Kicking a Hornet's Nest-USA/Libya 2011--US/NATO missile and aerial bombardment of Libya is the beginning of a bloody affair. Unlike Iraq and Afghanistan, it is doubtful that Ghadfi's. Libya will absorb the attacks without striking out beyond his borders at his attackers. He cannot win, but its not about victory; it is about making his enemy pay a price. Like Saddam , he will die with his boots on. Saddam died with contempt for his captors, so will Qadafi
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If past is prologue, after President Reagan struck Tripoli in in retaliation for a Libyan terrorist attack on a Berlin night club that killed American service men in 1986, Qadafi blew up Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie and later was believed to have sabatoged a passenger aircraft over Niger.. So terrorist make their own rules and symmetrical tactics is not to be expected.

It is a fact that Eastern Libya providerd the most volunteer Jihadists against the US in Iraq. It is this coalition now US/NATO hopes to rescue from Qadafi !

Qadafi's Army is a force for internal control or use in some third world fracas against primitive forces. His military equipment is vintage Soviet, so blasting it by US/NATO ironically forcibly retires his military junk. Libyans are killed in the process. Bombing tanks and trucks by US/NATO has nothing to do controlling the skis over Libya or instituting a no-fly zone.

The more we hear that the US is attempting to shift the air war from the US to NATO leadership, the more preposterous the war becomes. Until sorties flown; missiles fired and bombs dropped are accomplished in the main by non-US forces, you willc onvince no one of a subordinate US role in the War. The US has just started another was against Islam. No matter how it squirms, it carries the ball and will take the hits as it still does in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The war at this stage appears to be another ill conceived military operation being made up on a day-today basis. At least so far in Libya, we have been spared General Petraeus droning on trying to make his counter insurgency theory fit reality. Just win one war for change, general.

No one in the NATO/US command seems to know what the end game is in the war-Partition of Libya with introduction of peacekeepers? Or simply kill Libyans so they do not kill each other. If the US stands by as Yemen ,Bahrain, Jordan and Syria slaughters it populace, it is on thin moral ground and defending the action in Libya is an absurdity.

About the only American lobby to promote the Libyan war has been the Israeli Lobby--even lost soul Wolfowitz wrote an OpEd in the WALL STREET JOURNAL calling for intervention . My sense is that the LOBBY^ views this Libiyan opeartion as prelude to bombing Iran. which is the hottest inteim on the Israeli agenda. Senators Mc Cain and Lieberman are for the Libyan intervention, so what is new?

There is no money to pay for another war' Neither the Democratic Party or the Republicans can put together a US budget. So the policy appears to be BOMB when you do not what to do---this thing is not over by a long shot.---Colonel Robert E Bartos USA Ret.

THE US WAR WAGON KEEPS ROLLING----By now the US public has to acknowledge that the US war wagon keeps rolling. Makes little difference whether Obama or Bushes or Clinton or Mickey Mouse is president-- war is there to stay. The US administration is itching to jump into the Libyan civil war despite the fact that it has not the foggiest notion of what groups compose or dominate the Libyan rebel forces'. The only certainty is Libya has oil and it leader Gadaffi is thumbing his nose at the USA.

To make matters even more stressful for US interventionists is that the Arab League and most of the rebels are telling the Yankee/NATO combine to stay home.

To date the US has managed to put its head under the tent of chaos in North Africa by air evacuating sub-Sahara refugees from Tunisia who recently fled Libya.. Apparently the rebels are targeting blacks working in Libya, so that makes it even more farcical for a black US president to support the rebels. Blacks also serve as a majority in Gaddafi's mercenary forces that are slaughtering Libyans.

No wonder Hillary has characterized the situation as confused. At least our top lady diplomat has realized the only real source of news in the area is Al Jazeera and US MSM pitifully is not. My bet is that the Arab news outlet is ahead of US diplomatic cable reporting and the dreadful CIA politically correct misinformation.

Despite the anti Americanism and outright madness of Gaddafi, GW Bush would point to the Libyan regime as a US diplomatic success..Libya turned in obsolete nuclear processing equipment; the US Carlyle Group got to handle some profits from Libyan oil revenues. THE US helped set free the allegedly dying Lockerbie bomber who is still frisky ; through this misrepresentation, GWB could claim someone in North Africa loved him. And more importantly was back in business with Ljbyan oil.

Alas this good will moment was short lived as Gaddafi is now characterized along with his sons as a monsters by the US. Sanctions are imposed; Libyan assets are frozen in the US and Europe. And now a former Libyan Justice minister says that Gaddafi personally ordered the bombing of the Pan Am 103 aircraft over Lockerbie--what a difference a couple of years make.

Disgraced General McCrystal Ret has entered the fray. He has recently said that the upheavals in the Mid East does not help El Qeada--we are still waiting for the general to fade away quietly before he makes a greater ass of himself.

There are reports from Afghanistan by US Army officer that psychological operations have been turned on visiting US politicians to vote for more war funds. This mixing of public relations PsyOpts points out the role of the Army promoting more war and McCrystal popping out of box to make sweet lemons out of the current revolutionary situations in the Miiddle East is just another. 100 dollars a barrel --oh well

The day the Obama administration rattled the sword at Libya with the threat of no-fly zones, US gunships accidentally killed 9 boys gathering firewood in Afghanistan because of mixed coordinates--to date Karzai is outraged and refuses to accept a US apology' So it is no wonder the locals in Libya reject US military assistance in their civil war
Anyway, if this is such a problem why not let the Arabs and black Africans handle It ?.

At least SECDef Gates has signalled a cautionary note that no-fly zones are an act of war. With Somali pirates ravishing international shipping, it would be more logical to smack them militarily than to take sides in yet another civil war, but there is no oil in Somali and this may explain the US priorities.

Based on experience in Iraq no-fly zones, the cost was about 750,000 dollars a mission;and that is without bombs dropped or rockets fired. Estimates ran to 1.4 billion for no-fly in Iraq. People are killed during these no-fly operations as they were in the Balkans and Iraq.

So the US appears to be looking for opportunities to apply military force--Napoleon was right--you can do anything with bayonets except sit on them. Colonel Robert E Bartos USA Ret.