moment with regime change. No, they need some of the Army to defect in regiments, fighting units. The odd colonel is great for morale, but pretty useless for whipping the rebels into shape. They need a load of Army NCO's for that. Without proper fighting vehicles they're up against it. the standard pickup is so thin-skinned and leaky that a well-placed mortar will take out a load all at once Yes, they're brave. They have no choise though, If Gaddafi gets them they're dead anyway, or worse, in one of his torture chambers. Yes, I saw footage of them trying to fire a mortar that wasn't attached properly to the base-plate. Very simple to do, but they would prop it up, drop a round in and run. God knows if it even went in the right direction.. They need both - urgently. How so? The rebels are completely on the defensive. They have no hope of breaking out unless they get help. (in my opinion) Obama never even wanted to get involved in the first place. If it wasn't for France and the Arab League, he wouldn't have raised a finger. His lack of leadership in such a clearly humanatarian mission is very disappointing. This is France and Britains' baby. If it goes wrong you won't see Obama for dust. Britain is a disproportionately big part of NATO. Our involvement might not rise, but will probably not fall either. NATO is well-funded. That is no particular problem and all NATO countries carry a contingency for such exploits. France wants to fight this war more than most, though I'm not sure why. They used to be a colonial power in North Africa, did they have Libya? Maybe. It's not just Europe, it's all NATO countries including Canada. Even Norway is contributing and they're tiny. The US will still fly shotgun, and run the skies with its' JStars and AWACS. Don't forget there are some Arab aircraft in there as well. Yep, that's about the size of it. But NATO is highly competent though, and is a conglomerate of integrated forces. Blaming any one part would be difficult. I don't think it's idealistic. To a large degree it is actually happening - and more countries are involved than the west could ever have hoped for. Even if the rebels said "OK, we'll take some ground forces." I don't think NATO would be too happy deploying them unless specifically "ok'd" by a new UN resolution, and that would take ages. Gaddafi knows that as well. He's happy to play up till then I think. No, he's no push-over. He will continue to have support as long as he controls the Army and security apparatus. Even the defections wont have phased him, he will just appoint others, more loyal ones. People like him, don't forget he was a colonel himself, and a good one at that -dig in and will undergo extroadinary privations if necessary. Don't forget that Saddam was happy to hide in a hole on a farm, and Gaddafi is much tougher than Saddam. Gaddafi will also remember what the west did to Saddam, they pulled his head off.
The rebels took another good pounding today, and the besieged city of Misrata evacuated 300 people on a hospital ship to Benghazi where the WHO has stocked medical supplies. There has been a lot of food-aid going in as well. Gaddafis' forces have apparently been attacking some of the southern oilfields, and it is thought that the rebels will make thier first cash sale of crude this week sometime. The UK has authorized the deployment of non-lethal equipment to help the rebels, but I don't have the details on this yet. I don't think the rebels expected a long war, but those that aren't killed will be getting experience. The uk has also authorized the deployment of an extra 4 Tornados and they are concentrating now on armour and mobile artillery. The enemy still have a lot of resources including very capable T-92 tanks at thier disposal. I expect morale among the rebels to be faltering a bit by now. I hope they don't let frustration cause them to make mistakes, as this is what Gaddafis' army will be waiting for.
No D, source definately said T-92. I'll check on that if I can. Meanwhile, I've found out our "non-lethal" equipment is telecommunications equipment. This surely can be used to co-ordinate and organise the rebel force though. I like it! I think it's a good idea!
Hmm, I wonder if they mean the US project that never entered service or the one from the computer game? Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! I did find one sole mention, and photo which apparently is an Indian Army type - probably a local (with Russian help) mod. I even checked Tanknet (first time I've logged in there for years) - if they don't have it then it doesn't exist as far as I'm concerned. Those guys are serious about their tanks. All I can suggest is that either someone got the name wrong or the Libyans have done their (very limited numbers) own modification and given it that name. The only picture that I can distinguish details on (the Indian Army one is a bit small and fuzzy) is a Lego model - and that's most definitely a T-54/ T-55 derivative. Bloody reporters, couldn't get their own mother's names right if they tried.
Nah, they probably mean a T-72. We already know he has them and that they're not bad for a ruskie design. I'll tell him to dust off his Janes and use binoculars next time!
