Gadhafi launches military offensive
Source: Agencies |
March 3, 2011, Thursday
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MOAMMAR Gadhafi launched a land and air offensive to retake territory in Libya's east at dawn yesterday, sparking a rebel call for foreign air strikes against African mercenaries they said were helping him cling to power.
The veteran ruler twinned the attack with a fiery speech against the rebels, playing on both nationalist opinion and Western jitters by saying much blood would be shed in "another Vietnam" if foreign powers intervened in the crisis.
"We will enter a bloody war and thousands and thousands of Libyans will die if the United States enters or NATO enters," Gadhafi told Tripoli supporters at a gathering televised live.
"We are ready to hand out weapons to a million, or 2 million or 3 million, and another Vietnam will begin. It doesn't matter to us. We no longer care about anything."
On the battlefield, government troops briefly captured Marsa El Brega, an oil export terminal, before being driven back by rebels who have controlled the town 800 kilometers east of the capital Tripoli for about a week, rebel officers said.
Their account was contradicted by Libyan state TV, which said Gadhafi's forces held the airport and seaport.
The veteran leader, who once said ballot box democracy was for donkeys, told the gathering in Tripoli the world did not understand that he had given power to the people long ago.
"We put our fingers in the eyes of those who doubt that Libya is ruled by anyone other than its people," he said at a Tripoli gathering broadcast live on Libyan television, referring to his system of "direct democracy" launched at a meeting attended by visiting Cuban leader Fidel Castro in 1977.
Referring to an unprecedented two-week-old popular uprising against his rule, Gadhafi also called for the United Nations and NATO to probe the facts about what had happened in Libya, and said he saw a conspiracy to colonize Libya and seize its oil.
Witnesses said the attack was by heavy weapons and air strikes. One of the witnesses said Gadhafi's forces were 2-3 kilometers from the city center and had 300-350 rebels pinned down at an oil industry airport on the city outskirts.
In the opposition bastion of Benghazi, a rebel National Libyan Council called for UN-backed air strikes on African mercenaries it said Gadhafi was using against his own people.
"We call for specific attacks on strongholds of these mercenaries," said council spokesman Hafiz Ghoga. "The presence of any foreign forces on Libyan soil is strongly opposed. There is a big difference between this and strategic air strikes."
Any sort of foreign military involvement in Arab countries is a sensitive topic for Western nations uncomfortably aware that Iraq suffered years of bloodletting and al-Qaida violence after a 2003 US-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein.
The veteran ruler twinned the attack with a fiery speech against the rebels, playing on both nationalist opinion and Western jitters by saying much blood would be shed in "another Vietnam" if foreign powers intervened in the crisis.
"We will enter a bloody war and thousands and thousands of Libyans will die if the United States enters or NATO enters," Gadhafi told Tripoli supporters at a gathering televised live.
"We are ready to hand out weapons to a million, or 2 million or 3 million, and another Vietnam will begin. It doesn't matter to us. We no longer care about anything."
On the battlefield, government troops briefly captured Marsa El Brega, an oil export terminal, before being driven back by rebels who have controlled the town 800 kilometers east of the capital Tripoli for about a week, rebel officers said.
Their account was contradicted by Libyan state TV, which said Gadhafi's forces held the airport and seaport.
The veteran leader, who once said ballot box democracy was for donkeys, told the gathering in Tripoli the world did not understand that he had given power to the people long ago.
"We put our fingers in the eyes of those who doubt that Libya is ruled by anyone other than its people," he said at a Tripoli gathering broadcast live on Libyan television, referring to his system of "direct democracy" launched at a meeting attended by visiting Cuban leader Fidel Castro in 1977.
Referring to an unprecedented two-week-old popular uprising against his rule, Gadhafi also called for the United Nations and NATO to probe the facts about what had happened in Libya, and said he saw a conspiracy to colonize Libya and seize its oil.
Witnesses said the attack was by heavy weapons and air strikes. One of the witnesses said Gadhafi's forces were 2-3 kilometers from the city center and had 300-350 rebels pinned down at an oil industry airport on the city outskirts.
In the opposition bastion of Benghazi, a rebel National Libyan Council called for UN-backed air strikes on African mercenaries it said Gadhafi was using against his own people.
"We call for specific attacks on strongholds of these mercenaries," said council spokesman Hafiz Ghoga. "The presence of any foreign forces on Libyan soil is strongly opposed. There is a big difference between this and strategic air strikes."
Any sort of foreign military involvement in Arab countries is a sensitive topic for Western nations uncomfortably aware that Iraq suffered years of bloodletting and al-Qaida violence after a 2003 US-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein.
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