Uprising in Libya

[Juubi Karakuchi]

I will say that the British newspapers have been predictably infuriating. Before, they were screaming for intervention. Now, they are screaming for it to stop. The opinion columns are full of (equally predictable) whining about the supposed hypocrisy of it all, and how we are apparently trying to steal their oil even though, as Sea Skimmer points out, it's not entirely practicable. Depending on which high-brow newspaper you read (the tabloids seem to be enjoying every minute of it), it is all our fault, we provided Gaddafi with all of his weapons, and betrayed every principle of justice and humanity by daring to actually speak to him.

There is also the old chestnut about the Typhoon being air-combat only, though the British press has always been funny about that particular aircraft. The precise motivation seems to depend on political affiliation, the left hates it because they don't like military spending in general, while the right hates it because it's European. The RAF seems to love it though, and its reviews in various magazines (I generally read Air Forces Monthly and Air Combat Monthly) have been universally positive.

I suppose it's the London media bubble at work. Like politicians, they seem to live in their own little world where everything is as they say it is.

[Tribun]

Wow....compared to this, our press is actually sticking to the facts in this matter. Maybe part of it is that Germany isn't in the operation but nonetheless there's only very little whining about reasons, oil, etc... Here they are more asking the question if the whole operation can actually succeed and how long it actually could take.

[K. A. Pital]

There is no substantial difference between a democratic republic and a democratic constitutional monarchy, and there are situations where reasons of tradition, national identity, social stability and so on might make a monarchy preferable to a republic.

Except tradition is codified bullshit, mostly from dark ages or at least a few centuries prior, with moral norms that make people shake their head in disgust, national identity, when embodied in a Third World monarchic order, is usually a conservation of retarded state of affairs in society (Nepal, Thailand, pick any third world nations... and remove Nepal out of there, thankfully they got rid of the monarch), the royal family is a waste of money, and "social stability" is the conservation of opressive oligarchies.

Certainly one might ask what Nasserism brought to Egypt that was so great, unless perhaps Stas thinks that the military ruling class only became oppressive and corrupt once they stopped being clients of the Soviet Union? It is rather clear that Libya under King Idris was less oppressive than under Gaddafi, and it is not unlikely that a closer relationship with the West would have led to more development in Libya.

What Nasserism brought to Egypt that was "that great"? Well, at least, in two words, it returned Egypt the Suez Canal. A closer relationship with the West didn't help Saudi Arabia, Iran or Iraq with "development", too. Tradition-wise, they remain somewhere near to dark age level of atrocious stupidity and barbarism.

Of course it is a bit of a red herring. Most of the protesters are using the monarchy's flag because it was the flag of decolonization.

That's a legitimate point. Actually, from what I gathered, there is no desire to restore a monarchy, so I take my word on the monarchy back. I think Libya and any nation can do without a monarchy, but that's just me.

Having a good working relationship with the West seemed to be working for King Idris and Lybia until the coup that overthrew him. What other metric is there? As for language, I've only ever heard the event called "intervention" or the "Seuz Crisis". What would you prefer?

Idris was overthrown exactly because he was buddying up to the West and ignoring the desires of his people, such as gasp, equitable distribution of oil wealth, etc. Gaddafi's coup had lots of support in it's day. And there were lots of reasons for that support. Gaddafi failed to build a truly democratic state, but that does not mean the best interests of Libya's people lie with the West. Arab states that were allied with the West didn't see much help or improvement.

Lybia has DONE the anti-West arab nationalist thing. Gaddafi was a big follower of Nasser's pan-Arabism after all! Look what it's gotten the Lybians. Right now, Lybia's version of Nasser is trying to maintain his power over his people's dead bodies. However, if you think that is "much better" than a king, then that's your look out.

I said that being against Gaddafi does not require one to support a king. But, considering what Purnell explained about the monarchy, and Simon's post, I say, I am not worried much that the revolution would produce a monarchy. I just don't like monarchies, I think monarchy is bullshit as a concept and I'm offended by the very principle of monarchy, regardless of how much power the "king" has. I guess I shouldn't let my personal preferences impact my thinking too much, inevitable as it is.

[iborg]

I know that the CDG has a pretty limited air wing.

What I was wondering about is whether or not they deployed her near Libya to also serve as a SAR base in case some French or EU pilots are shot down. Fighters can sortie out of southern France and hit Libya, but helicopters can't.

BTW, is the CDG carrying any AWACs?

The current air group include two Hawkeyes (they're probably working in relay with the E3s including the French ones), and two Caracal helos tasked with CSAR.
I don't know where the Mistral is atm.

