The "no fly zone" is a lie, we are targeting military targets on the ground

[Taitertots]

The claim that we are enforcing a "no fly zone" is clearly nothing but a lie. The US has started this with unprovoked attacks on over a hundred ground based targets, specifically targets that are unrelated to upholding a "no fly zone". All to protect the "civilians" who are armed and in a state of continued civil war with the Qaddafi government.



Coalition forces are actively targeting ground troops. NOT upholding a no fly zone, but actively aiding the insurgents by targeting military forces.
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/africa/03/26/libya.war/index.html?hpt=T2

[The Wielding Truth]

1. That's how you begin a no fly zone. You have to destroy their airforce.

[Selatius]

3. You could achieve that simply by cratering all the runways at airforce bases.

Beyond that, targeting troop positions seems beyond the scope of ensuring that warplanes are not used to attack civilians.

[The Wielding Truth]

7. General James Mattis told senators that enforcing a no-fly zone would require removing Libya's air

defence capability in order to establish a no-fly zone, so no illusions here,
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/03/02/3152436.htm
"You would have to remove air defence capability in order to establish a no-fly zone, so no illusions here," he said. "It would be a military operation - it wouldn't be just telling people not to fly airplanes."Enforcing a no-fly zone over Libya would first require bombing the north African nation’s air defense systems, top US commander General James Mattis warned Tuesday.

A no-fly zone would require removing “the air defense capability first,” Mattis, the head of Central Command, told a Senate hearing.

“It would be a military operation,” the general said.

[jbnow]

10. The UN mandate says no fly zone and whatever is necessary to stop

government troops from killing civilians. That makes it pretty wide open but it does forbid occupation.

There hasn't been a lie. It isn't even talked about as just a no fly zone and what the UN is taking over is just enforcement of the no fly zone at this time.

When they have attacked troop positions it has been tanks etc headed for or bordering on towns where they had been killing people.

I am not saying it's right, just saying it is within the parameters of what UN said to do, which makes it all the more shocking that China and Russia didn't veto it.

[PurityOfEssence]

11. Quite right.

It's basically a blank check; virtually anything can be justified as "protecting civilians". If Qaddafi is bad for civilians, then anything to help get rid of him or his loyalists is fairplay.

Portraying it as a mercy mission to save Bambi is just plain deception.

Sadly, most people generally think that they are above any limits when they are in the right.

[Taitertots]

6. You don't create a no fly zone by destroying all their airplanes when they are not flying

That is an egregious act of unprovoked war. That has nothing to do with a no fly zone and everything to do with fighting to make sure the side that favors resource domination will win.

[aquart]

12. Actually, that's a preferred method.

Kinda stupid to wait till they're up in the air and shooting at people.

[Hannah Bell]

26. no, destruction of an airforce is an act of war, not enforcement of a "no-fly zone"

though of course, this is a war & the "no fly zone" is hypocritical cant.

[bluerum]

20. Yup. Destroy all five of their planes.

[Hannah Bell]

27. yeah, those pitiful arabs with their laughable airforce. what a joke.

The Libyan Air Force is the air force of Libya, with an air force personnel estimated at 18,000–22,000 and an inventory of 374 combat capable aircraft.<2> There are 13 military airbases in Libya.<3[br />
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libyan_Air_Force

[bluerum]

40. I'd guess that those stats are now inaccurate.

[Hannah Bell]

24. um, no it's not.

[MedleyMisty]

2. Why do you have a problem with actively aiding the Libyan people?

Seriously. Tell me why you want the Libyans to be massacred.

Watch this video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixwx_B38678

Watch it, and tell me that you want those children to die, that you want those young men and women who want to live in freedom and dignity to be shot and killed, that you want to dishonor the memory of Mohammed Nabbous and see his unborn child grow up in hell.

Normally I try to stay away from that kind of arguing because it's on the same level as people who are all "ZOMG we're not doing a NFZ anywhere else so that means you want all the people everywhere else to die!", but man.

If you had been following this story, if you had been listening to the Libyans, if you had any freaking idea what was going on, there is no way on this planet that you could say we should just leave them to die.

[Selatius]

4. It's a slippery slope, though.

If we say yes to intervention, then why were the answers no to the Congo, to Darfur, to Rwanda, etc.? Do we intervene in Burma because the dictatorship routinely uses military force against subsistence farmers who want to live in peace? Do we intervene in the Ivory Coast as well? How many soldiers and armies will it take?

[KharmaTrain]

8. And Who Do You Think Has Been Funding Some Of This?

Gadaffi has long been supplying money and arms to many of the "rebel" armies in the civil wars across Sub-Saharan Africa...especially Darfur and Chad. I'd bet his money and/or arms are being used in the Congo and Ivory Coast. Removing or neutralizing his regime would remove a major source of trouble in that part of the world. So, indirectly, this action is doing something about those areas.

[Selatius]

22. But it's like stamping out arms smugglers and cockroaches.

You remove Qadhafi from the equation, and some other arms smuggler will rise up and take his place. It's been that way for as long as smuggling weapons has been profitable. You could thus only create a weak if not temporary argument against Qadhafi with respect to stopping him from smuggling arms into those war zones because somebody else is going to do the same thing if Qadhafi is gone.

[KharmaTrain]

34. True...To A Degree

There aren't many arms dealers who had the free flowing cash Gadaffi did as well as the diplomatic cover that he could and has used. I'm certain that a good part of the French enthusiasm to get rid of him is due to the trouble he's caused in the Sub Saharan region for over 40 years. His adventurism in Chad led to the civil war between Moslems and Christians/Others in that region that spread to Darfur. Also, who do you think is one of Mugabe's biggest supporters? There's also a good reason why the Saudis are quietly supplying the arms and money to the rebels to take him down and you're not seeing much uproar on the "Arab Street"...Gadaffi's legacy is a bloody one that flew under the radar for years since it took place in Africa and out of the media eye.

