Gaddafi forces tell Benghazi residents to lay down arms

Source: Reuters

Wed Mar 16, 2011 9:58am GMT
TOBRUK, Libya, March 16 (Reuters) - The Libyan army told people in Benghazi to lay down their arms on Wednesday as its troops advanced closer to the rebel stronghold for what could be the decisive battle in the uprising against Muammar Gaddafi.

The town of Ajbadiyah, 150 km (90 miles) south of Benghazi on the Gulf of Sirte, was firmly in government hands after most of its rebel defenders retreated under fire from a withering artillery barrage on Tuesday. Those who stayed had now handed over their guns, a rebel officer said.

In Benghazi, seat of the insurgents' provisional national council, the mood was a mixture of defiance and nervousness, with some citizens predicting a bloodbath and others confident the rebels would still snatch victory against the government offensive.

Forces loyal to Gaddafi have retaken a string of coastal towns in the past 11 days, reversing gains made by the rebel army early in the uprising against his 41-year-rule of the North African country. Important oil industry facilities are now mostly back under government control. Continued...



Read more: http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFLDE72F0NQ20110316

How does Gaffadi have so much military power? I thought a lot of the generals defected early on...

Libya's entire military has been a relatively insignificant institution in libya when compared with other countries in the region. Unlike Egypt and Israel, the US has not been arming Libya with the latest and greatest or hosting their training. Unlike Saudi Arabia, the government has not been spending massively at the world's arms bazaars.

Gaddafi basically reduced the military to small local or tribal brigades.
The eastern province was always antagonistic to the Gaddafi revolution. So it was logical that the opposition movement started in the East, attracted support from regional military and political leaders and quick devolved into a civil war.

But in this war, both sides are relatively weak. But clearly, pro-Gaddafi brigades, lead in one case by a son, are more organized and determined that the pro-rebel brigades. That is typical of civil wars -- US or Nigeria -- the gov forces usually win.

The British have been arming them with sniper rifles and the SAS have even been over there training his "elite" forces.

See here: http://upload.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x496553

Also, up until recently Russia was one of the main suppliers of weapons to Libya.

See here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4763572

Gaddafi has been flying in mercenaries, who are only loyal to the dollar, and has been using tanks, planes and heavy artillery on the freedom fighters - who are mostly untrained civilians in possession of relatively light arms.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-16/arab-spring-uprisings-lose-momentum-as-status-quo-fights-back.html

Bombs and tear gas are threatening to smother the “Arab Spring” that toppled the leaders of Egypt and Tunisia and promised to spread democracy in the Middle East.

Already fighting two wars in Muslim countries, the reluctance of the U.S. and Europe to engage in a third enabled Muammar Qaddafi to turn the tide against Libyan rebels. In Bahrain, security forces today used tear gas to drive protesters from their main rallying point in the capital Manama, two days after Saudi Arabia sent troops to bolster the ruling family.

“When the guns are all on one side and being used, that side has a distinct advantage,” said Cliff Kupchan, a senior analyst at Eurasia Group, a New York political-risk consulting firm. “What we’re seeing now is the first really hard pushback from status quo forces since this year’s unrest in the Middle East began.”

The crackdown are tempering optimism about an “Arab Spring” spreading through a region that holds more than 60 percent of the world’s known oil reserves. While protests have toppled the regimes of Tunisia’s Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak in the past two months, the west’s reluctance to take action is emboldening other authoritarian regimes to resist the push for more democracy.

predicting. Some of the most egregious charges -- like bombing people from the air -- seem to prove false when the facts come out -- a few attacks on what seem clear military targets, that miss.

Gadhafi's son Saif al-Islam, speaking to French-based TV channel Euronews, said his troops were near Benghazi and "everything will be over in 48 hours."

The town of Ajdabiya, 90 miles south of Benghazi, was firmly in government hands after most of its rebel defenders retreated under fire from a withering artillery barrage on Tuesday. Those who stayed had now handed over their guns, a rebel officer said.

The breakdown of rebel defenses in Ajdabiya, 480 miles southeast of Tripoli, threatened to open the gateway to the long stretch of eastern Libya that has been in the control of the opposition throughout the monthlong uprising. Its fall would allow regime forces to bombard Benghazi, Libya's second largest city and the de facto capital of the opposition, by air, sea and land.

Gadhafi's forces continued shelling the city of 140,000 people overnight and throughout the morning with relentless artillery fire and little resistance from the rebels.

more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42105311/ns/world_news-mideast/n_africa/

No leader should be able to stay in power by using force against its citizens --

Gaddafi has to be ousted one way or another --

and nation turned over to the people!!

Without a no-fly-zone, the uprising cannot succeed.

Despite his expressed platitudes, Obama is obviously fine with that, just as he was fine with the Saudi invasion of Bahrain.

Clearly, he and the Saudis now want to calm things down in the ME so as to protect the dictators who supply the U.S oil industry.