An Air Picture for Libya, One Way or Another

[darrels joy]

An Air Picture for Libya, One Way or Another

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posted at 7:40 pm on March 21, 2011 by J.E. Dyer

Europe always makes war a challenge. During the years of no-fly zone enforcement in the Balkans (1993-95), European ham-radio enthusiasts collected and shared information on the operational communications frequencies used by NATO aircraft. A friend of mine came back from Sarajevo carrying someone’s self-published – but very popular – paperbound “book” of NATO communication lore, purchased from a bookstall on a street corner. A Dutch naval officer with whom my Italy-based command worked closely said the same book could be bought in Amsterdam.

The Internet has only expanded the opportunities for amateurs to follow military operations. As day 3 of the coalition effort against Libya ends, European media report that the ham-radio contingent is at it again. But in 2011, a printed book would be way too “dial-up”; today’s ham operators are copying positional updates from aircraft communications and putting them out on Twitter. The air-tracking dilettante now has other resources too, like LiveATC.net and Flightradar24.com, which allow for comparison and analysis of continuously updated data from different sources.

Air Force B-2s flying from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri this weekend managed to disguise their approach to Libya by using deceptive call signs. But the special-purpose “Commando Solo” aircraft was identified almost immediately by a Dutch ham operator with a military background.

Fortunately, Commando Solo is the uniquely configured EC-130J used to broadcast messages to audiences in a target country like Libya, so whoever listens to it is at least hearing something the U.S. government wants to be heard. Courtesy of the enterprising Dutchman, you can listen to Commando Solo’s message to Libyans here.

Although the significance of this to the security and effectiveness of coalition operations should not be exaggerated, it’s not meaningless either. The coalition’s central purpose is blinding Qaddafi’s air-defense systems and keeping his aircraft on the ground. If his early-warning radars and air command centers were functioning, the Tweets of random amateurs about enemy aircraft positions would be little more than entertainment. But Qaddafi’s military systems have been taken out.

Assuming he’s still got Internet access, there are some Twitter feeds he should be subscribing to.

J.E. Dyer blogs at The Green Room, Commentary’s “contentions” and as The Optimistic Conservative. She writes a weekly column for Patheos.

http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2011/03/21/an-air-picture-for-libya-one-way-or-another/

[darrels joy]

Evidence Of Massacre By Gaddafi Forces



12:35pm UK, Wednesday March 23, 2011
Alex Crawford, special correspondent
The Gaddafi regime continues to deny any massacre took place in the Libyan town of Zawiyah.

Too many non-youtube videos. To read the articles and see the videos, go here.

http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/Wor...15958004?f=rss

[darrels joy]

Libyan rebel commander admits his fighters have al-Qaeda links

Abdel-Hakim al-Hasidi, the Libyan rebel leader, has said jihadists who fought against allied troops in Iraq are on the front lines of the battle against Muammar Gaddafi's regime.



Mr al-Hasidi admitted he had earlier fought against 'the foreign invasion' in Afghanistan Photo: AFP








By Praveen Swami, Nick Squires and Duncan Gardham 5:00PM GMT 25 Mar 2011


In an interview with the Italian newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore, Mr al-Hasidi admitted that he had recruited "around 25" men from the Derna area in eastern Libya to fight against coalition troops in Iraq. Some of them, he said, are "today are on the front lines in Adjabiya".


Mr al-Hasidi insisted his fighters "are patriots and good Muslims, not terrorists," but added that the "members of al-Qaeda are also good Muslims and are fighting against the invader".


His revelations came even as Idriss Deby Itno, Chad's president, said al-Qaeda had managed to pillage military arsenals in the Libyan rebel zone and acquired arms, "including surface-to-air missiles, which were then smuggled into their sanctuaries".


Mr al-Hasidi admitted he had earlier fought against "the foreign invasion" in Afghanistan, before being "captured in 2002 in Peshwar, in Pakistan". He was later handed over to the US, and then held in Libya before being released in 2008.


US and British government sources said Mr al-Hasidi was a member of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, or LIFG, which killed dozens of Libyan troops in guerrilla attacks around Derna and Benghazi in 1995 and 1996.


Even though the LIFG is not part of the al-Qaeda organisation, the United States military's West Point academy has said the two share an "increasingly co-operative relationship". In 2007, documents captured by allied forces from the town of Sinjar, showed LIFG emmbers made up the second-largest cohort of foreign fighters in Iraq, after Saudi Arabia.


Earlier this month, al-Qaeda issued a call for supporters to back the Libyan rebellion, which it said would lead to the imposition of "the stage of Islam" in the country.

