Thursday, April 07, 2011

Somebody's Boots on the Ground

The British are edging towards hiring private military companies to whip the Libyan rebels into shape (tip to Real Clear Politics):

Britain is to urge Arab countries to train the disorganised Libyan rebels, and so strengthen their position on the battlefield before negotiations on a ceasefire, senior British defence sources have indicated.

The sources said they were also looking at hiring private security companies, some of which draw on former SAS members, to aid the rebels. These private soldiers could be paid by Arab countries to train the unstructured rebel army.

I did mention this early on. But instead of going in hard and fast to try to win, we are slowly escalating our efforts as past efforts prove insufficient to defeat the enemy. Yet the article also notes that the British don't even think we can win (as defined by President Obama (Khaddafi "must go.")):

At some stage a genuine ceasefire will be inevitable, so it is a question of whether it happens when the military advantage lies with Gaddafi or the rebels, the sources said. At present, the advantage is finely balanced, but with rebels unable to hold ground gained.

No, it is not inevitable. We could have tried to win from the start. But the way we are fighting this campaign, I surely agree that there will be a ceasefire. I can hardly wait for the "mission accomplished" speech.

This is no way to run a war time-limited, scope limited kinetic action. Unless we get lucky, we aren't going to drive Khaddafi from power. To be perfectly clear, that means Khaddafi wins and we lose.