While there may be others who will try to fill the slack, having the access to such large amounts of money (fill 'er up) isn't that easy to come by these days.

[Taitertots]

5. The only people being "massacred" are armed insurgents and their supporters

The same armed insurgents who are massacring countless people who don't support them. Why do you support murdering people to protect armed insurgents who are murdering people during a civil war?

So yes, I do have a problem actively aiding an armed insurgency during a civil war to ensure that the side which favors western resource domination will win.

[joshcryer]

15. What the fuck? The indiscriminate shelling of Misrata killed a family of five...

...but I don't recall any "armed insurgents" being taken out by them (because the "armed insurgents" are wisely afraid of big arty and fled when it fired).

[Taitertots]

18. It isn't indiscriminate if armed insurgents were there when the artillery was fired n/t

[Hannah Bell]

28. ...

[CJCRANE]

23. The rebels aren't massacring anyone. They're for freedom not suppression.

That's the point you don't seem to get. The rebels want a unified, democratic Libya.

Gaddafi just needs to step aside and then the Libyan government can negotiate a transition to democracy.

[dkf]

30. Are you sure about that?

You guarantee there will be no sharia law in Libya after this is all over?

[CJCRANE]

31. The Libyan people are not asking for sharia law, they want freedom of speech

and all the other democratic rights, just like you and me.

Maybe there will be a christian version of sharia law in America if the teabaggers have their way, maybe not. If some Libyans want sharia law then that is their right to promote it and if other Libyans want something different they should have their say too. That's democracy.

[Ramulux]

13. Why dont you tell us...

why you want the people of N. Korea to live in complete international isolation and utter poverty? That country has been a living hell run by a family of power-mad, psychotic, tyrants who have brainwashed the people into thinking of them as gods.

But I guess that is all America's fault because we haven't liberated the people there. I guess all of the American people want the N. Korean people to die in prison work camps because we dont support an invasion and forced regime change.

It is not America's responsibility to look after every person on this planet that is subjugated by a ruthless dictator. What has been happening in N. Korea over the past decades makes whats happening in Libya look like nothing. What is happening in Libya is not special, the suffering of the Libyan people is not worth more than the suffering of the people in any other nation.

It is sad and pathetic that our leaders in this country think us to be so special and important that we can pick and choose which nation to help and which not to based on political expediency. We are war mongers who learn nothing from our failures.

[joshcryer]

16. Let me know when the people of N. Korea rise up and are indiscriminately shelled.

[Selatius]

25. That's no different than if they were disappeared and died in a prison camp in Pyongyang.

Now you're just picking and choosing which form of murder merits intervention, aren't you?

[Ramulux]

39. What?

How are people who live in a police state and are unable to say anything negative about the current regime without getting sent to forced labor prisons, supposed to "rise up"?

They cannot communicate with the outside world, do you understand that? The country is one massive decades-long brainwashing experiment. The people's minds have been twisted and manipulated into thinking that poverty and starvation is just normal and not a big deal. What happens in N. Korea is more horrendous than anything happening anywhere on the planet.

But if some Libyan rebels get shot at by their government, we have to save the poor people. There is no logic to what you are saying. There is nothing special or unique about Libya that makes them more deserving of military aid than any other country.

[Gravel Democrat]

19. *bang*

Ramulux: "It is sad and pathetic that our leaders in this country think us to be so special and important that we can pick and choose which nation to help and which not to based on political expediency. We are war mongers who learn nothing from our failures."





***

http://costofwar.com

[Catherina]

21. +1. Or maybe warmongers who learned everything from their successes. n/t

[TomClash]

32. Then you have to answer the question

Why Libya and not Bahrain or Saudi Arabia or Burma or Turkmenistan or a dozen others?

[Catherina]

9. That was clear from the start of the mad scramble to *intervene*.

with the colonial powers tripping over themselves to see who can corner the resources best.

Right now Napoleon is in the lead.

[JoePhilly]

38. I thought we dithered?

Maybe that was last week.

[joshcryer]

14. R2P dude, Gaddafi was shelling Ajdabiya and is still shelling Misrata.

I don't know about you but even if you consider the rebels a terrorist force, indiscriminate shelling of cities is not the way to rout them.

[Taitertots]

17. Indiscriminate according to who?

Those cities are the front line in a civil war. Shelling enemy locations within those cities isn't indiscriminate.

[quaker bill]

29. Have you read the resolution?

Someone, I think the French, blew up a formation of tanks and APCs on day one. It was in the news, I even saw pictures. A "no fly zone" is just a part this. Kadaffi wasn't going to kill the civilians with aircraft, he doesn't have that many, he was using tanks. Tanks don't fly.

[meow mix]

33. good to hear it for the sake of the reformers

im sure the chicken littles are upset though

[Baclava]

35. We got the 'no-fly' zone done...into the 'no-drive' zone attacks now, I thought everybody knew that

Relax - it's just a “kinetic military action” video game, in which coalition members are just bombing a few parked tanks and enemy jets, competing with each other for the high score, right? Nobody is getting hurt, you don't see any body counts do you? It must be a game.

Then when we get through this part we'll be extracted and move on to the Chapter 2 mission and do the same to the Ivory Coast.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

36. Didn't you know that Libyan armor can fly? That is why we are blowing up all their tanks

[Baclava]

37. Look! Flying ammo dumps !

Allez Canada!

Combat camera video of Canadian CF-18 striking Libya weapon depot

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IS5JIU6_XE