British Islamists have also backed the rebellion, with the former head of the banned al-Muhajiroun proclaiming that the call for "Islam, the Shariah and jihad from Libya" had "shaken the enemies of Islam and the Muslims more than the tsunami that Allah sent against their friends, the Japanese".


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...eda-links.html

[darrels joy]

Reports: Obama secretly authorized CIA action in Libya, Al Qaeda may be looking to join rebels

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posted at 5:12 pm on March 30, 2011 by Allahpundit
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The authorization isn’t very recent, either. According to sources, it was “within the last two or three weeks.” Which is interesting for a bunch of reasons, not the least of which is the fact that coalition operations are only 12 days old. Was the CIA working on regime change before we’d even committed to the UN effort? Did Sarkozy and Cameron know about the CIA’s role when they signed onto the coalition or will they be blindsided by this? And what happens now to the political dynamics in Libya and abroad when Qaddafi starts screeching that he was right all along about the rebellion being a secret mission by the satanic crusader American government to blah blah blah blah?

Here’s a better question, actually. Why, oh why, is this being leaked? Reuters has no fewer than four U.S. officials confirming that the order was signed. Did they leak because they’re alarmed that the mission is quietly being escalated below the radar or are they coming clean about it as cover for Obama, so that he doesn’t look underhanded later if/when the fact of CIA involvement is discovered by the press? Better to get this info out when the mission is still young and people are still forming opinions about it than to surprise them later.

People familiar with U.S. intelligence procedures said that Presidential covert action “findings” are normally crafted to provide broad authorization for a range of potential U.S. government actions to support a particular covert objective.

In order for specific operations to be carried out under the provisions of such a broad authorization — for example the delivery of cash or weapons to anti-Gaddafi forces — the White House also would have to give additional “permission” allowing such activities to proceed.

Former officials say these follow-up authorizations are known in the intelligence world as “‘Mother may I’ findings.”…

Because U.S. and allied intelligence agencies still have many questions about the identities and leadership of anti-Gaddafi forces, any covert U.S. activities are likely to proceed cautiously until more information about the rebels can be collected and analyzed, officials said.

If I understand the article correctly, no “Mother may I” finding has been filed yet. He’s given the CIA the green light to conduct some sort of action, be it propaganda, funding, training, or beyond, but they’re still busy sizing up the rebels before jumping in. Which brings us to this bitter pill that’s just breaking at the Daily Beast. The fact that this story is coming out literally within an hour of Reuters’s story about the CIA order is making me woozy:

As the battle for the future of Libya continues, the excitement is almost palpable among Libyan-born al Qaeda fighters and other Arabs hunkered down in Pakistan’s remote and lawless tribal area. According to Afghan Taliban sources close to Osama bin Laden’s terrorist group, some of the 200 or so Libyans operating near the Afghan border may be on their way home to steer the anti-Gaddafi revolution in a more Islamist direction.

Now, as the White House and NATO continue to debate the possible ramifications of arming the Libyan opposition, the Haqqani network-linked Afghan commander says Libyan al Qaeda affiliates seem to be more “enthusiastic” about the war against Gaddafi every day. And from what the Afghan Taliban commander has seen, there appears to be more than “flickers” of al Qaeda’s presence in Libya, the description given by NATO commander Admiral James Stavridis. According to the Afghan commander, al Qaeda fighters can’t believe their good luck that U.S. and NATO aircraft—the same forces that have dropped bombs on their heads in Afghanistan and Pakistan—are now raining down ordnance against Gaddafi.

Eli Lake of the Washington Times reported last night that up to 1,000 “freelance” jihadis may already be among the Libyan rebels’ rank and file.
If the movement’s hospitable to them, AQ might figure there’s a place for them too. Or maybe the AQ story is propaganda drummed up by the Taliban to embarrass the U.S. and inflate Al Qaeda’s role in this year’s Middle East turmoil. Supposedly, even most-wanted Libyan-born Al Qaeda kingpin Abu Yahya al-Libi might eventually head home to spearhead the new Islamist movement inside the country, although I tend to doubt it now that everyone knows that the CIA’s operating in the area.

If that’s not enough good news for you for one day, let’s try one more piece. This time it’s the AP’s turn to ring the alarm bell:

Fresh battlefield setbacks by rebels seeking to oust Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi are hardening a U.S. view that the poorly equipped opposition is probably incapable of prevailing without decisive Western intervention — either an all-out U.S.-led military assault on regime forces or a decision to arm the rebels.

