Posted on 10/11/2011 1:31:50 PM PDT by La Enchiladita
SIRTE, Libya — NATO expressed surprise Tuesday at the determined resistance by forces defending Moammar Gadhafi's hometown as heavy fighting persisted more than two months after the fall of the capital, Tripoli.
The comments by Col. Roland Lavoie appeared aimed at pressuring the former strongman's troops to lay down their weapons and engage in talks with one-time rebels who now rule the country, thanks largely to NATO firepower.
Instead, in places such as Sirte, Gadhafi loyalists are still fighting, even though they can no longer be resupplied after the new government's units won control of key parts of the town's center, Lavoie said.
"So from that perspective, it just does not make sense to see what these few remaining forces are doing," he said. "This could certainly be qualified as surprising both from military and political point of view."
(Excerpt) Read more at google.com ...
The alliance has been criticized for allegedly misusing a U.N. resolution in March authorizing the use of force to protect civilians in Libya to justify months of airstrikes aimed at overthrowing Gadhafi's regime. NATO warplanes have flown about 9,500 strike sorties during that period.
One could almost say....’unexpected’.
Amazing, given all that popular will for Qaddafi’s overthrow.
NATO will only keep killing people for as long as it takes to save them.
Now the Muzzies have Libya...hook, line andf sinker. Ghadaffi had them under his thumb.
good point.
...and what silly person, said way back in March,
that it would take “days, not weeks” to end the tyranny?
(not to mention, NATO itself is responsible for more civilian deaths, than Qaddafi was even accused of...)
Popular will is of very questionable military value. In itself it is not decisive. We who live in long-established democracies have a hard time conceiving of how little value it has, when the contest is a matter of blood and not ballots.
Conquerors tend to have qualities that let them overcome popular will. Gaddafi and his backers are that sort of people, at least compared to the mass of the Libyan people. I don’t doubt the Libyans want them gone, but they certainly could not do it without outside help.
IMO Nato will wake up one day and say: What have we done?
That will existed only among AQ supporters in Cyrenaica (Eastern Libya) and among looters in London, Paris, Rome and Washington, DC.
What is amazing that Gaddafi green flags are flying today even in Dernah, the AQ heartland where he was never popular.
The only solution is to divide Libya 4:1, send NTC rats back to Benghazi and let the majority of Libyans choose the government they want.
British looters have snatched the oil contracts already.
The only cure for it is a hardline dictator, like it or not.
Not suprising that they are fighing to the bitter end.
They have no doubt what fate awaits them if captured alive,
similar to SS in the ruins of Berlin.
Ping
Well, the country that did most to push this fiasco was France. And the country that will suffer most as a result is France.
Considering the U.S. government was giving money to Gaddafi up until the they invaded him...
Sure it makes sense to keep fighting. They are resisting, in part, a Western aggressor and they will be killed, often after torture or imprisoned and tortured if they give up. So the default position is to take as many of the enemy with you as you can.
NOBODY EXPECTS THE LIBYAN RESISTANCE!
I guess my comment about the popular will behind the Libyan putsch needed a sarc tag. Disappointing.
“This failure is particularly glaring given that some European countries, by participating in NATO operations in Libya, have been party to the very conflict that has been one of the main causes of the involuntary movement of people,” said Nicolas Beger, director of Amnesty's European Institutions Office, in a press statement.
Well, duh!
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