Allied Force in 1999 is a case in point. I was convinced as we waged the war that we could not win that fight the way we were waging it. Yet in less than 3 months the Serbs cracked and backed down under our aerial barrage. Many air power purists thought that point number one above was disproven by the unmatched skill of point three. I think point one was proven because of point two--we finally did get something more than just air power--the growing threat of NATO invasion--even if I know that without point three being true that the threat might not have been enough to get the Serbs to back down. We might have been forced to actually carry out the invasion. Further, we got lucky by facing the Serb nationalists and not Baathists who might resist without caring about the effects on ordinary people.
So even as I believe point three is absolutely true in Libya and that point four might save us from the problem of point one, I keep watching for that needed something extra of point two for success that could deliver victory.
Strategypage writes:
Morale among government fighters is low. They know that the world, and most Libyans, are against them. That's why Kaddafi depends so much on mercenaries, who take their high pay (thousands of dollars a week) and send it home, hoping to get themselves out of Libya when the end finally comes. While Kaddafi is a proven survivor, he has never had to face this much opposition. But Kaddafi still has options. He controls much of Western Libya, and a third of the population (about two million people). He has some cash on hand (a few hundred million dollars, at least), but his overseas accounts are largely frozen by international sanctions. But Kaddafi knows he can hold the two million people he controls hostage, forcing the UN to allow "humanitarian" aid in. Kaddafi also has control of the western oil fields, but these produce only about a fifth of the nation's oil. Thus even if he is allowed to sell this oil, all he will end up with is the kind of "food for oil" deal that Saddam Hussein exploited in the 1990s. However, Kaddafi will be faced with an increasingly hostile population in Western Libya as income, and living standards, decline. Moreover, the rebels will probably succeed in halting shipments from the west Libyan oil fields. This would leave Kaddafi's two million hostages living on UN charity, meaning minimal food, medical and other aid. Thus Kaddafi's long term prospects are not good, and his most loyal followers have figured this out.
Is lack of money the something extra that could make the application of air power effective in this war? Because I don't believe "the world" is against Khaddafi. Plenty of countries want him to win--or at least want America and NATO to lose. Others just want "peace" for better motives without caring that it essentially saves Khaddafi from defeat. To this early list you can add Greece, which is working with Russia for a ceasefire; Turkey, which is doing God knows what to thwart NATO; and the Pope and UN Secretary General who both want a ceasefire.
I tend to think that if Khaddafi can hang on long enough, all those countries expressing open support for Khaddafi or just unease at what NATO is doing to Khaddafi will start to engineer a ceasefire that denies NATO a victory and lets Khaddafi survive. If Khaddafi appears he can survive, there will be people who will provide arms, ammunition, and money to Khaddafi despite sanctions, out of greed or ideology. The former since Khaddafi can hold out the promise of repaying much more from frozen accounts or from future oil revenues. The latter will help just to hurt America and NATO. Opportunities for further sanctions leakage to the Khaddafi loyalists will expand once the UN is involved in providing humanitarian aid. Further, it will be easy to gain sympathy under sanctions as the plight of poor, dirty-faced waifs is highlighted with plenty of images by the world press. And at some point, the dictator-self-protection-league will kick in to make Libya a firewall for toppling thug rulers.
To prepare for that longer struggle, I think Khaddafi needs to focus on taking Misrata, holding the line on the eastern front west of Ajdabiya by holding those oil infrastructure towns, and by capturing the rebel oil resources of the southeast. Much of that latter area is outside the formal no-fly zone and is practically beyond the range of persistent NATO surveillance. Do those things and there is no anti-Khaddafi enclave close to Tripoli where an enemy could sortie to strike at the heart of the regime; and the loyalists secure oil resources that the rebels can't exploit and that the loyalists will eventually be able to use as sanctions weaken in the face of greed and growing anger at NATO. This scenario could undermine the long-term bad prognosis for Khaddafi that Strategypage describes.
So lack of money could be the point two factor that makes this work, although I'm skeptical that this or plain material attrition will work. Yet even if lack of money isn't the point two that leverages our air campaign for victory, is there something else I'm missing that could do the trick? I keep looking for signs of ground threats to the loyalist regime. But that's my general bias at work, at least in part. There could be something else brewing.
Or we could yet get lucky with a bomb, or a secret dissident or disgruntled loyalist with a pistol standing next to Khaddafi, or Khaddafi slipping on a tile floor stepping out of the shower and supporting those statistics about the dangers of the bathroom.