Gadhafi is reaching deeper into his military ranks to send reinforcements onto the battlefield, has adopted new, unconventional tactics to counter the effects of coalition airstrikes, and apparently is convinced he can retain power by gradually retaking a degree of control of eastern Libya, a senior U.S. intelligence official said Wednesday. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence on the condition and capabilities of regime and rebel forces…

Helping propel the Gadhafi forces eastward was a change in battlefield tactics, the senior U.S. intelligence official said. Having seen much of their armor pounded by Western airstrikes earlier, Gadhafi commanders left many tanks and other armor in hiding places in Sirte and advanced eastward instead with small convoys of sedans, minivans, SUVs and other civilian vehicles that the official called “battle wagons” armed with small rockets and other weaponry.

In other words, knowing that his heavy weaponry was a target for NATO and also knowing that he could beat the rebels without it, Qaddafi decided to … beat them without it. Your move, coalition.

Needless to say, there’s precisely zero chance of Obama putting U.S. troops on the ground to oust Qaddafi, especially with fears growing about jihadist elements on the rebel side. It would mean the end of his presidency; even his, ahem, “anti-war” base, most of which has duly defended him for staging this intervention thus far, would desert him if American soldiers end up dying on the streets of Tripoli. So clearly, per O’s secret order, we’re going to start arming the rebels in earnest and doing what we can to force them to vet their own side for jihadis. In fact, maybe we’ll end up making a little trade with them: For each wanted terrorist they hand over, they get a few extra RPGs. It’ll be like a promotional giveaway.

I’ve got a few updates coming, but let’s stop here for the moment. My head is spinning.

http://hotair.com/archives/2011/03/3...o-join-rebels/

[darrels joy]

Update: How dependent are the rebels already on western air cover for their advances? Quote:

By Tuesday afternoon, it was the rebels’ turn to flee again — in a tangled, panicked traffic jam of gun trucks and civilian cars — as Gaddafi’s forces pounded them once again with a barrage of missile fire and sniper shots. It was a familiar scene, and Bin Jawad may yet become a most familiar front line. “They hit us with a Grad missile,” says Ali Adel Sherif, 19, whose friend was carried into the emergency room in the nearby town of Ras Lanuf on a stretcher, his face and arms bloodied by shrapnel. “It came from behind us in the hills and we could hear sniper fire.”

There was another factor. While there were reports of allied air strikes, TIME saw no sign of fighter-jet support as incoming shells from Gaddafi’s loyalists rained down on the rebels.

“Sarkozy betrayed us,” shouted one man on Tuesday afternoon, referring to the French President whose aircraft saved Benghazi from almost certain reconquest by Gaddafi last week. “There are no airplanes,” screamed another.

Well, no, technically, Sarkozy didn’t betray anyone. The point of the airstrikes according to the UN resolution is to protect civilians, not blow holes in Qaddafi’s front lines. Funny how even the guys on the ground are confused about that. More from AFP:

Panicked rebels called for air strikes as they fled in their hundreds eastwards through Uqayla, where they briefly regrouped, then on to Brega, where they also halted temporarily before charging to the main city of Ajdabiya, 120 kilometres away.

“We want two things: that the planes drop bombs on Kadhafi’s tanks and heavy artillery; and that they (the West) give us weapons so we can fight,” rebel fighter Yunes Abdelghaim told AFP.

The 27-year-old, who was holding a Russian AK-47 assault rifle and French flag, said it seemed as if the coalition had halted its air strikes for two days coinciding with a London conference on the Libyan crisis.

“We want the French to bomb the (Kadhafi) soldiers,” said another fighter, Ali Atia al-Faturi, as the sound of shelling and gunfire grew louder.

Update: Beaten to the punch by Reuters, the NYT files its own story about CIA agents operating inside Libya.

The Central Intelligence Agency has inserted clandestine operatives into Libya to gather intelligence for military airstrikes and make contacts with rebels battling Col.
Muammar el-Qaddafi’s forces, according to American officials…

The C.I.A. presence comprises an unknown number of American officers who had worked at the spy agency’s station in Tripoli and those who arrived more recently. In addition, current and former British officials said, dozens of British special forces and MI6 intelligence officers are working inside Libya. The British operatives have been directing airstrikes from British Tornado jets and gathering intelligence about the whereabouts of Libyan government tank columns, artillery pieces, and missile installations, the officials said.

By meeting with rebel groups, the Americans hope to fill in gaps in understanding who the leaders are of the groups opposed Colonel Qaddafi, and what their allegiances are, according to United States government officials speaking only on condition of anonymity because the actions of C.I.A. operatives are classified. The C.I.A. has declined to comment.