[MKSheppard]

while the right hates it because it's European.

Don't forget if the UK had dropped out of the EFA programme early on, you would have gotten more planes for less money with more capabilities.

The RAF seems to love it though

When your last fighter was the Tornado, the Typhoon looks super McAwesome Sexy.

[Gil Hamilton]

Idris was overthrown exactly because he was buddying up to the West and ignoring the desires of his people, such as gasp, equitable distribution of oil wealth, etc. Gaddafi's coup had lots of support in it's day. And there were lots of reasons for that support. Gaddafi failed to build a truly democratic state, but that does not mean the best interests of Libya's people lie with the West. Arab states that were allied with the West didn't see much help or improvement.

He was overthrown in a military coup and they got a military dictator, which one could pretty easily predict would happen. It was also worse than the government they overthrew and Gaddafi lined his families pockets with the Peoples Money even more than Idris did. Idris was unlikely to ever have an airliner full of civilians blown up, with bad consequences for Lybia.

I take your point that being allied with the West can be rough, but what other option is there now for the Lybians? It's Western pilots and Western bombs that are destroying Gaddafi's military and giving the Lybian people a fair chance to actually throw Gaddafi out. Very few Arab states are risking anything despite the amount of time that was given to outreach to the Arab states to get them involved (time in which rebels were dying to Gaddafis forces), and certainly states like Russia and China aren't going to lift a finger. Right now, those Lybian rebels seem pretty thrilled that American planes are smashing Gaddafi's apparatus and are certainly thinking nice things about the US, UK, and France. What was the last government to do so? King Idris'.

So why shouldn't they, if they prevail, turn to the West? We went and helped them when their anti-Western pan-Arab nationalist government was trying to kill them. Should they turn around and say "Thanks for all the air support and medical supplies and aid you provided us, now get the hell out, Western capitalist pigdogs"?

I said that being against Gaddafi does not require one to support a king. But, considering what Purnell explained about the monarchy, and Simon's post, I say, I am not worried much that the revolution would produce a monarchy. I just don't like monarchies, I think monarchy is bullshit as a concept and I'm offended by the very principle of monarchy, regardless of how much power the "king" has. I guess I shouldn't let my personal preferences impact my thinking too much, inevitable as it is.

I agree with you. Kings are not ideal, though in many constitutional monarchies, they seem to work and sometimes are even a positive (I don't think anyone can argue that King George VI actions during the Blitz as Symbolic Leader of His People didn't have a profoundly positive effect on the morale of the British people while fascist bombs were hitting London, for example). However, if we consider Gaddafi to be illegitimate, and given that he's currently trying to kill his own people to maintain power against a popular democratic uprising I think that's fair, who was the last legitimate government? A king. And what Lybia needs is a government that all its people can at least agree on paper is the legal one, if they are going to make a transistion to anything else more productive. One of King Idris' descendent can do that.

[Shroom Man 777]

Positive examples of constitutional monarchies are mostly European ones. Most of the monarchies in the Arab world have been anything but positive.

[Sarevok]

It's a simple problem. There is no current descendant of Libyan royalty that has name recognition and ruling ability. They are just nobodies who happen to have some family ties. What Libya would have benifited from is a skilled monarch with a respected and positive image. No such thing exists. Any bozo with a self imposed title brought from overseas would fail to keep his own position secure, much less help unite and lead Libya effectively.

[Artemas]

except for Jordan, shroomy.

[Zaune]

I will say that the British newspapers have been predictably infuriating. Before, they were screaming for intervention. Now, they are screaming for it to stop. The opinion columns are full of (equally predictable) whining about the supposed hypocrisy of it all, and how we are apparently trying to steal their oil even though, as Sea Skimmer points out, it's not entirely practicable.

There is, I suspect, more than a grain of truth in that. Do you really think we'd be committing a non-trivial chunk of our country's increasingly laughable excuse for an air force so readily to back a revolt in Zimbabwe, for example?

Don't forget if the UK had dropped out of the EFA programme early on, you would have gotten more planes for less money with more capabilities.

From where? The French probably would have gouged us for the Rafale on general principles, and whilst the Saab Gripen might have been cheaper I very much doubt it's more capable. The F/A-18 isn't by any means a bad aircraft either, but it's been around for quite a while and there's an upper limit to how far you can upgrade an airframe before it becomes more economical to start from scratch.

When your last fighter was the Tornado, the Typhoon looks super McAwesome Sexy.

The F3 might have been a lousy dogfighter but it wasn't that bad at its intended role, which was a stand-off weapons platform for knocking down bombers.
And didn't I hear that the Typhoon had finally been tested versus the F-22 a while back, and done rather well?

