NBC: Gadhafi making plans for leaving Libya

Source: MSNBC TV

Moammar Gadhafi is making preparations for a departure from Libya with his family for possible exile in Tunisia, U.S. officials have told NBC News, citing intelligence reports.

One official suggested it was possible that Gadhafi would leave within days, NBC News reported.

The information obtained by NBC News follows a series of optimistic statements this week from U.S. officials that Gadhafi would soon give up the five-month-old fight and and leave Libya.

In an on-camera forum at the National Defense University this week, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said, "I think the sense is that Gadhafi's days are numbered."

The officials could provide no further details as to conditions or precise timing for Gadhafi's departure, NBC said, and the news report emphasized that there was no guarantee that Gadhafi would follow through on any plans to flee.
</snip>


Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44192334/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/

Looks like Obama made the right decision.

By now the Rebels would have been put down without support.

DU needs to stand in solidarity with Qadaffi. He and his heroic third-world allies, standing up against the massed forces of the NATO/EU/US petro-capitalist aggressors, are a splendid example to all of us on the left.

Why, if he had only put his oil on the world market, and broken down and opened his country to foreign oil exploration teams, he would never have been attacked. But he refused to do so, so he had to go.)

(I know most of this analysis is contradicted by actual events, but I learned all the categories I need to understand the world back in the late '60's and early '70's. They were correct now, were correct then, and don't need to be rethought or re-examined. Besides, I'm too old, and it's too much work, to change them now.)

Create two, three, many, Libyas!

Edit by author to correct typo.

:rofl:

"petro-capitalist aggressors" is a good one.

Perfect caricature. :D

But here ya' go.

:rofl:

No water, no electricity, no fuel. It would've been at least as long for Benghazi and the other Eastern cities, meanwhile the Western Mountains would've gone nowhere. If it ends soon then Obama did indeed end a civil war years before it would've naturally ended (civil wars tend to last many years, decades sometimes).

which I'm sure they'll gladly repay with their oil revenues.

A project worthy of a Nobel Laureate.

Keeping Quadaffi from slaughtering his own people is a worthy project.

Libya will likely break up into two or three states, at least one of them Islamic.

So, we destabilize a sovereign government so that people whose only uniting attribute is also hating that government can take over? The people who have already had an internal coup while the revolution is still going on? That's progress? Should we just bomb the fuck out of any country we don't agree with in hopes that it will make their government fall, and just maybe it's new government will be nicer to us?

Given the choice between that and the butcher ordering it and his forces of mostly African Blackwater-style companies I think it's pretty clear who the better side is.

We'll see what happens, but I don't think it's clear at all. Do you think this rebels aren't also killing civilians? Do you think NATO has special bombs that don't kill civilians? I didn't think that technology existed...

in the hospital were like 90% men, iow, fighters and not women or children or older people. So no, it's not clear at all but is the NATO version of what happened.

Assad in Syria will be next ;)

US, allies declare that Syria's Assad must leave
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_US_SYRIA?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-08-18-19-19-20

Otherwise the siege and relentless fighting in the streets will unleash all manner of horror on the most vulnerable civilians in Tripoli.

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

But I do agree, a peaceful solution would be best. Shame Gaddafi never agreed to a peaceful one until it went this far.

but not Obama. Good job.

and still do. I would have preferred no direct involvement and I don't really think the ends justify the means (after all, how is the moral calculation made to save some people from a brutal dictator but not others?)...but I hope this is true nevertheless.

Then again, we have no idea how Libya will turn out in the long run and whether the rebels can achieve a lasting piece and form a cohesive and unified government.

Is Qaddafi Really going to Flee to Tunisia?

http://www.juancole.com/2011/08/is-qaddafi-really-going-to-flee-to-tunisia.html

I fear that NBC is being used by US intelligence for psy-ops purposes, since the report strikes me as highly unlikely to be true.

1. While Qaddafi might be willing to flee Tripoli, I’m not sure he has it in his cantankerous old soul to go into exile abroad.

2. Tunisia would not want him. He opposed the Tunisian revolution and had had members of the Ben Ali government on retainer. When I was in Tunisia this summer I found that most Tunisians to whom I spoke were afraid of Qaddafi and tended to support the Transitional National Council in Benghazi, even if some opposed NATO intervention. There would be a danger of him intriguing with tribal supporters in Libya from Tunisia, which would be a huge headache for the latter.

3. The Transitional National Council would not accept Qaddafi’s presence right next door, from which he could do mischief, nor his residence on the soil of a friendly neighbor.

4. Tunisia has joined the International Criminal Court. Since the ICC has indicted Qaddafi for war crimes, as a signatory Tunisia would be constrained to turn him over to the Hague for trial.

So, while it would be a wonderful thing if Qaddafi would just go away somewhere, and it might even save Libya’s future, I just don’t believe the intelligence officials who told NBC this story. My guess is that they wanted to demoralize the loyalist officers and high politicians in Tripoli and encourage them to defect. After all, anyone who defects now is a hero. Wait too long and the same person will be on trial for treason. And if Qaddafi himself is about to abandon ship like a rat, then why risk your life for him any further?

Sounds like a very precarious situation. :(

don't believe all the bullshit you read, but don't hesitate to try to score points off it.

Now send his evil ass to the Hague for crimes against humanity.

Good job Libyan rebels!

Tripoli is under siege and that is no rumor.

I have no predictions for Qaddafi. I don't really understand how he moves or what his resources are at this point.

by characterizing them as rumors.

is precisely a rumor. Good grief.

Thanks for the thread, Dennis Donovan.

Tripoli, Libya (CNN) -- Libyan officials are rejecting rebel claims that Moammar Gadhafi is seeking refuge for his family, saying that neither the leader nor his wife and children plan to leave the country.

Libyan Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled Kaim told CNN that Gadhafi and his family are staying in the country, countering rebel reports that the governments of Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria have been asked to accept the family.

U.S. and NATO officials also say they have no indication Gadhafi is making preparations to leave.

Abdel Monem al-Houni, a representative of the rebel Transitional National Council in Cairo, told CNN he was informed about the request by the Arab governments who received it.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/africa/08/20/libya.war/index.html?eref=rss_topstories