What if they info they glean about opposition leaders indicates that they’ll be hostile to the U.S. once in power, might shelter terrorists, etc? Does that change our strategy going forward? Realistically it can’t: We’re not going to pull out after Obama’s rhetoric about preventing a massacre in Benghazi, no matter how distasteful and counterproductive to American aims some of the rebels might be.

Update: Here’s Paul Wolfowitz last night on CNN encouraging the White House to formally recognize the Libyan opposition, even though, er, the CIA apparently still isn’t done vetting them yet. It pains me to say it, but Tom Friedman may have identified the most crucial component of this war right now: Luck.

(video)

[darrels joy]

Hillary to Congress on not seeking authorization for Libya war: Too bad

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posted at 10:21 pm on March 30, 2011 by Allahpundit



I don’t know how else to read this except as the White House telling Congress that they don’t want to hear from them going forward, period.

And based on the reactions from both Republicans and Democrats at the briefing, sounds like they don’t know how else to read it either.
Unbelievable.

They said one dynamic was very clear: The administration doesn’t much care what Congress thinks about the actions it’s taken so far.

Challenged on whether Obama overstepped his constitutional authority in attacking Libya without congressional approval, Clinton told lawmakers that White House lawyers were OK with it and that Obama has no plans to seek an endorsement from Congress, attendees told POLITICO…

“If they didn’t need congressional authorization here in these circumstances, can you tell me under what circumstances you’d ever need congressional authorization if we’re going into a war? Nobody answered [that] question,” said Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.). “The administration and its lawyers believed they had the authority under the War Powers Act.”…

Without a vote, it’s impossible to tell whether a majority of members would support more intense action in Libya, but it’s clear the administration has done little to assuage its critics.

Lawmakers expressed skepticism that they’d even be consulted if the administration were to take such action.

“Now he wants people like me to support him,” said one moderate Democrat. “Quite frankly, I can’t.”

Isn’t he required under the War Powers Act to seek congressional authorization after 60 days of hostilities? Or is this guy so intent on waging war whether Congress likes it or not that he’d go to court to try to have the WPA ruled unconstitutional? Normally I’d dismiss that possibility as insane given that he did, after all, run in ’08 on his anti-war cred and that not even a Republican president would dare pull a move like that amid bipartisan clamoring for accountability, but I don’t know that anything can be safely ruled out at this point.

No wonder Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Intel Committee, is now drawing a very sharp line on arming the rebels:

Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI) said in a late Wednesday interview that the Obama administration’s top national security officials were deeply split on whether arming the rebels was a good idea. In a classified briefing Wednesday with lawmakers, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen, and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, Rogers said it was clear that there were deep divisions between the cabinet officials regarding the wisdom of arming the rebels.

“I’ve never seen an uneasiness amongst their national security cabinet members as I have seen on this. It’s kind of odd,” said Rogers. He declined to say which cabinet members were supporting arming the rebels and which were opposed, but he said it was obvious that they disagreed…

“Any covert action that happens would have to get the sign off of the intelligence chairmen, by statute. You won’t get a sign off from me,” Rogers said referring to National Security Act 47. “I still think arming the rebels is a horrible idea. We don’t know who they are, we only know who they are against but we don’t really who they are for. We don’t have a good picture of who’s really in charge.”

I won’t pretend to know offhand whether he has the right to block The One under the NSA, but if we’re no longer abiding by the War Powers Act, why bother with that one either?

Seriously, what’s Obama’s angle in all this? The last thing he wants with an election around the corner is full blame if things go badly wrong in Libya. As I’ve argued before, rationally, he should be looking to get Congress involved in all this to provide himself with some political cover.

Even if they refuse to play along and deny him authorization, that’s okay too. That’s his exit strategy from all this — just blame Congress for tying his hands and then that’s the end of it. Why would President Present want to finally take sole responsibility for a policy measure when it’s as dicey as this one?

Update: Cold comfort: Obama’s apparently not the only western leader half-assing this thing by refusing to consult with important advisors.