[Sea Skimmer]

There is, I suspect, more than a grain of truth in that. Do you really think we'd be committing a non-trivial chunk of our country's increasingly laughable excuse for an air force so readily to back a revolt in Zimbabwe, for example?

If it was Zimbabwe we'd see less reluctance to just send in some ground troops to win the war.

From where? The French probably would have gouged us for the Rafale on general principles, and whilst the Saab Gripen might have been cheaper I very much doubt it's more capable. The F/A-18 isn't by any means a bad aircraft either, but it's been around for quite a while and there's an upper limit to how far you can upgrade an airframe before it becomes more economical to start from scratch.

The British government was presented with figures back in the 1980s that said developing a UK only fighter would cost about 4% more then the required share of funding a joint Euro program and not much reason exists to doubt that claim as Eurofighter costs then went up and up and up mainly because Germany fucked with the program and tried to ruin it at every chance, after having been bribed by accepting its design. Eurofighter is effectively four different planes (each with about seven different blocks now, no joke) built on four different assembly lines... really great for saving money! Eurofighter was pure politics and everyone knew it would cost far more all along, but it did have the advantage of being harder to cancel.

The F3 might have been a lousy dogfighter but it wasn't that bad at its intended role, which was a stand-off weapons platform for knocking down bombers.
And didn't I hear that the Typhoon had finally been tested versus the F-22 a while back, and done rather well?

The radar never worked right; not good for an interceptor. The very low rate of climb and low acceleration and generally not correct wing for the role are all also serious problems. I can't think of any time Typhoon and F-22 met. Rafael and F-22 have met, but guns only.

[Sea Skimmer]

It looks like the rebels have finally retaken, or at least begun fighting for the actual city at Adjabiya after Coalition jets took out most of the tanks around the city. Very good news; its a shame they could not take it alone but even with much better quality manpower they didn't have the weapons to do it. As even better news in some days, its also being reported that the Gaddafi forces that had been shelling Zintan have fallen back, and apparently without being subject to any particularly major air attack, the rebels claim to have destroyed some soft skin vehicles during the retreat and captured armaments from them. This could mean several different things, but almost all of them are positive for the rebellion. 40-50 armored vehicles had been reported in the area so its not some token force pulling back. These troops may have been driven back by rebel opposition in the hills, they may have lost heart, they may have been ordered to fall back to defend Tripoli or to reinforce the faltering Gaddafi onslaught at Misrata.

Misrata is still a major battle, and still being bombarded on and off, but no way will it fall now.

[Sea Skimmer]

As a really really amusing note, the Syrian government has been blaming unrest in Daraa on people from Jordan for the last couple days, while Jordan is now blaming agents from Syria and Egypt for causing its own unrest.

[Darksider]

It looks like the rebels have finally retaken, or at least begun fighting for the actual city at Adjabiya after Coalition jets took out most of the tanks around the city. Very good news; its a shame they could not take it alone but even with much better quality manpower

Wait. You're saying that the rebel masses have better quality troops than Gaddafi's forces?

How does that work? I know some of the Libyan military joined the rebels, but I thought the best trained and best equipped units remained loyal to Gaddafi.

[Sea Skimmer]

Wait. You're saying that the rebel masses have better quality troops than Gaddafi's forces?

No, I meant even if the rebels had better people, they still just don't have the the firepower to counter tanks in the open desert. They need at least a few ATGM launchers to do that, which we could easily supply, but so far no one has. Without that they've got RPGs and 107mm recoilless rifles, both of which can kill an early model T-72, but even the latter weapon is just not going to hit a tank outside maybe 800 meters without firing fifty shots (assuming the tank did not move). This is a non option when the Gaddafi forces also have artillery to prevent the rebels from holding fixed positions or slowly creeping closer from dune to dune. The fact that the rebels simply don't know to dig in or bring any kind of shovel really isn't helping them. The best hope attacking that city without air support would have been to advance in short rushes, digging it at every point until they have a vast web of foxholes creeping up to the city limits.

As it is though the rebels apparently did attack the supply lines into the city, which is a smart move and may have helped them a fair bit. A T-72 has enough gas for maybe 24 hours of operation and its unlikely they had large stocks near the front.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Bahrain, Egypt, Libya and now Syria, where next?

On a sidenote, I saw both the Eurofighter and the F-22 at RIAT last year and both were pretty impressive, the Eurofighter was a fair bit louder in terms of engine noise, but that's hardly surprising. The 2 planes are designed for different roles, but the Raptor has 2 things the Typhoon lacks- stealth and thrust vectoring. The Euro is regarded as a gen. 4.5, the Raptor as a full 5th generation fighter.

