military action against Libya

Seems to me that the US has gotten into watching country football over the decades I've been tuned in.

I think it is because Hillery put his nuts in a vice on this one.... She pointed out that Gadaffi was not our friend... She pointed out that there was enough opposition to legitimize our attacking him; and that the opposition was varied enough, and disorganized enough to allow us to snatch victory for ourselves from out of their grasp, and she took the trouble to arrange all possible support for us from the Arabs and Europeans, and she offered the humanitarian justification of what might happen as in Bosnia and Ruanda... It is all about keeping our friends in power, and causing our enemies to fall... Nothing good is going to come out of this for the Libyans... Nothing good ever comes out of any orchastrated change for the common people... If they were slaves before they willyet be slaves... But now they will be our slaves...

If this mess fails, Hillery can take the fall... If this mess succeeds, Obama can take the credit... If Hillery had offered him this opportunity on a silver plater, and he had refused it, then she would have had every argument to run against him in the next election... For her it is a gamble, but one which she holds most of the cards... It is not a sure thing... The people are smart enough to know that with everyone out of work, and the economy in the toilet that they really cannot afford these adventures... It is not without some slight risk to her... Heads she wins, and tails we lose... This is your first real taste of Madam President Clinton... I hope you do not like it enough to never elect her to nothing... That crew is nothing but social parsites...

If you need some one to tell you the truth you will never have it... If you are waiting for some one to lie to you why wait... Anyone can lie to you without appointment of invitation... We are left to figure out the truth because they own it, and put such a high premium on it that the people cannot afford it...The truth is denied, but the less we have of it the more vividly it can be imagined... And for us; is that not the point??? When the people realize they are only given enough to ensure their cooperation, and that government exist for their manipulation, then the credibility of government will be historical, and we can begin our futures without them...

Do you understand that when the republicans vote for a republicans they must follow their votes with a measure of trust and support, and ditto for the democrats with their candidates... When we learn that vote for one is no measure of support, but only a means of resisting one even worse then we can **** can the whole bunch of those criminals once and for all and get on with life...Mr. Obama has proved he is putty in the hands of the rich... I don't owe him nothing, and it is he that owes me everything... I do not expect to get from him what he owes me, but if he thinks some loyalty to him is going to make be vote for him again just because I know the republicans are worse, stupid, arrogant, and unlettered then he really is a fool... I do not care if the people change presidents more often than their underpants... Sooner then they will learn the whole government does not work, and cannot work because it was not designed to work but to not work, and we can replace the whole business..

Well ya!!! When the mob shows up at the door for bread, if all you have for them is bread, and no bullets you are not going to get them to be satified with bread... If a few of our European satalites fall out of orbit, we could get very wobbly here as well... As far as the potential of catastrophe goes, our society is way too top heavy, over burdened and undermined, and the government has lost the trust and loyalty of the people... It does not matter that it is people in government who have spread distrust, because across the board they have all been worthy of distrust...

In the civil sector look who is spreading distrust: Fox and the Christians... They are the ones that have it all, and if they see gain in wrecking the faith we should be able to have in government it is because they have squeezed all they can out of the people already, and only by sucking the life out of government is their own survival (in their eyes) assured... Good luck with that... They do not realize the extent to which law and government protect tehm from the caprices of the people...

so, the rebels seem to be making big gains, but at a cost, their thin ranks are stretched far and wide, the logistics of supplying support and new troops will likely cause problems, did the air strikes really impede Quadafi's ability to prosecute his war, or is he withdrawing to Tripoli in an effort to launch a big attack on a weakened rebel army that has to stretch itself to protect ground already taken

Who are these rebels?
Muslim Bro-Hood? The Taliban? al-Qaeda?

It was also reported that Obama's trip to India cost $200 million per day.

Be careful of the numbers you are hearing about the cost.

The cost for the war in Afghanistan is $5.7 billion per month.
http://factcheck.org/2010/11/ask-factcheck-trip-to-mumbai/

I doubt it will cost more for a no fly zone over Libya than it does to have troops on the ground in Afghanistan.

Parados, You are correct; it's estimated now at close to the $1 billion level, and the $2 billion is the cost for the war in Afghanistan.

Obama's war in Libya is for oil.

I think that he is trying to buy the good opinion of Arabs, trying to compensate for his being on the wrong side of history with Mubarak...

THis will not work, because not only do significant numbers of Libyans support Gadaffi but most Arabs dont want the U.S. dropping munitions anywhere in the Middle East for any reason...

John Kerry wrote an opinion piece in the WSJ a couple of days ago saying the exact opposite. He used the example of Egypt and how well things have worked out there.

I'm nervous, though. I can foresee scenarios where this might not end well.

Life is like that.


Inaction can often lead to the same end as action.

True. And figuring it all out is definitely above my paygrade lol.

Kerry must have been smoking dope. There is no good reason to assume that anything substantive has changed in Egypt.

He may not be addressing the current reality there as much as he's romanticizing the 'idea' of it...

That's my guess.

I think that's an unfounded assumption. There is no evidence that Got-Daffy is particularly militarily competent (in fact, the evidence is that he's rather militarily stupid, despite his education), but anyone operating in Libya knows that there is only the very short front in military operations. The rebels aren't going to be stretched out, because they don't have to occupy and hold large tracts of country. Fifty kilometers from the coast, there is nothing.

During the campaigns in North Africa in World War II, Rommel made use of this to do an end run around a rather weak British presence. But to do so, he had to cart all his food, water, fuel and ammo into the desert beyond the coast behind his forces, and although he made it all the way to Benghazi, his bolt was shot. He was unable to take Tobruk. It was another year until he had built up enough to renew the offensive and finally take Tobruk. From the point of view of both sides, it may well be a hard slog.

The only way to overcome the liability of the desert is through air power, which allows you to strike into your enemy's rear without actually marching there. Got-Daffy no longer has that card to play.

I agree with this, not that he's going to launch a big attack but that they are strategically withdrawing to pick their battles at a later date.

This much is clear: they aren't getting pushed back by the rebels, and they have decided to pull back in several cases.

That makes much more sense, and i agree that the rebels haven't "taken" these cities. In effect, he's falling back on his base, while they stretch their logistical communications farther and farther. However, without an air force, it is unclear to me what he would do with that. His wars in Chad suggest to me that he isn't that militarily competent, and that he must not have learned much in Greece and England.