Sarkozy won a fair measure of praise for being the first leader to recognize the Libyan opposition as the legitimate leadership of the country – but even that may come back to haunt him if things go wrong. Sarkozy’s decision was taken almost on the spur of the moment, and under the spectacular brow-beating of mediagenic philosopher Bernard-Henri LÉvy, who decided to make crusading to protect the Libyan opposition a re-make of his 1990 campaign as the savior of the Bosnians during the Balkan war. Sarkozy reportedly did so without even consulting his newly-named Foreign Affairs Minister Alain Juppe (who was said to have been both hostile to the move and aghast that a media star had taken his role as France’s top diplomat). “There may heavy consequences,” says Bitar, “when a president makes decisions based on input by celebrities.”

http://hotair.com/archives/2011/03/3...a-war-too-bad/

[darrels joy]

Ex-Mujahedeen Help Lead Libyan Rebels

• 
  By CHARLES LEVINSON

Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Libyans in the eastern town of Derna shout anti-Gadhafi slogans in a protest in February.



DARNA, Libya—Two former Afghan Mujahedeen and a six-year detainee at Guantanamo Bay have stepped to the fore of this city's military campaign, training new recruits for the front and to protect the city from infiltrators loyal to Col. Moammar Gadhafi.

The presence of Islamists like these amid the opposition has raised concerns, among some fellow rebels as well as their Western allies, that the goal of some Libyan fighters in battling Col. Gadhafi is to propagate Islamist extremism.

Abdel Hakim al-Hasady, an influential Islamic preacher and high-school teacher who spent five years at a training camp in eastern Afghanistan, oversees the recruitment, training and deployment of about 300 rebel fighters from Darna.

Mr. Hasady's field commander on the front lines is Salah al-Barrani, a former fighter from the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, or LIFG, which was formed in the 1990s by Libyan mujahedeen returning home after helping to drive the Soviets from Afghanistan and dedicated to ousting Mr. Gadhafi from power.

Sufyan Ben Qumu, a Libyan army veteran who worked for Osama bin Laden's holding company in Sudan and later for an al Qaeda-linked charity in Afghanistan, is training many of the city's rebel recruits.

Both Messrs. Hasady and Ben Qumu were picked up by Pakistani authorities after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 and were turned over to the U.S. Mr. Hasady was released to Libyan custody two months later. Mr. Ben Qumu spent six years at Guantanamo Bay before he was turned over to Libyan custody in 2007.

They were both released from Libyan prisons in 2008 as part of a reconciliation with Islamists in Libya.

Islamist leaders and their contingent of followers represent a relatively small minority within the rebel cause. They have served the rebels' secular leadership with little friction. Their discipline and fighting experience is badly needed by the rebels' ragtag army.

Among his followers, Mr. Hasady has the reputation of a trained warrior who stood fearlessly at the front ranks of young protesters during the first days of the uprising.

And his discourse has become dramatically more pro-American, now that he stands in alliance with the West in a battle against Col. Gadhafi.

"Our view is starting to change of the U.S.," said Mr. Hasady. "If we hated the Americans 100%, today it is less than 50%. They have started to redeem themselves for their past mistakes by helping us to preserve the blood of our children."

Mr. Hasady also offered a reconsideration of his past approach. "No Islamist revolution has ever succeeded. Only when the whole population was included did we succeed, and that means a more inclusive ideology."
Messrs. Ben Qumu and Barrani were on the front lines and couldn't be reached for comment.

Some rebel leaders are wary of their roles. "Many of us were concerned about these people's backgrounds," said Ashour Abu Rashed, one of Darna's representatives on the rebel's provisional government body, the Transitional National Council.

"Al-Hasady told me he only wants to remove Gadhafi and will serve under the authority of the local governing councils, and so far he has been true to his word."

After the uprising began in Libya, Mr. Hasady told several journalists that he had joined the fight against the Americans during his time in Afghanistan. He now says he was misquoted and that he only settled in Afghanistan because Islamists of his ilk were unwelcome everywhere else.











For the U.S., the situation recalls the problems that followed America's ill-fated alliance with the Afghan Mujahedeen fighting the Soviets in the 1980s. Many went on to al Qaeda and other violent radical Islamist groups.

Adm. James Stavridis, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's supreme allied commander in Europe, pointed to this concern when he told a Senate committee on Tuesday that U.S. intelligence has picked up "flickers" of al Qaeda among rebel groups in Libya. He also said they were a minor element among the rebels.

Col. Gadhafi has gone out of his way to paint the popular uprising against his rule as an al Qaeda plot. He has singled out Mr. Hasady and the city of Darna as the capital of an alleged Islamist emirate, a baseless claim.

Local enmity for the Libyan leader runs deep. The first uprising against Col. Gadhafi's rule took place in Darna in 1970, less than a year after he seized power. The city proudly boasts that the first political prisoner killed by the Gadhafi regime was a Darna native.

Write to Charles Levinson at charles.levinson@wsj.com

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...432212406.html