[Tribun]

The situation in Libya changed in the east quite significantly today. The Rebels finally managed to capture Ajdabiya and are now busy with weeding out possible hidden soldiers. At the same time they entered Brega and reported that there are no soldiers even near the city, sighting them on a chaotic retreat towards the west.

Meanwhile the western airforces are busy with breaking the armed forces still threatening Misurata.

[Tribun]

Addendum: The Rebels also seem to have captured the number thee in Gaddafi's forces, General Bilgasim Al-Ganga. Seems he now will be brought to Benghazi, facing a not-so nice future. Read up about him, he's got quite a bloody reputation.

[Edward Yee]

What is this I don't even...

TRIPOLI, Libya — A Libyan woman burst into the hotel housing the foreign press in Tripoli on Saturday morning in an attempt to tell journalists that she had been raped and beaten by members of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s militia. After struggling for nearly an hour to resist removal by Colonel Qaddafi’s security forces, she was dragged away from the hotel screaming.
[...]
A wild scuffle began as journalists tried to interview, photograph and protect her. Several journalists were punched, kicked and knocked on the floor by the security forces working in tandem with people who until then had appeared to be members of the hotel staff. A television camera belonging to CNN was destroyed in the struggle, and security forces seized a device that a Financial Times reporter had used to record her testimony. A plainclothes security officer pulled out a revolver.

Two members of the hotel staff grabbed table knives to threaten both Ms. Obeidy and the journalists.

“Turn them around, turn them around,” a waiter shouted, trying to block the foreign news media from having access to Ms. Obeidy. A woman who worked at the hotel coffee bar shouted: “Why are you doing this? You are a traitor!” Then she briefly forced a dark coat over Ms. Obeidy’s head.

There was a prolonged standoff behind the hotel as the security officials apparently restrained themselves because of the presence of so many journalists, but Ms. Obeidy was ultimately forced into a white car and taken away.

Video here, and CNN's version. (CNN claims that one of his cameras was deliberately destroyed in the incident by government-affiliated personnel.)

[Edward Yee]

Bootleg edit: According to CNN's Nic Robertson, the blue-shirted reporter was none other than Financial Times' Charles Clover, mentioned by the New York Times article... "Charles Clover Financial Times who tried to stop thugs was put in van & driven 2 border. Sd was told last nght hd 2 leave bec of his reports"

Media pool footage, basically CNN's minus the voice over narration.

[Tribun]

Maybe we can open a new thread with the title "War in Libya"? Since this one is now quite full and the title doesn't any longer reflect the situation.

[Sea Skimmer]

The rebels have retaken the oil ports at Brega and Ras Lanuf without opposition. Qaddafi still has the personal for a brigade sized force in the east; but they are clearly in full retreat. As of me posting this it is about noon Tripoli time; if the rebels can find gas they may reach Bin-jawad today, the previous limit of the advance or even further depending on if Qaddafis forces attempt any delaying actions. My money is on a pull back to Sirte, but the truth will be found in blood.

Reports also suggest the Coalition has bombed the retreat of the Qaddafi forces, but this seems unlikely to me because that would be an exceptionally broad interpretation of the UN resolution, unless its on the basis of those troops heading to Misrata. Misrata looks bad, every time planes are not overhead the attack resumes on the city. Talk is being raised of sending AC-130 gunships in to start attacking Qaddafis infantry. But to stay about MANPADS height the AC-130 can only use the 105mm howitzer.

[Tribun]

According to reports, all remains of Gaddafi's eastern army have fled to Sirt, Rebels have re-taken Ras Lanuf and Ben Jawad, essentially being back to where they'd been before Gaddafi's counter-attack. Unlike last time however, this time I doubt Gaddafi has the means for another counter-attack, so his remaining forces most likely will try to entench themselves in Sirt.

This is the current situation:

[K. A. Pital]

If the popular support in both parts of the country would not drastically change, it's East Libya and West Libya, then. Unless one of the parties is willing to unify the nation by force. And from the looks of it, the one with NATO weapons behind it can now seize the moment.

Reports also suggest the Coalition has bombed the retreat of the Qaddafi forces, but this seems unlikely to me because that would be an exceptionally broad interpretation of the UN resolution

It seems unlikely to you that the developed nations' forces can act far in excess of the resolution? *shrugs* To me, it seems kinda obvious and even dull. If there's evidence, it shouldn't be dismissed out of hand just because we're talking about First World nations militaries involved, or a UN resolution authorizing the operation. Where are these "reports", anyway?

[Thanas]

I updated the title.